Newspapers are hurting for cash all over. Subscriptions which is their bread and butter is down sharply and they are desperate to make up for loss revenue. Instead of maybe trying to attract readers by, oh hell I don’t know, actually reporting the news, reflecting the views of he community instead of trying to impose their political views and publishing more stories than ads, they go and hire Righthaven, an Attila-The-Hun-Tactics company who does nothing that surf the blogosphere for “violators” of copyright laws and sue them into silence. They basically target anybody who quotes a newspaper’s digital content whether they link to the newspaper or not and they really don’t care if you are a small blogger who decided to share with the world the great recipe for Snickerdoodle Cookies she found in the Life Section of the newspaper.

Now, Has anybody told the Rain Men at the Newspaper company that advertising revenues for online publications are rated by hits to the website? I am not advocating here that a newspaper should let anybody steal their content but for Hearst’s sake, if the bloggers are quoting a paragraph of an article and providing a link for the reader to go read the whole thing on the paper’s website, you are losing potential readers! Less hits means less money for the price of your ads you dumb morons! You do not treat anemia by bloodletting the patient.

So, let’s hit them where they are hurting: money. Go to the Righthaven Victims Blog and learn how to block the newspaper websites that are under the protection racket of the Umbrella Corporation Righatheaven. And make sure you pass the word to your fellow bloggers and friends. And also stay up to date on the comings and goings of the Newspaper Mafia Group by following Clayton Cramer’s Blog.

h/t to Sebastian.