(Not a typo.)
I’m in the wrong business. Catching up with some old emails I came upon this article sent by reader Matthew. A couple of “internet entrepreneurs” (the article’s description, not mine), are suing the buyers of their business for “improper use of [one of the couple’s] name, likeness, persona and credentials” – ie implying she still worked for the company when she had left. Not the sort of thing to interest Skeptico, you might think, except the business they had sold was Astrology.com and they sold it for (wait for it), $40 million! Jeez – there’s money to be made in woo. No wonder they’re not interested in Randi’s poultry paltry one million.
The funniest part of the article was this comment from the plaintiff, astrologer Kelli Fox:
The way my persona is currently misused by iVillage and Astrology.com is obviously misleading innocent consumers…
Well yeah I see her point – that’d be stealing her job. But from what I can tell, iVillage still features, (strangely looking much younger in the picture), Kelli Fox as your iVillage Astrologer.
Funny – you’d have thought she would have seen this coming.
That $40 million ISN'T a typo? Is phrenology.com taken?
Posted by: bsa | May 17, 2006 at 07:38 AM
If it isn't, I call dibs.
Posted by: BronzeDog | May 17, 2006 at 07:50 AM
"Poultry" million? Randi made money in chickens? I call fowl!
Posted by: Eric | May 17, 2006 at 09:25 AM
Eric:
LOL – how did that slip in?
Spelling now corrected – “paltry”.
Posted by: Skeptico | May 17, 2006 at 09:32 AM
Actually the 40 million is in Australian dollars so its not quite 40 million. more like 30 million USD or so. Still way too much for the web site though.
Posted by: Jeff | May 23, 2006 at 06:32 AM