In June 2012, FunnyJunk's lawyer, Charles Carreon, sent Inman a letter demanding US$20,000 in damages from him, alleging the claims he made were defamatory.
Inman responded by publishing the letter on his site, along with a response and announcement that he would be organizing a charity fundraiser through Indiegogo, donating the amount demanded by Carreon to the American Cancer Society and the National Wildlife Federation.
In May 2011, Inman made a post on The Oatmeal's blog against FunnyJunk and contemplating a cease and desist under the DMCA (see Online Copyright Infringement Liability Limitation Act).
[9][10] Rather than pay the damages, Inman proposed to donate the money to two charities, the National Wildlife Federation and the American Cancer Society.
This blog post elicited more popular support for Inman and The Oatmeal than anticipated, and the fundraising effort "Operation BearLove Good.
[13][14] The incident spurred commentary by Dan Mitchell of SF Weekly on how the Digital Millennium Copyright Act places the onus of policing violations on content creators[15] and by Maxwell S. Kennerly Esquire of the Beasley Firm LLC on whether public accusations of copyright infringement are defamatory.
Carreon expressed surprise, stating: "I really did not expect that he would marshal an army of people who would besiege my website and send me a string of obscene emails.
"[17] On June 14, 2012 Carreon replaced his contact page with one saying, "Due to security attacks instigated by Matt Inman, this function has been temporarily disabled.
[19] Carreon's website, Twitter account and WordPress site were all attacked, but he says "I welcome the opportunity to confront legally the misuse of a new technology.
"[37] On June 15, 2012, Carreon filed a pro se lawsuit Carreon v. Inman et al in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California in Oakland against Inman, Indiegogo Inc., the American Cancer Society, the National Wildlife Federation and a hundred anonymous Internet users for allegations related to the Oatmeal case.
[50] On the same day, the Electronic Frontier Foundation announced that it would represent Inman, stating, "This lawsuit is a blatant attempt to abuse the legal process to punish a critic.
"[51][52][53] On June 25, Carreon amended his lawsuit against Inman and the other defendants to include Kamala Harris, the state Attorney General of California.
[59][60][61][62] Carreon declared, "Mission Accomplished," in an interview with Ars Technica[60] and told Comic Riffs, “Inman aborted his ‘publicity stunt’ to photograph himself with the proceeds that were intended to go to charity, the court took cognizance of the issues and ordered Inman to deposit evidence of his disposition of the funds, and Inman deposited the evidence of payments made to the charities.”[63] Carreon wrote to MSNBC.com, "While it's not the largest sum of money I have ever had a substantial role in raising, it is the first time I've seen it go to charity, and I think it's great.
[67] Levy filed a federal suit Doe v. Carreon to seek a declaratory judgment to protect the satirical site's owner in July 2012.
He then "engaged in unnecessary, vexatious, and costly tactics" to determine the proper amount of attorney fees, but was ultimately ordered to pay $46,100.25.
[69] On July 7, 2012, Carreon released a music video "Psycho Santa: The Heroic Exploits of Matt Inman / A Work of Perpendicular Fact" on his new site Rapeutation.com.