Gary Kleiner's theft of my name, and the name of a company in which I'm a partner. Included is information about his recent theft of copyrighted works.

Gary Kleiner at a VASST event.

7/04/2005
>On April 8, 2005, Gary Kleiner of Vegastrainingandtools.com bought domains in the names of Douglasspottedeagle.com and vasst.net. On that day, he purchased other domains as well, some relevant to myself and the business I'm partnered in, others not related.
>Gary Kleiner (by his own admission) then activated those domains, and redirected them to his own website, where he sells software and training DVDs that directly compete with VASST software and training DVDs.  Gary has previously been a VASST instructor, which not only makes this entire incident personally painful, but also confuses people in the market by them believing that his competing training materials are somehow related to VASST.

About the same time, as we discovered the re-directed domains, Gary Kleiner's business partner Timothy Duncan, posted negative comments about VASST, attacking VASST software on the Digital Media Net forums, using a pseudonym of "Byron Taylor."  When we saw the posts from "Byron Taylor, we requested the DMN trace the IP addresses. The IP address used for the Byron Taylor posts led the DMN administrators to Northstar Studios, a video editing facility.
DMN informed us of who the owner of the IP address was.
Both DMN and ourselves called NorthStar and made inquiries regarding "Byron Taylor." We were informed that there was no "Byron Taylor" there and to the knowledge of the facility manager, never had there been a "Byron Taylor." We further inquired of the personnel department, and were told that no one named "Byron Taylor had ever worked at NorthStar in its entire history. However, a "Timothy Duncan" did work there. (and still does) When we specifically asked Mr. Duncan if he was "Byron Taylor," he indicated that "Byron Taylor" was a part time employee at NorthStar, and a guy that comes to the studio "on occasion."  
NorthStar's personnel department had no tax records for "Byron Taylor" and had never heard of him. Nor had the management of Northstar ever heard of "Byron Taylor."  Click here for an explanation of who we believe "Byron Taylor" is.

We'll likely never know if the timing of the Byron Taylor threads and the use of my name and our company name were conspired or coincidental.

>We discovered Gary Kleiner's action from multiple forum members, who alerted us to what had been done, redirecting websites in our names to his own site where he sold Sony Vegas training and software related to Sony Vegas.  At the time this was discovered, Gary Kleiner was a partner in a software product known as "Excalibur" with Timothy Duncan and Edward Troxel. Gary is allegedly no longer involved with Excalibur. Excalibur directly competes with Ultimate S from VASST.

>We contacted Gary Kleiner, who assured us initially, that the re-directed websites were not of his doing, and that he didn't know how it had happened, and that he was "just as upset about it as we were, and would immediately get to the bottom of it." Gary Kleiner never directly responded to our phone calls following that initial contact. Until August 3rd, Gary denied any knowledge and/or responsibility for his actions.
RegisterFly.com showed Gary Kleiner as the sole registrant of these domains, and other domains purchased on April 8, 2005.

>It would appear an attempt has been made to hide the registrations after the re-direct had been uncovered. The vasst.net listing was changed the same day we discovered Gary Kleiner's actions.

Update 8/3/2005
Gary Kleiner no longer denies that he bought the domains. However, this post fails to mention that he also bought other domains related to our business, and redirected them to his website.

Myself and my business partner offered Gary Kleiner what we felt was a simple means of resolving this situation.
      -We asked Gary Kleiner to fully admit his guilt in the very communities where he'd claimed innocence of this act.
      -We asked that he pay attorney fees that we'd incurred in researching the legality of his actions.

Some people have referred to this situation as "Cybersquatting." Cybersquatting is merely owning a web domain not related to your name, or any business you might have in operation. Activating and redirecting those domains goes beyond cybersquatting. 
What might happen if one were to take say....Sonyvegas.com  (also purchased by Gary Kleiner) and redirected it to a pornographic website, or perhaps to the AVID, Pinnacle, Adobe, or Ulead website?

Gary Kleiner's first response  through his attorney (2 months after the fact), refused to admit that anything had been done wrong, and that even though nothing had been done "wrong," Gary Kleiner regretted the action and incident, and might be willing to pay attorney fees. Months later, Gary Kleiner's attorney simply told us to file in court against Gary Kleiner or let the situation go away.

Gary Kleiner has recently indicated through his attorney that he no longer owns the domains in question. However, we've attempted to purchase the domains, and cannot. Registerfly indicates the domains are owned by a party whose name they will not reveal without a subpoena.

>Gary Kleiner's former partner, Edward Troxel, came forward with this statement (7/22/05) about Gary Kleiner and Timothy Duncan's involvement in the above described incidents. We believe Gary Kleiner may still be associated with Excalibur and Timothy Duncan. However, there is no evidence that would tie Mr.Troxel to the actions of his former business partner(s). We have no reason to doubt Edward's claims of innocence in this matter and every reason to believe Edward's statements. In fact, Edward Troxel assisted me in discovering other websites Gary had registered, without being asked to help or participate in any way. His efforts are much appreciated.

(7/22/05) What Gary's former partner had to say.  Edward Troxel is a saint, in my personal view.

-IP Address search as performed by Digital Media Net administration.
Additional Evidence: Click images for full size page view.
Click image for full size page. Text is readable on the full page. Click image for full size page. You can see here the redirect from the vasst.net website to Gary Kleiner's Vegastrainingandtools.com website. What Gary Kleiner has had to say about this situation in public forum. Click the image to see a full page version.

 
>Gary Kleiner claims in the (above) public post dated May 14, 1005, that he "apologized to Spot" when in truth, he never had done anything of the sort until August 10, 2005 (4 months later). My office, home, and cell phone numbers have not changed in more than 10 years, so it's an easy thing to phone me, or send an email. No apologetic emails or phone calls have ever been received by me or anyone else here. Gary Kleiner did leave a cell phone message in which he claimed that he had nothing to do with the redirected domains, and he'd be getting back to me. I have never heard back from him. An apology would have gone a long, long, way with me, and likely would have averted a lot of sleepless nights for a number of people.
>Update August 10, 2005:
Gary Kleiner asked to speak with me at the WEVA show.  I agreed to speak with him in hopes of achieving a resolution. Gary said he was sorry for the trouble he caused, but didn't think he'd done anything wrong, and didn't owe anyone an apology. He felt it's perfectly acceptable to buy websites in someone else' name and in the name of a competing business and surreptitiously redirect that domain to his own where he sells competing, nearly identical products. 

Gary had a "faint" while I was expressing my anger at him for what he did. I can't accuse him of pretending, but it was very strange that he caught himself as he "fainted" and a videocamera fell out of his bag with the recording light on. It's likely that he was recording our conversation. For what purpose, I do not know, and could have been completely coincidental that the recording light was on. He did claim the "faint" was due to low blood sugar. However, his speech was completely clear prior to and after his faint.  My personal feeling is that there was an agenda with the video camera and the fall to the floor.

Gary specifically told me that he'd do the right thing and quickly resolve the situation with his attorney and ours. He also told my business partner the same thing in a separate conversation. On our return to Utah, we anxiously awaited a letter or phone call from his attorney that would put an end to all this, just as Gary had agreed to do not just with me, but with my business partner in a separate conversation. 3 weeks after Gary had told both of us he'd "do the right thing," we we never heard from Gary again. Gary had misrepresented himself in the past; I feel an utter fool for having believed he'd been honest in saying he'd do the right thing and settle this issue when we spoke at WEVA.
Someone whom I once considered a friend, who has shared my food, shared my table, and shared my business, has stolen something from me, even as he put his arms around me and hugged me at NAB, which took place after he'd started down the road of using my name and my business name for his own personal gain. And refuses to make the situation right.
If it could happen to me, it could happen to you.
Do you really want to do business with this sort of person?

And all Gary needed to do in the first place was to admit and apologize. He's currently done neither.

Update 2/1/2006  

Read about Gary's most recent behavior.
Update 8/1/2006  
Gary Kleiner had promised to turn the various websites over to us, but we recently discovered they've been turned into pornographic sites. We don't know if this was deliberate on Gary Kleiner's part, or if it simply happened as part of his release of the websites. We were never notified that he'd released them, and they were not turned over to us as promised.
Update 1/1/2008  
Gary has still not returned the domains, he did not follow through on his promises to correct his actions, he continued to use my name and the VASST name as part of his "credentials."
He was asked to leave a private industry party based on his actions outlined above, and he complained to the vendor about being asked to leave. He lied to the vendor and said he was "physically removed" from the party. The woman that asked him to leave did not touch him, she is 5'3" and weighs 120lbs. Gary complained he was "threatened by her."  Then again, Gary has demonstrated his lack of integrity in several instances.
 

Further, we have been told, and it appears obvious, that Gary is using our web and DVD tutorials as templates for his own, including an error on our part that escaped us on the Vegas 8 Update DVD, being included in his own training.


There is plenty of room for competition in the Vegas training world without resorting to theft, copying, and violating the integrity of our small Vegas community members, stealing names, re-routing weblinks, and turning names into adult sites.


Nearly 3 years later, I still do not own my own name-domain, thanks to Gary's illicit actions. At the time of this writing, it is a redirect to an adult site.

 
Update 12/26/2011  
Wow, hard to believe it's been 3 years since this page was last updated. I'd actually forgotten it existed, and then some friends made me aware of a Facebook page discussing Gary's past actions.


To date, I still do not own my own domain name; it was secured from the porn vendors to a clearing house site. They've offered to sell me my name for 1200.00. Gary had agreed to turn this over to me back in 2005, both in writing and in conversation. VASST.org and VASST. net suffered the same fate.

It's very clear to me that Gary's vegastrainingandtools.com uses our training as templates for his own work; some of the flows found in our training come straight from engineering backdoors, and there is no way Gary could have discovered them on his own. We've been told in the past that Gary Kleiner uses our training tools as templates, and it doesn't surprise us he's still doing it 6 years after the fact.

I suppose the biggest disappointment is that newcomers to the Sony Vegas Software world aren't aware of his nefarious actions, for which he's never apologized. I see Gary a couple of times a year; he studiously avoids me and my employees.
For me, it's a lesson in life. Apologize for wrongdoings and move forward. Poor Gary has to skulk around the Vegas community like a pariah. All of the pro's in the business know who he is, what he's done, and he's shunned by any Vegas professional out there. That's gotta suck.

It's also very important to note here, that Edward Troxel was not at all in any way involved in Gary's actions. I could edit the above portions of the page for those that might not read deeply enough, but it's more honorable to stand by what was said at the time.  Based on what I know of Edward, I have no doubt that Gary acted entirely on his own.


Edward has become a good friend, and were it not for him, the entire deceit carried out by Kleiner would have been more difficult to unravel, as there were so many threads to it. We were grateful to him at the time, and appreciative of him now.

 
Gary Kleiner, Vegastrainingandtools.com, Vegas Training