
This site is down because the owner stiffed the web designer - talhof8
http://www.nycfreshmarket.com/
======
grey-area
I'm all for staging payment, and requiring final payment before delivering the
goods, or even pursuing clients in the courts if necessary for non-payment
(though usually that's fruitless), but when in dispute with a client you
should never take retaliatory action like this, because it reflects an
intemperance and lack of professionalism which means others will think twice
about hiring you even if they have every intention of paying for your work.
The same goes for a client not paying - if I hear someone hasn't paid their
bills (for whatever reason), I'm then hesitant to work for them in any
capacity unless it's a very clear-cut case. News travels quickly in many
industries.

If you've already given them all the work without being paid, and with no
contract, you have no recourse, but that doesn't mean you should use your
technical privileges to try to exact revenge if you still have access to their
server. If it's their hosting you're probably on difficult legal ground.

If you have to do this, you chose the wrong client, so tell everyone you know
not to work with them, take note of the warning signs you saw and the failures
of process that led to this point, and move on.

~~~
djillionsmix
Someone always types up this same response to any incident like this, and it
always sounds like exactly what I'd expect to hear from the sort of person who
stiffs people.

~~~
drwl
I think this is a common response because it's actually the right choice(s) to
make. I mean yes, not getting paid is never fun. There's a video posted in
another comment titled "fuck you, pay me" and I think it really addresses this
for freelancers. The short version of the video is have a lawyer and write a
contract and if they don't pay then enforce the contract. Just my thoughts.

~~~
mgkimsal
For all we know this action may have been part of the contract and the client
simply failed to read it, or didn't believe it would happen.

~~~
nedwin
Highly unlikely.

------
RyanZAG
A lot of people are saying that this was the wrong move because it will hurt
the designer. Maybe. It's still the right move for other reasons: everyone
doing business with these guys now knows they don't pay and to demand payment
up front or not work with them at all. There are already mentions of this on
consumer reviews [1]. Basically nycfreshmarket is likely to go out of business
over this issue as that market is already so cutthroat.

This action is the best action for the community at large - if every designer
did this, the world would be a better place and everyone would be sure to pay
their designers for work done. Win win situation for everyone involved
(besides for crooks).

[1] [http://www.yelp.com/biz/nyc-fresh-market-new-
york](http://www.yelp.com/biz/nyc-fresh-market-new-york)
[https://www.facebook.com/NYCFreshMarket](https://www.facebook.com/NYCFreshMarket)

~~~
flexie
Let's extrapolate: What if you were thrown out of your apartment if you failed
to pay rent, the hospital would make the pacemaker stop working if you didn't
pay your bills. Your lawyer would tell your secrets and tell the court you are
guilty if you didn't pay his fee. Guys would show up to collect the TV you had
failed to pay for. Your citizenship would be revoked if you didn't pay taxes
etc. etc, all without the creditor having to go to court first. Oh, and
everything would be posted on Facebook, Linkedin etc for your friends to see.

Stopping services and naming and shaming clients who don't / can't pay is a
slippery slope and not always civilized. Be happy not all creditors act this
way.

~~~
glesica
Wait, I can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not, because just about all
those things that you mentioned _actually do happen_.

You DO get evicted if you fail to pay rent. The hospital won't make the
pacemaker stop working, but they'll refuse further treatment that might be
necessary. The lawyer wouldn't tell all your secrets, but might be asked to
help track you down. Repo men DO come and collect your TV if you don't pay for
it. Your citizenship won't be revoked if you don't pay your taxes, but you can
go to prison, thus having your liberty (arguably the most important part of
citizenship) revoked. And most of these things happen in public, for everyone
to see.

~~~
lambda
Note that eviction requires the landlord to go to court, not just unilateral
action on the part of the landlord. Somehow I doubt this web designer got a
court order to allow them to deface their client's page.

Hospitals will not refuse treatment that is necessary to provide life support.

Collections agencies generally operate by sending you mail and calling your
phone repeatedly until they get their payment. The contents of your mail and
phone calls are generally private.

Note that most of these are private matters, generally considered
confidential.

~~~
ceejayoz
> Hospitals will not refuse treatment that is necessary to provide life
> support.

[http://www.nbcnews.com/id/22357873/ns/health-
health_care/t/f...](http://www.nbcnews.com/id/22357873/ns/health-
health_care/t/family-sues-insurer-who-denied-teen-transplant/)

~~~
anigbrowl
That's not the same thing, now is it?

------
Confusion
This is unwise. The main idea is that, as someone suggested in a comment:

    
    
      it has a nonzero probability that it will shame somebody 
      into paying.
    

This is in fact quite unlikely. If you believe this, you are not considering
_why_ someone isn't paying. In the majority of cases, the reason is
_disagreement_. Nothing is going to materially change about a disagreement by
taking a website hostage. You are only exacerbating the issue.

The main thing you achieve by something like this is satisfying your personal
sense of justice and being judge, jury and executioner to accomplish it.
However, that's vigilantism and as in most other examples of that, it is
probably illegal.

As a webhoster, you may suspend hosting. As a designer, you may withdraw
someone's license to your design. As a hoster and designer, assuming a single
contract covering both, suspending hosting is by far the easiest, as the other
path requires legal action. However, you should never replace agreed upon
content with something that would be defamation if your claim were denied.
Just suspend hosting.

~~~
marcosdumay
> In the majority of cases, the reason is...

You are the third person making the same kind of claim. It's not that I
disagree, in the majority of the cases, something like that isn't a nice thing
to do...

But this is one case, not the majority, we know nothing about it, except that
it's in an extreme minority. If for no other reason, because the designer
decided to retaliate this way. We are looking at extreme selection bias here,
don't shove it under a carpet.

~~~
Confusion
You always discuss an issue based on the specific case that raises the issue,
but that doesn't mean there is automatically extreme selection bias going on.
The relevant facts of a case are rarely unique. I've seen a dozen or so of
such cases in the past ten years and I've never heard of a case where this
kind of retaliation worked.

If I report that my green car was stolen and claim that a gang stealing green
cars is active, then people respond with "That's unlikely, they're probably
just stealing every car they can get their hands on". In line with your
argument, they should instead say "Wow, a gang stealing green cars, how
unlikely. How wonderous I would stumble upon this case of extreme selection
bias here on the web".

That is even ignoring the fact that it is probably illegal. You are allowed to
end the delivery of a service if the other party effectively cancels a
contract, but you are not allowed to keep delivering the service in a way that
breaches the contract. You cannot just serve any content you want on their
domain (unless this situation was specifically foreseen in the contract).

------
MaysonL
The definitive advice on the subect, Mike Monteiro's "Fuck You, Pay me!":
[http://vimeo.com/22053820](http://vimeo.com/22053820)

~~~
um304
Love this video!

~~~
chris_wot
I knew a guy who didn't pay me and who then posted that video to his Facebook
wall when he, in turn, didn't get paid.

------
mpchlets
I don't know, this is a new site:
[https://www.google.com/#q=site:nycfreshmarket.com](https://www.google.com/#q=site:nycfreshmarket.com)

There is no cache, so I think this is an over-reaction at this point by the
designer and only discredits their business sense and will most likely result
in not getting paid for this job.

The phrase 2 wrongs don't make a right comes to mind. WE already have a legal
system in place to handle these issues, no reason to defame on the internet,
which is truly a permanent record.

~~~
emiliobumachar
The legal system is a realistic option only if there was a written contract in
place, which is not always the case.

~~~
icoder
Really? AFAIK in my country (Netherlands), a 'verbal agreement' is also
legally binding. Is that different in US? Of course it may be harder to proof,
but at the end of a website building job there's often enough paper and email
trails to make your case.

~~~
mpchlets
A verbal (oral) contract is a contract in the US - though very hard to prove.
Chain of custody of the code is one way.

Intellectual property rights are all the rage these days and that would mix
into this.

------
mariuolo
That's why you move the website to the customer's server only _after_ you've
been paid in full.

Before that it's only a showcase on the developer's server.

~~~
toyg
I would certainly listen to somebody with "smallscalethief" as nickname, in
matters of money.

------
aaron695
Uuuugh.

Link straight from Reddit, and probably an illegal act from the designer.
(Sorry but that's probably the law, like it or not)

Much as we all love to string people up, the reality is it's not professional,
and probably not good for society.

Where is the proof the designer got stiffed???? The reason everyone loves this
is cause we love to string someone up, proof not needed.

Not a healthy way to be.

~~~
DrJokepu
Is this, like, really "illegal" in New York? Are you really sure about that?
I'm not a lawyer but it seems to me that me that the grocery store has
breached the contract and the designer has a number of options available to
remedy the situation, including not delivering his part of the agreement. It
would be interesting to hear the opinion of someone qualified in New York
Contract Law.

~~~
reginaldjcooper
If it is their server you are definitely committing a CFA to change the
content. If it is your server, it's probably fine due to they haven't paid you
so they broke whatever contract was in place.

------
braum
What the designer did is fine except I would have just put up a "Coming
Soon..." instead of directly calling out the owner. It would have the same
reaction from the owner because they don't know how to do any of it. And it
wouldn't give anyone who visits the immediate knowledge that the designer can
and will use their technical powers to embarrass you or your business.

~~~
edanm
This is actually a really sensible middle ground to the (very valid) views
around here that this is _a terrible career move to make_.

There's still the legality aspect which concerns me.

~~~
grey-area
I think it probably depends whose server the files are hosted on, if they're
on the designer's, they could easily just turn off service and be justified,
logging in to a client's server to do it without permission is probably
crossing a line though.

However hijacking the domain with a message like this is legally risky IMHO,
wherever it is hosted, as it could be seen as slander. Good luck to the
designer getting paid now - I'd be very surprised if the client did pay up
after this.

~~~
carbocation
In the US, truth is an absolute defense to the claim of libel, so venue is
pretty important.

------
jghrng
On a related historical note, this can happen if you don't pay the chiselers
building your church:
[http://www.holidaycheck.de/data/urlaubsbilder/images/41/1163...](http://www.holidaycheck.de/data/urlaubsbilder/images/41/1163611749.jpg)
(part of
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freiburg_Minster](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freiburg_Minster)).

------
balloot
I can't believe people are defending this. If a brick-and-mortar store has a
pay dispute with a contractor, would that contractor have the right to put a
giant padlock on the store doors and spray paint a message on the door saying
that the store owner didn't pay? Obviously not. How is this any different?

The key thing to keep in mind is the _designer may be wrong_. I'm sure if you
ask the store owner they have a totally different story, and it's likely not
"We are SUPER EVIL and just stiff people who do good work". Maybe the
contractor (onemine.com, if you're curious) tried to bill the store owner more
than agreed upon, the store owner refused, and this is the result. Maybe the
contractor left out some significant part of the site and the store owner wont
pay until completion. Who knows?

The problem here is OneMine has taken all the power in the pay dispute by
holding the client's intellectual property hostage until all demands are met.
It's at the very least unprofessional, but it becomes defamation very quickly
unless OneMine has an absolutely airtight case. There better be exactly zero
unfinished products, missed deadlines, rate changes, etc. And it's safe to say
with many contract projects this is not the case.

~~~
alexqgb
It's different because the stiffed party in your example does not own the
store being locked and vandalized and cannot take those actions without
breaking unrelated laws. That's not the case with IP for which the creator
still has clear title and is (presumably) hosting on their own servers.

Seperatly, it's 2013. We are waaaay past the point where intelligent people
think that laws pertaining to the ownership of tangible and intangible goods
can, do, and should map directly to one another. The differences between these
classes of property are not trivial, and neither are the laws and social norms
that govern people's treatment of each. Making analogies that ignore these
differences is just unhelpful, stupid, and irritating. It's a bit like saying
to a judge "I don't see why you're issuing this fine. After all, what I did is
perfectly legal in (insert name of foreign country here)."

None of this is to say that connections and parallels can't be drawn between
the fields of tangible and intangible goods. It's just to say that doing so in
a useful fashion demands acknowledgement of the wide gulfs that separate them,
and clear identification of the specific points where they do overlap.

~~~
balloot
So you think onemine.com, and not NYC Fresh Market, has IP rights to
nycfreshmarket.com and its website contents, simply because onemine.com was
hired as a contract designer?

I would LOVE to see a legal precedent for this claim.

~~~
alexqgb
Given the petulant tone of your response, I'll leave it to you to do your own
research on the basics of copyright law. But I will note that, under the law,
the contents are owned by whoever created them. If the client failed to pay
for the work, and did not secure a clear transfer of title, ownership of the
IP remains with the author. This is Copyright Law 101.

The domain is a seperate matter. Presumably, this could happen because the
designer was hosting the site. The owner of the domain is free to host it
elsewhere, but would need to populate any sites they publish with content they
actually own, and not work stolen from people they didn't pay.

------
elnate
I remember googling my professor at university one year to find out that he
had been criminally convicted for hacking the site of client that never paid
him. I would never have guessed otherwise, he was a jovial guy. Screwing
people out of money quickly brings out an aggressive response in most.

~~~
madaxe
_> an aggressive response in most._

The word you're after is _defensive_. If you've been ripped off, you are _not_
the aggressor.

~~~
avalaunch
That entirely depends on the action you choose to take after being ripped off.
Being ripped off doesn't give you a blank check to do whatever you want. If
someone fails to pay you, you can prevent delivery of the service they failed
to pay for. Anything beyond that and you are the aggressor.

------
anaran
But will this increase the web designer's chances to get paid? I don't think
so.

While it sure provides negative publicity for the store owner, it would
probably not further the career of the web designer either.

~~~
drewcrawford
I'm continually fascinated by these comments (there's one on every story like
this) that try to second-guess the decision based on no actual information.
Doesn't it seem likely that the person who did this is in a better position to
judge the potential consequences than you?

Unless OP is right on the threshold of being hard up for work, it makes no
real difference to his dealflow, and it has a nonzero probability that it will
shame somebody into paying.

~~~
jacquesm
> Doesn't it seem likely that the person who did this is in a better position
> to judge the potential consequences than you?

In fact, no. If there is a dispute and you forego the legal option you might
get your ass handed to you. Things like this blow up in the face of the party
doing them as often as they lead to some kind of settlement.

The damage to the client could outweigh the amount owed (assuming there is
one) very rapidly.

> Unless OP is right on the threshold of being hard up for work, it makes no
> real difference to his dealflow, and it has a nonzero probability that it
> will shame somebody into paying.

It also has a non-zero probability of him/her being sued for (substantial)
damages.

------
jusben1369
Every contractor should secretly applaud this person. Although wrong, events
like these, when witnessed, make others who might otherwise not pay reach for
the checkbook. "I remember what happened to xyz site when they stiffed their
consultant"

~~~
teddyh
“But let us raise a toast to all our bombers, all our bastards, most unlovely
and most unforgivable,

let's drink their health…

…then meet with them no more.”

— V

------
esw
I appreciate the designer's frustration, but I've found that in most cases,
simply taking the site offline (assuming you host it) is enough to get a call
back from the customer. If the customer decides that they'd rather not have a
website at all than have the website you built for them, then I think perhaps
both parties should cut their losses and move on.

~~~
hobs
Yep, I have had a few clients for minor hosting things not pay, and the most
simple way is to revoke access to the content. While putting some snarky
comments on the page is funny, just taking it down would generally elicit the
same response from a small minded shop keeper. Having dealt with the same
stuff, shaming them or poking at their pride instead of having a very basic
and honest discussion about consequences when they decide to not pay can lead
them to become twice as bullheaded.

I still feel for the dev in this case, because this shit happens way too often
in the industry.

------
mlopes
Is this really different from what hosting companies do? Most of them, if you
have a bit more traffic than usual and pass the agreed limit, will replace
your site with a message and only remove it if you upgrade your plan. Never
saw anyone go apeshit on those cases like people are on this one.

------
ck2
This is also why you do not let your web designer own and operate your website
hosting.

~~~
ceejayoz
You don't let your designer host so you can stiff them?

No, this is why you pay your web designer for their work.

~~~
ck2
One has nothing to do with the other.

If they haven't paid you and you happen to own and operate it, just turn it
off completely, there is no professional middle ground.

If a mechanic fixes your car and you don't pay them, in many places have have
the right to seize your car until you pay. But they do not have the right to
tamper with your brakes or spray paint "pay me" on your windshield.

~~~
nknighthb
They're free to park it by the road with a big sign on it.

------
brianmcconnell
Years ago when I did freelance work writing software for custom phone systems,
I had a shady client up in Marin. Suspecting they would not pay, I slipped a
feature into the system where if I did not dial in and punch in a secret code
within 90 days, it would stop functioning and display a cryptic "database
error".

Sure enough, the client didn't pay, and right on schedule, I got a customer
support call mentioning the database error. I told them "actually it's working
perfectly, you didn't pay your bill".

I later found out they went through several other developers and then went out
of business. I am sympathetic to small businesses that have money problem, but
some people are simply shady and must be avoided.

------
herbig
This is indeed a bad career move. Not because it's unprofessional, but because
that pin sitting on top of the sheet of paper rather than indented into it
shows a lack of attention to detail and poor design.

------
delinka
I'm going to start using this as a remedy in contracts, if for no other reason
than to put a stopper in all these "unprofessional response" replies.

------
mimog
The response is unprofessional juvenile in that it publicly calls out and
shames the customer. He should just take the site down until payment is
received.

------
StavrosK
We do enjoy our public shaming, don't we!

------
bennyg
After a WHOIS, it looks like the domain was registered by Onemine - and this
is the most likely candidate for who registered it:
[http://www.onemine.com/](http://www.onemine.com/)

My guess is, they still own the hosting and server space for the domain too.

------
casualaistudent
An alternative is - from the commencement of the project - to have a watermark
or other visual design element present which makes the site unusable to the
client but still allows them to evaluate the work.

------
sdnguyen90
this has been up for a long time

------
ss64
Also the page contains the cloaked text (in yellow on a yellow background) :
"This store owner is dishonest. Please Read."

Defamation lawsuit waiting to happen.

------
richsin
I agree that this is not the best option. Shaming the client does far more
damage to both parties. I feel the designer's pain but public humiliation is
not the answer. I think this also gives new or future
freelancers/entrepreneurs the wrong idea. This happens rarely. If it happens
too often, then it's probably your fault as much as the client's.

I ran a web shop for small businesses ($500K - $10M/yr revenues) in NYC for
about 8 years with many clients (good and bad) and faced non-payment issues
only a handful of times. Here is my take on it:

\- Always get enough money from the client to cover your break even hourly
rate for the entire project. Don't do payment terms without a deposit - unless
it's a seemingly great client and your cash flow positive.

\- Keep your margins healthy. The tighter the margins, the harder it is to be
civil when these situations come up.

\- When a customer does not pay, I give them more time and payment options
first. I have even gone as far as extending more services to clients I believe
are good people on credit if the issue has to do with business being slow.
This has built some great long term clients.

\- 99.9% of the time, if your work causes a positive effect on someones
business, they will always pay and never let you go. (They may not show it,
but prompt payment and consistent work is the stamp of approval)

\- When a client does not pay and you have exhausted your process of
collections, I put their old site up. If they did not have a site before, I
put up a splash page with logo, phone numbers and contact form. Simple and
classy. It takes 5 minutes. Most times if they had the money they would pay -
so wish them the best of luck. It's usually always about money.

\- If you have a simple contract, you can always take them to court and you
will almost always win or they will settle. I always do it myself, no lawyer.
I always choose to not take down the site when I have a contract, I prefer the
judgement or settlement if it goes that far.

\- Make sure the project has the potential of being successful. I am always
approached with bad ideas and although they are willing to pay, successful
projects pay off in multiples over the long term. It's not up to me to tell
someone their idea sucks, but I do believe that if they are not willing to
take some basic advice - there is a higher risk of issues. If not payment,
satisfaction.

I hope this didn't run too long, but bottom line, this type of publicity is
not positive and as stated above, these things happen, rarely. Build a process
to handle these issues and focus on finding better clients ALWAYS - not
chasing bad ones.

------
whitej125
Congrats, you've probably just did the owner of NYC Fresh Market a huge favor
by giving this place some attention. Good publicity or bad publicity, by
shining a spotlight on this establishment in HN you might convince some NYC HN
locals to check it out.

------
edo
Immature response that only makes the designer seem unprofessional.

------
Pent
This is brilliant marketing regardless of the negative press

------
adnam
Professional, very professional.

------
bally999
I'm assuming the designer doesn't own the website domain. This is like
breaking into someone's property, and saying that you won't leave until a
demand is met. He should really consult a lawyer before he gets criminally
prosecuted.

~~~
mpchlets
Agreed on the ransom, moreover - they gave the site to the owner on good faith
that they would get paid, now they are complaining that they were fooled.

