ScanCafe Threatens Various Photo Scanning Companies
with Bogus Lawsuits using a Letter of Intimidation.
Click here to read the July 2007 Update to this story.
February 5, 2007
ScanCafe is a 3 month old photo scanning company that mails their customer's photos
to Bangalore, India to perform the scanning work. We've tried to arm visitors
to our website with the facts so they can make an informed choice concerning the
risks their photos undertake through such handling and transport. Most
people care a great deal about their photos and recognize that they are irreplaceable
and would never even consider letting a company ship them overseas. We don't
believe ScanCafe makes it nearly clear enough that they will indeed ship their customers
photos to India. Just try to find it on their website. Get your reading glasses
out because you're going to have to read through pages and pages of fine print and
even then you'll find only a passing mention of a facility in India, then further
down you'll find another statement that says they may process your photos in any
of their facilities. Hardly a definitive statement about sending their customer's
photos off to India. In fact, do a search on Google for scancafe india.
You'll find the first two pages in the results and the most information are on these
pages at DigMyPics, not ScanCafe. If they are so proud of their India outsourcing
operation like they claim in their retort to this page, why not put it in their
advertising, up on their main page, and on their pricing page in big, bold letters?
Anything less should be considered less than honest with their customers about their
practices.
On February 5, I, like several other photo scanning company owners,
received a letter from a lawyer representing ScanCafe threatening to initiate litigation
against us and demanding that we remove any and all information about Scan Cafe
from our website. I view it as a clear attempt by ScanCafe to suppress unfavorable
information about them from the marketplace. While the other companies are
quite small, just the threat of hiring a lawyer was enough to cause them to relent
to ScanCafe and remove the information from their websites. We, however, decided
we would not be bullied and decided to publish the threats for all to see.
One of ScanCafe's complaints with us is that we said "...and they never mention
those facts on their website" while talking about how they ship their
customer's photos to India. As stated in the letter, there is mention on their
website of the fact that they ship their customer's photos to India but it's buried
deep within a long, wordy page that is easily overlooked. We were looking
specifically for that information and couldn't find it when we read through it after
the company first launched their business a few months ago. We suspected they
did ship their customer's photos outside the USA and we were looking for such a
statement on every page we could find but we finally confirmed it by calling them
and asking them directly.
They also complain that we state that their customer's photos are outside of ScanCafe's
control. We actually state that the photos are outside of their customer's
control, but since they brought it up, the photos, while traveling to India, are
outside of ScanCafe's control, too, and are under the control of the shipping company
and/or airline en route to India. Unless, of course, they are hand carrying
those photos there themselves in the overhead bin and under their forward seat.
I know that when I travel, especially to the third world where corruption and theft
is rampant, I don't let the airlines handle anything I wouldn't want to lose. I
carry those items with me and don't let them out of my sight. Of course, ScanCafe
may have a statement on their website stating that they hand carry their customer's
photos to India and I just couldn't find it. Let's just hope I don't get another
threatening letter about that tomorrow.
Scott Crossen
www.DigMyPics.com
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American Justice System Abuse
You can't win a lawsuit against someone who speaks the truth. Their tactic
here is to intimidate their competitors hoping that the threat of having to pay
a lawyer to defend ourselves will be enough to bend us to their will and thus suppress
information about scan cafe that is unfavorable to them. Their intimidation
tactics apparently did work with at least one of their competitors as we noticed
that they removed truthful information about Scan Cafe from their website on or
about the same day we received our letter. We suspect they received a similar letter.
It's an abuse of our legal system and it is shameful.
Here is the letter I received from ScanCafe's lawyer, Diana Fung of DLA Piper.
Please review this scancafe document. Our Lawyer reviews scancafe letter
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July 2007 Update: ScanCafe
has finally decided to be more up front with readers and has started publicizing
the truth about their so called "Revolutionary Process", which consists
of nothing more than physically mailing people's photos to Bangalore, India where
workers there will scan them. Given the fact that they didn't take this approach
from the start, they either had a miraculous change in character or, as a direct
result of the pressure we put on them to be truthful about it, they decided it was
better to embrace their "process" rather than have us make them look like
they were hiding something.
Unfortunately, the other companies which received a similar letter, fearing costly
legal expenses, fell victim to ScanCafe's bully tactics and agreed to their demands,
essentially relinquishing their right to free speech on the subject.
Just to be clear, this issue isn't about bashing the competition or "Made in
America" patriotism as ScanCafe's
propaganda machine has attempted to spin it in order to divert attention
away from the real issue. It is about the safe handling of your photos and the risks
involved in sending them on such a long, arduous journey through airports, airplanes,
third world government checkpoints, customs, freight handlers and whatever service
retrieves them from the airport in Bangalore as they make their way to their final
destination. It's about transparency. Its about you knowing and understanding the
risks you accept by choosing a company that will ship your photos overseas.
If you find those risks acceptable, well, at least you now have the benefit of making
a decision based on knowing about those risks.
We've found that our customers have a strong emotional bond to their photos and
the memories those photos represent. Losing them or even the risk of losing
them is not an option, no matter how much money they think they could save.
Our professional photographer clients realize that their photos
are their biggest asset and often their life's work and not something with which
they're willing to take such risks. We don't think anyone should make such
a decision lightly, and certainly not without knowing all the facts. Although
it may sound self-serving, we've feel we have a responsibility to provide the facts
so you can make your decision based on the truth and not on marketing hype or spin.
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