Online megatrader Amazon has issued a cease and desist order against the Moon, obliging the satellite to end its intended traverse between the Sun and the earth, lawyers acting for the company announced.
According to the order, Amazon claims that it copyrighted the term “e-clipse” in 1995 at the same time as “e-books”, “e’s-are-good” and “e-by-gum” and that any use of the term or enactment of its definition represents a serious infringement of Amazon’s intellectual property rights.
Lawyers from the New York law firm Gagarin, Armstrong and Aldrin acting on behalf Amazon confirmed that company founder Jeff Bezos takes such a strong view of the infringement that he is preparing to deliver the order to the Moon’s celestial representative, “The Man on the Moon” in person, aboard Virgin Space’s newly commissioned spaceship, Canute.
“Jeff sees this as a definite red line. He isn’t prepared to have his authority tested by a fictitious character who owes his non-existence to the coincidental synchronous rotation of the earth around its sole satellite,” explained a spokesman.
The spokesman declined to comment on what action Amazon would take if the non-existent man on the moon failed to ceases his traverse between the earth and the sun plunging large parts of the US into near total darkness.
“Let’s say we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it, and after we’ve counted the profits from flogging “e-clipse” glasses, hats, masks, t-shirts, arseless “moon pants” and all the other e-crap too dismally tawdry to mention,” he said.
“Mind you, assuming he does make it back in one piece – keep an eye out for special limited edition offers of green cheese,” he added.
