Month: October 2012

Amex must really like advertising on #1 copyright infringing and illegal porn linking site Filestube

<<<Editors note.  This story is from Aug 30th,  we didn’t run it because we expected to hear something from American Express after the initial story.  We never did.  Maybe this time we will get an explanation from American Express.>>>

Aug 30th.

A couple of weeks ago the Trichordist along with http://www.Adland.tv  caused a little bit of a fuss by showing Amex was advertising on the #1 copyright infringing site http://www.filestube.com. They were giving money to the shysters ripping off my music.

As shitty as that is, we know that most of brouhaha  had nothing to do with Amex getting caught advertising on yet another file-sharing site. No, http://www.filestube.com is not just any disreputable copyright infringing site. It goes a step farther. It likes  to promote it’s “recently watched videos” on virtually every page and A LOT of the time these “recently watched videos” appear to be  illegal pornography.   So you have an iconic American brand like AMEX sitting right next to some pretty disgusting links.  (Screenshots were provided.)

Our post seemed to generate a good reaction.  Indeed, it appears the mother of all ad networks DoubleClick stopped advertising on the site, at least as far as we can see into the labyrinth of ad networks.

We tweeted out our post and follow up to @AmericanExpress and notified their ad agency. We figured that was the last we’d see of American Express on that site.

We were wrong.  Apparently someone working for or on behalf of American Express  must really like advertising on this site, cause they are still advertising there. If DoubleClick stopped serving ads  at filestube.com did Amex switch to a different company that serves ads at fielstube!!? WTF?

Now I’m not an advertising expert  maybe people who don’t want to pay for music AND watch bestiality videos are American Express’s ideal target audience.  But it doesn’t seem likely and…

How stupid do you have to be to get caught doing this twice?

More amusement follows if you look at the website for the company that served the AMEX ad the second time:

Drive results with Sojern

With greater scrutiny than ever on advertising strategies, budgets and results, Sojern is the powerful partner you need to reach premium audiences in ways that no one else can.

  • Exclusive audiences – Sojern reaches the most desirable demographic groups: with higher incomes, more frequent travel for business and leisure, more income to spend – and a greater inclination to do so.

Pure comedy gold. Or out and out fraud.  I don’t see how whoever is doing this to American Express could keep their job.  We wrote Sojern to alert them of this situation and try to get a comment for this article but as of this morning we have heard nothing from them.  I dunno maybe you can get them to comment:

http://www.sojern.com/contact_us/pr-media

Also Ogilvy and Mather appears to be the ad agency for American Express.  Perhaps they can explain the rationale behind advertising on this site.

Amex–stop giving money to people in Moldova that exploit my work.  Stop giving money to people who appear to  distribute illegal pornography.  And if you didn’t intend to advertise on this site?  Do your shareholders a favor and demand an audit and rebates from your advertising agency and the advertising networks.

We still haven’t seen Coca Cola, Pepsi or Apple advertising on any of these sites. It can be done.

filestube lyric page with search for camper van beethoven.

by Dr. David C Lowery

Sign the @musiciansunion (AFM) Letter: Friends don’t let friends get IRFA’d!

If you’ve been following the growing opposition to IRFA, the Internet Radio Fairness Act (aka the “Pandora Shakedown Act”), you won’t be surprised to know that Pandora has now enlisted the Über National Association of Broadcasters to help them screw musicians.  (NASDAQ: P)

You’ll remember the NAB–they are the ones who led the dirty tricks campaign against the Performance Rights Act that would have really leveled the playing field by paying American musicians and singers for the same rights that every other country pays them for when records are played on the radio.

So it’s not surprising to see Pandora lining up the lobbying muscle and huge political donations of the dreaded NAB, one of the few trade associations that has a news outlet in every Congressional district.

Do we just have to take it and get bullied?  Not without fighting back.

Here’s a start, a few things you can do:

First–make sure you and your band are registered to vote.  Can I Vote? is a good place to start if you’re not.  If you’re going to be on the road on election day, be sure you find out about early voting or getting an absentee ballot.

You can look up your representative at Tweet Congress and tweet them to vote against IRFA.

You can follow us on Twitter and search for #opposeirfa, then you can decide if you want to retweet our tweets or RTs to Members of Congress, especially members of the House and Senate Judiciary Committees, or

You can use the letter to Congress interface that the American Federation of Musicians has put together for you.  The link will lead you to an interface to enter your zip code to find out who your representatives are, then it pulls up an editable suggested form letter.  You can either use that letter or write your own using the web page.

And remember–friends don’t let friends get IRFA’d!

by thetrichordist