It has been roughly 10 weeks since “The Professor” sent a Cease and Desist letter to the company I work for concerning content on one of our client’s sites. We refused to bow to this individual’s demands and that was the beginning of the harassment. At this point I count no less than 20 individual messages in my inbox. The Professor has called the company I worked for numerous times and asked the same questions and received the same answers.
The messages range from, ‘Do it please, can’t we be reasonable,’ to ‘Do it or I will contact your Dean where you went to college as well as the Attorney General in your state.’ Somewhere in the middle this individual consistently asked how much money they had to pay to get this post removed. The fact that I find most interesting in this case is that had this individual simply accepted ‘No,’ for an answer the post he wants removed would not exist. That post was drafted after the individual failed to grasp the concept that they were not going to get what they wanted simply because they demanded it repeatedly.
I am still, at this point, refraining from identifying this individual directly with their name as that is the least I can do as a courtesy. My desire to be courteous may not last should this individual not CEASE AND DESIST the aforementioned harassing emails and phone calls.
I am not out to cause The Professor harm or damages and most certainly do not wish to do so, however, I also do not wish to be harassed. I do not want your money – no amount of money is going to cause me to remove the post you are working so hard to get removed.
I am willing to make only one concession. Listen closely Professor.
If the professor comments on this post that they will cease and desist aforementioned harassment [emails, phone calls, etc] I will unpublish this post and refrain from updating existing posts and creating new posts about The Professor, his actions, or the company he is associated with. So long as The Professor keeps his end of this deal I will keep mine, should he accept.
If the harassment continues, and I hope it does not, I will continue updating this post and/or making new ones and possibly revealing more information about this individual as permitted by law. Furthermore I can and will examine and execute the legal and criminal remedies available to me to end such harassment. I don’t want to go down this route, so please choose wisely Professor.
The ball is in your court, Professor. I advise you quit while you are ahead.
Update – 07/22/15
It seems that Mr. Polletta desires to continue the email harassment. Within these emails he makes it clear he is going to continue his harassment by calling the company I work for and wasting more of our time.
No – I will not talk to you on the phone – please stop calling and harassing my coworkers. No – I will not accept some bribe to take down my posts. No – I will not take down my posts simply because you ask and/or demand it. No – I will not respond to your emails – please stop sending them.
Future email is going to be documented but discarded – it will go unread by human eyes. Your issue is with the webmaster of this site and that is me. If you want to talk to me – you can do it here in the comments.
Have a wonderful day Professor.
Update – 07/11/2019
It seems that Mr. Polletta is still in the business of drawing conclusions that simply don’t make sense and connecting dots that should never be connected. Here is the latest complaint received FOUR YEARS later.
From: legal at gregorysung
Good morning,
Per the below email chain, we have attempted to reach Mr. Michael Denney ( listed in ARIN & WHOIS records as the owner of MikeDVB and MDDHosting since Apr 28 2015) re: being labeled as “harassing” for contacting him re: the active linking and relinking of our firms work to the Ukrainian Death Metal band Kladovest’s fake album called iGNITIATE launched in 2016 and which in the last 2 weeks has been newly linked to 100’s of religious and satanic videos online. This has resulted ( again this year as as each year at this time ) to our firm and our associates and their families then receiving numerous email and voice mail death threats.
Due to the severity of this issue ( death threat emails and voicemails ) we have BCC’ed the 2 US FBI offices we have been working with re: this case since 2015 as well as speaking with the Germany, Ukraine and UK Legal Attache’s offices to the FBI today. We have no desire to be connected in anyway to death metal music, satanism, religion etc., and specifically Michael Denny / MikeDVB / MDDHosting. Our firm has made zero online postings of any kind connected to Mr. Denny, his firms, blogs, TweetTunnel re: any of the above. We cannot have our firm’s ability to conduct business ( operating since 2001 ) being directly impacted by the above or our founder and CEO being prevented from working with new clients, giving industry lectures, plus PhD Engineering and MBA courses globally because of being labeled by Mr Denny, MDD Hosting and MikeDVB.
We have tried to reach MDD Hosting / MikeDVB / Mr. Denny on 6/1/2017, 9/14/2017, 11/22/18, and 4/25/2019 with no success. Each year around this time, Google News Alerts will send notifications ( attached ) of 100’s of new URLS related to this issue. This year those new URL’s were placed programatically on Scoop.it ( email from the CEO of the firm ) in a 24hr period again connecting us to The Ukrainian death metal band Kladovest’s album iGNITIATE and to more than 25 new google search results pages, images, etc,. and 25 separate new page of YouTube videos in our firms name and our founders name again connected to MikeDVB in google search results. This is unacceptable.
We are requesting that there be no connection between Mr Denny, MDDHosting, MikeDVB and our firm or our firm’s founder’s name online and ( per the attached #, URL & image removal list ) any and all #’s, HTML files, directories, links, etc., on MikeDVB and MDDHosting related to the above be deleted. We believe Mr. Denny, the MikeDVB blog, MDDHosting etc, will have no issue doing this. Will there be any issue with the above request taking place?
Please advise.
– iGNITIATE Legal
Mr. Polletta – you have been told to stop harassing me on numerous occasions.
If you choose to continue harassing me I will continue updating this post. Hey, I might even make a new post.
Good Morning Mr. Denney,
Per your demands that all our communication be done on your blog and open to the entire internet:
1) I am writing regarding my 6mo of phone, email and written requests to you and your firm https://www.mddhosting.com/ to assist me in contacting directly by phone the firm whose website is hosting copies of all my firms tweets and links regarding design and new product development which are stored on your servers. The firm in question which you are hosting has no valid contact information via whois, ARIN or via internic, for 6mo their phone numbers to not answer – just a voice mail system, all email address are 50 random characters long and bounce when written to which clearly indicates this firm is intentionally not interested in being contacted by anyone
2) I am writing regarding: the removal of all webpages on your personal blog such as this one and another in my firms name which through someones specific SEO efforts continually appears on page 1 of google similar to other websites who have made it clear they will not remove pages with my name or my firms name unless they are paid to do so.
I have no idea why:
3) this discussion needs to take place in public and indexed on google and you will not speak with me on the phone regarding this
4) you have any issue as the owner of a hosting firm in helping me directly speak with the firm per #1 above linking my firms tweets to SEO activities to push specific content to the top of google search results. Simply I am not interested in Google SEO games.
The situation here is very simple to me: each time I call your hosting firm I am hung up on and all my emails to your firm bounce. if someone wants to reach me or my firm, they call, I speak with them and/or email them and resolve any and all issues quickly and efficiently. If someone wants content removed that I have produced with their firms name or products i remove it. I assume that the rest of the world also works in a respectful and proper business manner.
I look forward to speaking with you in real time (as I do with anyone I work with) Mr. Denny re: the resolution of point #1 and specifically #2: the removal of these posts from your personal blog.
Cordially,
-Professor Gregory N. Polletta
In some of my older sites, I have seen some excerpts of my content copied and published onto a forum (many times as an answer to some question). Sometimes I have contacted the forum administrators (never the hosting providers) to at the least include a link to my site and they seldom respond. I think I deserve at least that for typing for hours with my RSI :). At least you took the time to look into this case which seems to be someone republishing twitter messages. Clearly, if you push something on twitter/facebook or even youtube you lose your copyright onto it. It is definitely not a crime…maybe just lack of creativity on the part of the person who did this.
Btw I am a customer of MDDhosting and thank you for the awesome support.
Good morning Mike,
Since the initial posting of this message, I have made 2 responses. It seems that have all been removed. I do not know what is going on here, and why my responses have been removed. Let me be brief. Each time I call to deal with this blog post, I am hung up on. Each time I email, ALL of my emails bounce. Each time I write a letter, they are returned to sender. I have made my rebuttals here, I expect that they will be kept online so I may be allowed to defend myself against the statements here. Is this correct? If you have any questions, please contact me directly and expetiantly.
Further, On June 18, 2016 it will be 3 full years of specific, daily SEO – Search Engine Optimization cyber bullying efforts to make sure that 6 reports with incorrect & defamatory content on myself and my firm remain on page 1 of Google without any resolution.
This is being accomplished from:
– May 14, 2012, google analyitics reported 1000 new backlinks/month placed anonymously on servers throughout Sweden, Denmark and Russia each day for +1yr. Admins & webmasters contacted re: the above say any
contact with them re: the above is harrassment.
– June 18, 2013, and each day since, webpages connected to the above +16,000 links to our projects, bios, online works and webpages have their content swapped & resubmitted to Google for re-indexing daily linking our content to 6 RIPoff Reports all created on June 13th in one 30min period.
– June 18, 2013 through today ANY new content, design work, projects, university work, international awards etc., through negative SEO are all immediately and automatically de-indexed by unknown individuals in google search results within 24hrs, yet we do not, and have not to date, performed any SEO activities in any manner.
We do not know who the author is of the content or how to reach this author, nor after countless requests to resolve whatever issues may exist has there been any resolution. Calling any webmaster, server admin, etc., has resulted in being hung up on, all emails bounce, all physical post returned, etc., regardless myself and my firm of 14yrs, are committed to resolving this cyberbullyng and online reputation defamation efforts directly with the author in question.
Good day.
-Gregory
Good morning:
– Mr Michael Denney owner of Camby, Illinois USA firm MDD Hosting and
– Mr Michael Denney owner of Australia registered and hosted MikeDVB.com
– unknown cyberbullies and cyber extortionists
Myself, my firm and my legal team for +2yrs have had:
– no success reaching your management team or legal team re: since 4/28/2015 re: 50,000 links connecting slanderous and verified incorrect details on myself and my firm hosted on tweettunnel on MDDhosting servers as all emails bounce, all calls are hung up on, all post is returned when we have attpted to contact you.
– NO success: with MDD Hosting or MikeDVB.com removing the multiple pages, on page 1 of google and in google search images re: http://www.mikedvb.com/tag/ignitiate/ and http://www.mikedvb.com/tag/gregory-polletta/ defining myself as harassing
Each time ( and I have posted 3x responses now ) they are erased from this site – MikeDVB owned by yourself Mr Denny. This is cyberbullying. Or is there some other special way to deal with the continued CyberBullying and extortion associated with this situation? Alternatively we can remove all content ( these html pages and images with my name on it ) from this server and be done with this – the cyberbullies will have won. As my firm does not participate in SEO activities, OR slandering other firms in print or anonymously, I see no reason why my firm needs to be abused like this online via your sites. Do You? We again ( as we have for the past +1yrs ) await your response.
Cordially,
– Professor Gregory N. Polletta
Good evening Mr. Denny,
As of July 17th 2017 ( and where neither I nor anyone from my firm have done anything like this previously in ANY capacity ) today I have been forced to reply to the 1st and only specific TWEET re: this situation in my name and my firms name from you. Why have my requests by email ( and with specific non-disclosure statement footers attached in all correspondences with you ) to resolve my name and my firms name / reputation being destroyed online showing up in this blog post being tweeted? Have I or anyone from my firm done anything like this to you or your firm in the past? No.
Therefore, why was I FORCED to contact you on July 17th of this year? Because last month, my name and my firms name showed up online in 10’s of thousands of NEW posts and videos on servers all over the world connected to a death metal band’s album, satanism, etc., and this blog post. This was NOT done by you, however this MUST stop and there is NO way to do this unless I work with you to deal with the removal of your blog posts. I cannot stop 10’s of thousands of posts / links on servers all over the world connected to this blog post here by trying to find and contact of the server owners where these links are made can I ? No, that is not possible.
Further, as it is CLEARLY stated in the email to you and your firm, that at NO point has ANYONE said these new 10’s of thousands of links online are your doing, rather that the ONLY way to stop this is for you and I to someway, anyway, come to a resolution re: the taking down of your blog posts labeling myself and my firm as “harassing” as well as images of people being beaten up and explosions etc., in my name and my firms name on your blog/servers. IF you and I can do this, then ANY connection to the above will disappear. If there is a fee for your time to do this, fine. If there is something else that you want, fine. Ether way, I and my firm CANNOT go through life being linked to the word “harassing” death metal bands, satanism, etc, nor should we and which is negatively impacting my and my firms ability to conduct business.
In closing Mr Denny, myself and my firm do not now, nor in the past have ANY ill will towards you or your firm, we ONLY want to resolve whatever is going on here since 2013 and want no connection to you, your firms, your servers, etc, and the above. HOW can we PLEASE work together to solve this problem as YOU are the ONLY person that can help re: being labeled as “harassing” on your blog and servers ?
Cordially,
– Gregory Polletta
Stop contacting me. As I have made you aware in the past any and all communication from you or on your behalf will be made public.
The only way to stop me from publishing your messages is for you to stop sending them.
You clearly haven’t learned that sometimes it’s better to give up while you’re ahead. Had you simply accepted no as an answer originally there would not even be any posts on my blog about you or your conduct.
Hi Mike, hope you’re doing well.
We flew 14 hours to attend a program held by Gregory only to find out the whole things a scam.
Have you had any legal action taken against him?
Thank you
Asma
I’m sorry to hear that! No legal action. He stopped reaching out a while ago.
Honestly I don’t know anything about him except what’s on my site.