September 3, 2009
Mike v. TXDOT: Round 2
If you missed out on part one of this imbroglio, I highly recommend catching up . If you're too lazy to click, here's the Cliff's Notes®: Sarah B. did a story about TXDOT starting breaking alert Twitter feeds in markets all over the state, but not in DFW. Unsatisfied with their answers, I decided to create feeds with a naming structure that mirrored the other cities and we hooked them up to the RSS of our traffic and transportation news. TXDOT didn't like that and sent me a letter accusing me of the jail-able offenses of forgery and impersonation. I responded publicly, refuting the allegations and offered to give them the accounts so long as they promised to use them. Others picked up the story. And then...
Yesterday I got a new letter from TXDOT Associate General Counsel Juliet U. King. The whole thing is below, but the gist is:
- OK, penal charges won't work so now we're alleging violations of the Deceptive Trade Practices Act.
- And this one's really juicy: TXDOT has something in Amarillo called the " P anhandle E lectronic G uidance and S afety I nformation S ystem." Yup: PEGASIS® . And Juliet thinks that so long as we cover transportation and traffic issues, we're violating their service mark.
Of course, I have a response. See below.
The sad thing is that this is all so unnecessary. It's a textbook case study in a government body's well-meaning attempt at engaging in social media hitting a bump and then compounding the problem with wild, misguided threats.
Compare to my experience with the State Comptrollers Office and their chief web developer / social media coordinator at the time, Robert Doyal .
Note that haven't talked with Robert since that interaction and as far as I know, he has no idea about this brouhaha. But if I were at TXDOT, I'd be calling Robert today to ask for help navigating these apparently tricky waters.
This is an issue that is going to continue to come up in communities all over the country -- citizens and businesses parsing public data in useful ways that government agencies can't or won't and then getting heat from said agencies. Remember the UNT student who got crosswise with the Denton Police for his unofficial feed ? It's now coexisting with an official account . Just this week, the Austin Fire Department went after some folks reporting fire info on an unofficial account .
I really have nothing against TXDOT. There are some really good people over there -- our John Meyer was just raving about how great they've been to work with on an upcoming story that has nothing to do with this mess. But you don't dig yourself out of an honest miscalculation and misunderstanding by threatening to prosecute and/or sue people who buy pixels by the barrel.
I hope this is the end of it. But I can't say I'll be surprised to get a letter from my new pen-pal.
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lightsguy, anonymous:
Amazing. Nice to know my tax dollars are being spent on something super important.
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jtmbls, anonymous:
Maybe they should let their lobbyists fight their battles for them instead of their sub-par general counsel.
Kudos for not letting them push you around!
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Travis Bush, verified:
Give em hell, MikeO!
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Jason Rice, verified:
Oh, for the Love of God, Mike, release the names....
Just let us know the hour and minute. I promise I won't mess with Jessica Simpson.
(Although we all find your protectiveness over her a bit strange considering how nasty your breakup was - and we all sided with you not because of the significant monetary gain from your purchase of our support, but because we truly sided with you on the Shrub Affair )
Please, release them.
(I SOOO need a reason to upgrade to Adobe CS4)
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Travis Bush, verified:
Make us proud on the news tonight! KDAF Channel 33 News at Nine.
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Travis Bush, verified:
AHAH!..
Reporter: "Are you at all afraid of TXDOT?"
MikeO: "No, not at all..I don't have any outstanding traffic tickets..."
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Mike Orren, verified:
<embed align="middle" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" bgcolor="#ffffff" devicefont="false" flashvars="&titleAvailable=true&playerAvailable=true&searchAvailable=false&shareFlag=N&singleURL=http://kdaf.vidcms.trb.com/alfresco/service/edge/content/8ae62a59-fbb4-4e79-91e1-cc39dc786371&propName=kdaf.com&hostURL=http://www.the33tv.com&swfPath=http://kdaf.vid.trb.com/player/&omAccount=tribglobal&omnitureServer=the33tv.com" height="900" loop="true" menu="true" name="PaperVideoTest" play="true" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" quality="high" salign="l" scale="showall" src="http://kdaf.vid.trb.com/player/PaperVideoTest.swf" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="600" wmode="transparent">
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jtmbls, anonymous:
That reporter was kinda...eh. At least they mention the site multiple times.
Travis, did you notice any highly coveted item missing from Mike's office???
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Travis Bush, verified:
Yes..he probably has it locked in a vault guarded by vicious doggies.. As soon as I confirm he has left it for me in his will..TXDOT may have one less worry.
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Todd Jones, staff:
Uh, Pegasis is not the same spelling as Pegasus. In fact, the spell checker doesn't even recognize Pegasis. Hmmm. But, I can't tell the difference. :(
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Mike Orren, verified:
Travis, when I'm in (ugh) full frame, you can see the edge of your simian friend at the right of the screen.
FYI, they say the camera adds 100 lbs.
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Scott Doyle, verified:
You both Cc'd Twitter in each letter, have they said anything about it?
Also, I'm not sure how I feel about mention of this Robert Doyal character...
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ch0, anonymous:
Awesome!
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Jason Rice, verified:
::FYI, they say the camera adds 100 lbs.
Lucky for you it was only a 3 camera shoot, then. Whew!
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Travis Bush, verified:
I had to go back and watch again...At least he isn't locked in a vault as I earlier suspected. This way I can simply repel down the side of your building and viola'!
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Scott Doyle, verified:
Can't believe you missed it, tbh. I almost posted that I loved seeing it until I realized jtm beat me to the punch (damn you, vile woman!).
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Travis Bush, verified:
Unlike some of you knobs, I was trying to listen to MikeO and figure out how he could be younger than the 62 I previously prescribed for him. What is wrong with you peoplze?
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Jesus Valadez, verified:
It looks like they interviewed those two folks at UTD... blah, so close to giving out a shout out to my homies. :(
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ch0, anonymous:
*rappel (née Abseil)
Long live Pegasus.com!
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jtmbls, anonymous:
Hey! I listened the first time! However, I was clearly much more clever than the rest of you and set my dvr to it. I then proceeded to rewind, play, rewind, play in search of the unholy grail!
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jtmbls, anonymous:
I wish the reporter would have taken a much more sensational angle on the story.
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jtmbls, anonymous:
And don't hate, Doyle...It won't be the last time I steal your thunder!
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Jason Rice, verified:
I was clearly much more anal than the rest of you
there fixed it.
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Travis Bush, verified:
You get that with the primitive poo flingers...
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Mike Orren, verified:
Per its proprietors, the Austin fire account was shut down by Twitter.
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jtmbls, anonymous:
Fire account? Is that TXDOT's own account?
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Travis Bush, verified:
Probably not..
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Mike Orren, verified:
Different government body taking a similar attitude in a different situation.
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RICH GRAHAM, verified:
Mike writes a great letter.
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Mike Orren, verified:
Via an email from a reader: Looks like there is a local group responsible for roads who intends to do social media right:
http://www.star-telegram.com/local/st...
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Scott Doyle, verified:
Damn you Orren, answer Doyle! Twitter ever say anything about it?
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What do you think?