Dan's Journal of Skepticism

The plight of the Australian Vaccination Network, now known as Australian Vaccination-skeptics Network has taken an amusing turn for the worse. The Director of Investigations, Compliance and Enforcement Division, at the department of Fair Trading has ordered the AVN to quit using the acronym ‘AVN’ and instead adopt the acronym ‘AVSN’ to reflect the groups new name.

The reason the anti-vaxxers have inserted a hyphen into their new name is so they can claim that “Vaccination-skeptics” is a single word and can therefore keep the initials AVN. 

They thought they were smart. Until this happened:

If you have been following our saga during the past year you will know the prequel to this post. For those who missed it, we were directed last year to change our name – after 16 years – because our opponents complained that it was misleading. After exhausting our avenues of appeal, it turned out the Minister for Fair Trading had the power to enforce this. In fact, he introduced a new regulation just so that he could see this through!

So we changed our name. We are now “Australian Vaccination-skeptics Network Inc”. The new name was accepted by our members, as well as by NSW Fair Trading.

Now we have a new threat. Director of Investigations, Compliance and Enforcement Division, Mr David Byrne, phoned last Friday to say he requires us to change all instances of the abbreviation “AVN” to “AVSN”. And he has threatened to commence action without further notice to shut us down and remove our domain from the internet. -Australian Vaccination-skeptics Network, 25 March 2014

The AVN/AVSN currently appears on the first page of Google for “Vaccination” their domain name is vital tool for gaining a new audience and they know it. Which is why they tried the hyphen bullshit.

Not only are they trying to avoid changing their website name but they are also refusing to rename their Facebook page, which is still listed as “Australian Vaccination Network” despite yesterdays deadline for the name change. The trick they are trying with the Facebook page is to create a fake account and pretend the page now belongs to someone else.

Once more AVN supporters thought this would be a smart move.

I hope this obvious bullshit gets tested in court, it will be amusing to see them explain how their page now magically belongs to an unidentified person who conveniently resides overseas.

So what next for the AVN/ASVN?

There has been plenty of speculation about the possibility of the organisation going on the run to escape New South Wales authorities. Recently they have registered the business name “Australian Vaccination Network – QLD” fuelling speculation that they may cross the border into Queensland. We will have to wait and see.

The Australian Vaccination Network has surrendered it’s charity fundraising license.

Is this the end?

History is repeating itself and the Australian Vaccination Network is once again being investigated by the Health Care Complaints Commission.

As you probably already know, the NSW Health Care Complaints Commission (HCCC) spent more than a year and a great deal of taxpayer funds investigating the Australian Vaccination Network in 2009 / 2010. This resulted in their being told by the Supreme Court that they had acted illegally and did not have the jurisdiction to investigate our organisation.

Fast forward to 2014 and the AVN is once again facing a lengthy ‘investigation’ and potential public warning by the HCCC. In the the interim, parliament granted the HCCC new powers, so that it can now file its own complaints, investigate them and then, make a judgement based on their own investigation. As a result, a new complaint was recently received by the AVN. -Australian Vaccination Network

Some people just can’t stay out of trouble.

Readers of this blog will be aware that I own the business name “Australian Vaccination Sceptics Network” and also that the Australian Vaccination Network is in need of a new name since the Department of Fair Trading ordered them to adopt a new one.

Rather than adopting a new name they have decided to do the wrong thing and use my business name as their own.

As of Friday, March 7th, the Australian Vaccination Network, Inc. will now officially be known as the Australian Vaccination-Skeptics Network, Inc. We will still have the same domain address (www.avn.org.au) and will still go by the acronym “AVN”.

I already own the business name they want to adopt.

My business registration.

Within a matter of hours, Dr Rachel Dunlop, Mr John Cunningham, Mr Dan Buzzard (against whom our former President, Meryl Dorey, held an interim Apprehended Violence Order [AVO] for 10 months) and Ms Tracey McDermott had registered the following names: 

• Australian Vaccination Sceptics Network (ABN 33 627 009 978)
• Australian Vaccination Skeptics (ABN 82 084 251 657)
• Vaccination Sceptics Network of Australia (ABN 26 113 403 635)
• Vaccination Sceptics Australia (ABN 12 806 631 921)

-Australian Vaccination Network, Newsletter 10th March 2014

So the AVN readily acknowledges that the name is already in use, but continues to use it anyway. The fallout from this will be even more painful for the AVN than they could imagine. After all when was the last time dishonesty worked in their favor?

Supporters of the Australian Vaccination Network have vandalised two billboards in Western Australia that promote vaccination.

Two billboards in Fremantle promoting immunisation of children, have been defaced.

The billboards on South Street share stories of local parents who follow an alternative type of lifestyle but also immunise their children.

The campaign was launched three weeks ago by the Immunisation Alliance of WA in response to figures showing that the Fremantle area had one of the lowest rates of vaccination in the country.

Both billboards have been sprayed with red paint spelling out the website of anti-immunisation group, Australian Vaccination Network. –ABC News

So we can now list Crimminal Damage to the long list of deplorable tactics used by AVN supporters.

Anti-vax top ten tactics:

1. False DMCA reports.
2. False reporting of critics websites to anti-virus vendors.
3. Threatening Politicians.
4. Harassing, abusing, vilifying Grieving Families.
5. Seeking Court orders to silence their critics.
6. Abusing Facebooks report feature to get critics banned.
7. Advocating the use of violence against critics.
8. Calling their critics terrorists. 
9. Registering other people’s business names to confuse the public.
10. Criminal Damage. *New*

It’s been very quiet lately (plus I’ve been busy elsewhere) as we wait for the deadline of the Australian Vaccination Networks name change order to approach. The minister for fair trading has confirmed via twitter, the AVN has until the 24th of March to adopt it’s new name.

We’re just waiting now to see if the AVN finally complies with the law.

The Australian Vaccination Network an anti-vaccination organisation was ordered to change its name more than a year ago to something less deceptive. After delaying compliance for as long as possible they eventually tried to register Australian Vaccination Sceptics Network but thanks to a speedy source I learned of this attempt to adopt a new inappropriate name and registered the name myself as seen in this previous post.

On January 4th the AVN embarked on a childish vendetta and have gone ahead and registered “Australian Vaccination-Sceptics Network” an identical business name to mine. Except they have added a hyphen between the words “Vaccination” and “Sceptic” as a way of exploiting ASICs automated registration process.

Click image to enlarge

As you can see in the image the Australian Vaccination Network has also registered “Australian Skeptics Network” this isn’t the first time that Meryl Dorey has made attempts to steal the name of Australian Skeptics Inc. I wrote about their last attempt here. The battle to force the AVN to comply with the law is ongoing.

Yesterday I put out a call for members of the public to help build a list of acceptable names for the Australian Vaccination Network.

In a single day we managed to create a list of 50 suitable names for the AVN to adopt.

Dear Australian Vaccination Network

I writing to you in order to offer some assistance in coming up with a new name. On the 24^th of December my investigators notified me that you had attempted to register the name “Australian Vaccination Sceptics Network” with the Australian Securities & Investments Commission. Since it is unacceptable for you to adopt such a misleading name I saw fit to register it myself. As you can see online at: www.danbuzzard.net/journal/avn-fails-to-obtain-new-name.html 

So as an act of good faith I have asked your critics to help compile a list of names that we feel would be more appropriate for your organisation. Mine is #1, the rest have been added by members of the public.

1. Australian Society for the Spreading of Vaccine Preventable Disease

2. People Against Evidence Based Preventative Medicine, Inc

3. Friends of Pseudoscience in Medicine

4. People For Preventable Diseases

5. Friends of Infant Mortality

6. Biohazard Advocacy Network

7. we like to watch your kids die horribly from something preventable

8. The Malthus Society of Australia

9. The Society for the Preservation of Infectious Diseases

10. People Against Truth in Healthcare

11. Friends of Meningitis

12. Australian immunisation Denial Society (AIDS)

13. Mates of Mumps, Inc

14. The Society for Letting Children Get Sick

15. Bangalow Baby Killers Inc

16. I Can’t Believe it’s Not Homeopathy

17. People for Pathogens

18. DOUCHES – Department of Ultra Contrived Holistic Energy Services

19. Cough Bullshit Cough

20. Australians for the unethical treatment of children

21. Derek Zooland Centre For Kids Having Dumb Parents

22. Stop the Stop the AVN.

23. Australian Coalition for the Denial of Vaccine Efficacy

24. The Official Andrew Wakefield Fan Club

25. Aardvark – Australians Against Rational Discussion of Vaccines And Related Knowledge

26. M.U.M. Morons Under Meryl

27. G.L.U.M. Greggles Labouring Under Misconceptions

28. Greggles Labouring Under Mepryl

29. Liberal Australians Maming Everyone – LAME

30. Australian Sociopath Society Eradicating Science – ASSES

31. Childish Holistic Entrepenerus Entertaining Skeptics Everyday, Deliberately Instigating Child Killing & Stupidity – CHEESEDICKS

32. Anti vaccination network

33. Douchenozle – Decidedly Overrated Unscientific Conceited Hombres Enthusiastically NoticingOverbearing Zealots Lying Entirely

34. Aussie Virus Nutters

35. Centre for Unethical Negativity Towards Science

36. Centre for Natural Population Control

37. Mums for Measles

38. The Natural Selection Advocacy Society of Australia

39. Anti Vaccination Nutbags

40. Advocates for vicious nonsense

41. The Dunning-Kruger Society for Vaccine Denial

42. Australian Vaccine Misinformation Network

43. Parents for polio

44. The Polio Appreciation Society

45. Advocates for iron lungs

46. People Against Effective Healthcare

47. Friends of Endangered Microbes

48. People Imitating Medical Practitioners Stupidly (P.I.M.P.S.)

49. Advocates for Darwinism in the Kindergarten

50. CUNT – Community Under No Trust

 

Any of the above names would be acceptable.

Sincerely, 

Dan Buzzard 

PO Box 72, Northbridge 6865

–Letter to the AVN

The tracking number for this letter is 509330704010 once the AVN receives this list they will no longer have any excuse for not changing their name. We skeptics are a helpful bunch.

Anti-vaccination group the Australian Vaccination Network has failed to adopt a new name.

On the 24th of December 2013 sources monitoring the registries at Australian Securities & Investments Commission learnt of an attempt to register the name “Australian Vaccination Sceptics Network” however the registration never left “pending” status before vanishing from the record.

As a precaution I submitted an application for the same name on the off chance that the attempt may have been the AVN trying to hijack the term Skeptic.

We now know that the registration attempt was indeed made by the AVN.

THE Australian Vaccination Network, which promotes the “benefits” of measles and believes vaccines cause autism, has lost its first battle to find a new name. 

…

The Australian has identified a failed attempt by the organisation to “reserve” the name Australian Vaccination – Sceptics Network with the Australian Securities & Investments Commission.

In the wake of the failed attempt, other members of the public rushed to register the name as well as Australian Vaccination Skeptics.

Network president Greg Beattie said he “did not care” whether the attempt at a new name provoked more attempts to expose the group as unscientific. “We have reserved the name but we haven’t registered it,” he said. –The Australian

How can the AVN have “reserved” a name which I now own? Another lie.

Efforts to force the AVN to adopt a non-deceptive name are ongoing.