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Italiano Yesmoke – A year without slogans
2004 Comes to an End.
Year 2005 could be the last one where cigarettes advertisement will be allowed in the Formula One Championship
On the eve of the abolition of cigarette advertising, starting with Formula 1 and with the backing of Big Tobacco, for the first time a product has reached popularity without having to spend a single dollar on advertising. And it has all the rights.
The attacks of those who consider the law a party game are putting Yesmoke in a position where it will have to pay 548 million dollars to Philip Morris, and 17 million to New York City; this last sum has already been imposed by a sentence. Moreover, new problems are arriving all the time for Yesmoke, including a mountain its product already confiscated.
This sounds like the “bleeding to death” of a company. However, the old year is not closing completely negatively for Yesmoke, because thanks to these events, interesting and constructive topics tied not only to the tobacco market have unexpectedly come to the attention of everyone.
And so, in a reliable country like Switzerland, Yesmoke is becoming famous, not because of well-chosen advertising slogans, but thanks to discussions on topics that are vital for consumers: first of all, how to safeguard consumer protection.
And in a single year it has come a long way… Might tobacco advertising be out-of-date?
Yesmoke in 2004
- It's the first and only case worldwide of the confiscation of an Internet domain (Yesmoke.com), now transferred into the hands of Philip Morris, using telecommunications means. It is a case that is bound to be widely discussed in the future, because the issues are not at all clear. Sites like Amazon.com or Ebay.com might some day find themselves in the same situation.
- In the history of United States legislation, it will be the highest request, if confirmed, for damages (548 million dollars) for the alleged offence of Copyright Infringement and Unfair Competition. This disproportionate sum has focused the spotlight on the conflict between Big Tobacco and a new manufacturer who has just come onto the cigarette market.
- The first cigarette (Yesmoke) with its production date and list of ingredients made public is trying to bring something new to the world of tobacco: free competition. That is, the freedom to prefer a manufacturer who respects the law.
Another “record”
So, here comes the latest sentence involving Yesmoke, issued by the Court of New York City: it establishes, with a very approximate calculation, the amount that Yesmoke should now pay the City: 17 million dollars for the cigarettes it sent, defined as “contraband goods”.
Yesmoke did not appear in court to defend itself from this absurd charge.
Why did the U.S. Customs Bureau leave unanswered for almost five years the import requests that have always accompanied the packs? Moreover, the City of New York is asking for the payment of duties from a handy, easy-to-reach subject, Yesmoke, while the importers are, in fact, the people to whom the goods are addressed.
So, according the news articles that refer to the blitz conducted by “several agencies, including the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, postal inspectors, customs agents, state and federal tax agents and investigators”, Yesmoke has set another record: its “smuggled cigarettes” were not unloaded at night on isolated beaches, but always shipped on regular airlines, with all the documents in order and they were always delivered by the U.S. Post Office…
Like the slot machines of Las Vegas
In 2004, Philip Morris tried to make points all over the place. The colossus gave a virtuous show of its influence on the U.S. public apparatus making the “City of New York” enter the field. The city is a versatile no smoking “hospital ship”, that when necessary, can be transformed into a powerful battleship for Big Tobacco. All in contrast with the behavior of the U.S. Post office and the U.S. Customs, not so acquiescent to the demands of the colossus and to those of NYC lawyers.
New York, in fact, over a year ago prohibited all forms of cigarette shipments by mail in the State, in open contrast with the Federal laws that also govern the Mail Service and Customs. Cigarettes continued to reach their customers without interruptions in compliance with United States laws of that guarantee, in the home of the free market, the freedom of the interstate circulation of goods.
This most recent attack joins the other highly expensive first class lawsuits initiated against Yesmoke by Philip Morris. One of these, after shifting the property of the Yesmoke.com domain to the colossus, may lead to a sentence to pay 548 million dollars in compensation to Big Tobacco.
Bleeding by legal expenses
Adam Smith (1723-1790) was the great Scottish Philosopher and Economist
With these lawsuits and others that are on their way, the tobacco giant is trying to defeat its adversary using the classic method of “bleeding to death by legal expenses”.
To show that Yesmoke is extraneous to the charges, whatever these are, the company, in any case, would have to be present in court and defend itself with a host of lawyers. If one does not appear in court one is automatically condemned.
That is how they are trying to knock out a Swiss company and all its workers, because it did not present itself at the opening of this new (and very expensive) game: The RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupted Organization Act) that covers an infinity of charges.
Fortunately the Big Tobacco battleship has nothing to do with the US Navy, and Philip Morris is a common trader. But it is a powerful trader that tramples over the rights of American citizens, responding negatively to all requests, coming from authorities to disclose its product recipes, and selling cigarettes which, though they are a food product by law, do not report on the packet any information on the ingredients, the more or less cancer-inducing additives, the expiration date or the real place of manufacture.
The free market, in every sense
Justice should be applied with rigor and impartiality; it is not a party game, with its rules, its reassuring boundaries and its certainties. Justice calls for profound reflection, a basic ingredient for those who have respect for the rights of citizens at heart. Because, sooner or later, in a democratic country like the United States, it is the citizens who issue the final judgment.
While Yesmoke continues to repeat that: the application of customs duties on products acquired by mail, without any surcharge or penalization would be the reasonable solution in everyonès interest, Big Tobacco seems to be doing everything it can to confirm the positive function that Adam Smith attributed to smugglers: that of opening a breach for the free market.
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