How much do I have to pay to get LOLcats off the intertubes? I am so sick of those things.

I guess that was kinda cute. Honestly, though, people do maliciously try to get their websites as top search results and it's an inconvenience for most people, so I don't see what's so bad about this service.

By the way, the First Amendment only applies as against government action.

Awww, c'mon lady! You're telling me you couldn't tell you were being messed with?

This makes me want to laugh and cry at the same time. What a world.

this is what i love about the consumerist :-)

Kelly is going to be having a very bad day today :-)

bwahahahahahaha
bwahahahahahaha
bwahahahahahaha

I am as much a fan of the first amendment as anyone. However, I'd like to point out that it reads:
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances"

Congress, and the government, are not in charge of Complaint Remover. Private companies and private individuals are pretty much welcome to limit free speech, even as that's part of their free speech.

Now if Congress or your various local governments were doing this, then there's a big issue. But a company...you may not like it, but it's not against the 1st amendment, because they aren't government.

@picshereplz: I don't know if services like this will differentiate between what you described and people legitimately complaining about a product or service. Negative comments, as much as companies don't like them, have a place just as much as positive ones.

And no, it's not a First Amendment issue, but sending cease and desist letters to scare off people who have legitimate claims is pretty sleazy.

Wow, can you really trust a company that hires employees that can't even spell simple words?

@picshereplz: While, you're correct that it only applies against government action...we don't exactly need to make it easier for the government by tacitly approving the same behavior for private businesses that we deplore from our elected business.

eh I'm against these kinds of things. She is a person trying to pay her rent. Based on her responses she doesn't take things too seriously. She couldn't just disconnect him because its recorded and she could lose her job. People take out their angst on the wrong people. Call the CEO, he is probably one of few there who actually care about what they are doing. Leave these customer service reps alone.

I guess this could be anticipated, its like the inverse of bumping up your page's rank. I wonder how this works, technically speaking, do they, click on other site's pages through google over and over for months to bump everyone else's rank up and take yours down? Consumerist, don't take my lolcats!

The fact that you tried to get them to stop LOLCats is TREMENDOUS.

I really like that.

Hmm...wonder if anyone's saying anything bad about my site...this service could be useful. If not evil.

It may not technically be a 1st Amendment issue, but this does violate the spirit of the 1st Amendment, and I think that was The Consumerist's point. The service this website offers seeks to hamper free speech. Anyone who values the internet and free exchange of ideas should be disgusted, and whether or not it is actually a 1st Amendment issue is irrelevant.

whats messed up is that they are not offering to remove incorrect information, but negative information. They don't even pretend to offer an honest service. They flat out say they are going to negate people saying things you don't like from the net.

That reminds me, I haven't visited LOLcats in a few days.

LOLcats, ftw.

Was that Kelly Kapoor?

$10 says "Kelly" is actually a "Bob" sitting in his moms basement.

Does anyone else think that "Kelly" doesn't look like she does in that picture and is in fact from a country where english isn't the first language?

I'm calling them and getting them to remove links to people seeking to remove links to LOLCats. I can has pictures of cats accompanied by irreverent Photoshopped comments. Two can play this game! ;)

It seems like their main business is search engine optimization. Not so much removing unflattering websites from the Internet as displacing them at the top of search results. The cease and desist letters could be pretty shady, but then we don't know what kind of remarks would trigger such a letter from these guys.

Kelly looks a little like a long haired Kevin Bacon.

I looked silly this morning giggling like a little girl in my cubicle.... hilarious....thankyou.

@catskyfire: Gah, beaten on the whole "The Constitution doesn't apply to private companies" thing.

What's with the screechy, sensationalist take on things here of late?

The hilarious idea of finding out how much money a sleazy company would charge to have some image macros removed from the internets is kind of diminished by the First Amendment hurf blurfing.

Also, that embeddedchat thing is creepy.

Is this the same company from way back when you did a few cease and desist letter stories or is this a new one?

$10 says Kelly doesn't actually exist. That conversation looks like a conversation with a bot.

OK, this is all well and good, but why not actually ask legitimate questions about the service? Like what is included in their "network of thousands of high ranked websites"? Or do they care if the offending information is true or not? Wil they just bring down rankings of competitors regardless of if it includes negative information? Or what if two clients want each others' websites ranked lower, like if ICHC wants to bring down FanciersPlus? Or better yet, what if a client wants to lower ComplaintRemover.com?!?!?!

SO they're basically just a regular old SEO firm? To cause a page to lose pagerank you have to promote other links above it, and if you think there's not already an all out war for the top spot among people who stand to profit from it, you'd be sadly mistaken. So they really don't have anything to offer that the people who would need their services don't already have. What's to stop this company from planting negative comments out there to drum up business?

I hope nobody invested too much money into this, besides, you can't stop the lolcats.

Here's a novel idea, how about provide excellent customer service so your customers WANT to say good things about you? I'll be willing to bet it's cheaper than paying some shady SEO firm.

Man that is funny. And Kelly talks a little like an LOLcat.

There is a big difference between "Negative information" and "libel".
So if let's say, Monsanto wanted to remove all of the "negative information" about their company from the web, even though most of what is out there is 100 percent true, should they really have the ability to do that?

One of the great things about the web is that it gives us access to information. It allows us to seek the truth and be powerful consumers. What would happen if every company with "negative information" here on Consumerist was able to rip that information from our view?

So it's like this kind of site... that tries to clean up any bad things you don't like on the Internets... by using SEO and kindly asking websites to remove information. Wonderful. Not.
[www.reputationdefender.com]

Here is my little chat with them,

Hello, My name is JamieB. Is there something I can help you with today?
CLIENT: I was wondering what legal authority you have to remove links from search engines
JamieB: Do you have bad links in search engines?
JamieB: its legal what we do
CLIENT: How exactly
CLIENT: The last time I checked the internet was a free place
JamieB: if you search for your name(or your company name) in google, yahoo, msn or other search engines and a negative link will shown we can remove that by posting positive content about you on higher ranked sites than the negative one , by doing that the negative link will be pushed away in the back of all major search engines where nobody is looking
JamieB: this is what we do
CLIENT: But couldent that bury negitive information that could be helpful to a consumer like about a recall or dangerous parts in a product?
JamieB: nobody will bury negative info from search negative
CLIENT: Excuse me?
JamieB: nobody will delete negative info from search negative
CLIENT: thats true but if my company gets horrible reveiws but I dont want anyone to see them I could pay you to blast those to the bottom of the search so if someone just searched the name of my company they would only see sunshine and rainbows correct?
JamieB: correct
CLIENT: that seems rather shady to me

She then told me to hand out my phone number so a manager could call me I said no thanks.

Here's a good business model. Charge one company X dollars to lower their negative hits. Charge three other companies Y dollars, which can easily be under competitors charges since you're getting paid both ways, to raise their relevance. That's actually pretty smart, if you ask me.

Wow, this just boggles my mind in so many ways. First of all, this was just awesome, awesome, awesome. I love the way you guys did this - getting info, giving crap, and making us laugh all at the same time. Second, Manipulating search results really pisses Google off, from what I understand. I wonder what their official opinion of this company's actions is. Third, this is PR gone insane, just the concept of a company doing that - It just shows that some companies would rather manipulate public opinion instead of address and improve issues and problems within their company. Sad sign of the times, all around!

You need a pic of "the cleaner" from pulp fiction for this story

To all the "This isn't a first amendment issue" people out there, the company says this:

...by appeals to law to remove negative information. We send cease and desist letters and if necessary, file legal actions against the perpetrators and Internet service providers contributing to the unjust defamation of our members

If they're using the courts to try to get words taken down, doesn't that make it a first amendment issue?

Oh noes! Not teh kittehs!

CLIENT: now when you guys say you replace negative information with positive do I need to supply it or do you just make it up?
JamieB: it's better if you can supply iy
JamieB: it
CLIENT: but if I cant you would make it up?
JamieB: we will find something to work with

Can we get a Digg on this, so I can Digg it? 'Cause I dig it.

@Jhonka: THAT'S the one that was in the earlier Consumerist stories! Thanks!

The story I was trying to remember: [consumerist.com]

Hmm, seeing how their tactics are to lower google search results by posting positive information across the web, I wonder how they would like if others did it to their site. Complaint Remover
complaintremover.com

Yup, sometimes it just takes moths instead of humans to remove negative links. I guess they're attracted to the burning flames of negativity?

Bloody comment system makes it look like a link works, but it doesn't...

Too funny, I bet Kelly is a bot too. I'm kind of curious though, how much do they charge to shit on the first amendment?

Still, surely Consumerist should remove the link to them, spell out the address instead. We don't want to be givng them any undeserved pagerank.

I wouldn't want to be a CSR for this company. Not that I'd want to be a CSR for any comapny.