Berman’s PR Firm (Mark Firmani) Deletes Avvo Names… Coincidence?
For everyone following the proposed class action against Avvo, I wanted to raise a disappointing development. There was a big media event in Seattle called the “Naked Truth,” where a number of influential reporters were speaking. Seats were limited so we signed up as soon as we learned about it. We also thought that Avvo might come up, so we wanted to be sure to be there. Oddly, the names of all three Avvo attendees vanished from the RSVP list (which was posted on an open wiki), so that we were unable to attend.
Thanks to Kevin Flaherty at Wetpaint and his blog post entitled, “A wiki “who done it“, we have learned that “someone” from the PR firm of Firmani and Associates made the deletion. Firmani and Associates is the PR firm for Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro, the law firm that filed a class action against Avvo nine days after we launched. Mark Firmani responded to the wetpaint blog by saying, “I can assure all involved that if someone from my shop did delete anyone from the RSVP list, it was done in error. My sincere apologies to anyone we may have inconvenienced.” Oddly, it appears the only names Firmani’s firm deleted from the RSVP list were Avvo names, so I guess he was talking to us. He also fails to note that he has any connection to Hagens Berman or Steve Berman specifically. How disappointing.
On behalf of Avvo, I would just like to go on record to say how sad it is that Berman’s camp would apparently stoop to this. It is one thing to try to chill and censor our opinions through the courts, but it is another to stalk us in our everyday lives. This type of activity is bad for everyone especially the legal profession.
Mark
p.s. John Cook at the Seattle PI has also blogged about the Firmani deletion here.
July 27th, 2007 at 4:43 pm
Mark
As I mentioned to your team today when I bought you lunch, I personally accept responsibility for our error in screwing up the invitation list. As others have commented, using a wiki as an invitation list isn’t the best way to go, in part because it allows errors like this to occur. I accepted responsibility for our mistake, and it was just that a screw-up. But to say our flub in signing up for a free event was part of a grand conspiracy to stifle your voice within the tech community, keep you and your team away from free beer and barbeque at the event or to strip you of your constitutional rights is, frankly, absurd.
You fail to mention in your comments that the good folks at Wetpaint — who broke this earth-shattering story — concluded that the deletion was obviously unintentional, a conclusion repeated by John Cook in his PI story, and by those responding to his blog.
Mark, I appreciate and respect what you are doing as an entrepreneur and a business person, but leave the snarky conspiracy-theory yarn-spinning to the likes of Karl Rove.
Mark Firmani