Dog eat Dog: Scott Richter’s OptInRealBig Sues SpamCop   - 3,033 Views,

In a move which surprised many, but others not at all, Scott “I am a legitimate businessman” Richter, and his Evil Twin Scott “I am the King of Spam” Richter, of OptInRealBig, sued SpamCop and Ironport over a recent SpamCop listing of OptInRealBig. Ironport, manufacturers of the Ironport email sending appliance, and providers of the Bonded Sender service, recently purchased SpamCop for an undisclosed sum of money.

In the lawsuit Richter, himself a defendant in a lawsuit by New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, for ..gosh…whodda thunk it…spamming, accuses SpamCop of interfering with OptInRealBig’s contracts and their potential revenue, and of defamation for calling a spammer, well, a spammer, and reporting them to their ISP, leading to their ISP cutting off their Internet access.

The amount of damages alleged, “not less than $150,000″ according to the complaint, is but a drop in the Kentucky Fried Chicken bucket compared to the amounts which Richter has claimed to pull in for even a single month’s worth of his high volume email deployment services. Yet Richter complains that the issues with SpamCop started in 2003, meaning that the issue has been going on for at least 4 months (and, let’s face it, probably much longer), and yet then goes on to ask for injunctive relief, which is, particularly at the TRO stage, to be granted only if the plaintiff would suffer irreparable harm if the defendent wasn’t forced to stop the offending behaviour immediately.

So, let’s see, the “issue” which OptInRealBig has with SpamCop has been going on for at least 4 months, but has cost Richter only a tiny fraction of his substantial income from spamm..er…emailing, and yet all of a sudden now he complains about it, and right now, today, he needs injunctive relief.

Something doesn’t smell right in Denmark. Could it be that Richter needs to Lose Money Fast because he made so much money sending millions of pieces of spam per month that he Added 6 Inches to his tax bracket?

Or perhaps he simply wants to Fire His Boss, and to Work From Home, and sees Ironport’s recent multi-million-dollar infusion of VC cash as a quick way to achieve that end.

Or, who knows, maybe he’ll surprise us all, and show us that he’s as educated and savvy about the legal system as he is about the female anatomy, and that he can demonstrate to a judge or jury that he’s a clean, opt-in emailer just as easily as he can find a woman’s clitorious.

On the other hand, between Attorney General Spitzer’s lawsuit against Richter, and the amount of perjury which would likely be necessary to make the suit against SpamCop stand half a chance, perhaps he’ll just DoTimeRealBig.