Intellectual Property Law

MySpace on Thursday "accidentally" deleted its hottest profile: that of 22-year-old Ashley Alexandra Dupre, Eliot Spitzer's alleged call girl, setting off a feeding frenzy among cyber squatters jostling for control of her suddenly vacant address.

The original vanity MySpace address for  Dupre -- myspace.com/ninavenetta -- rapidly changed hands beginning moments after Dupre's profile was deleted by MySpace officials Thursday morning.

At one point, the URL appeared to be promoting gangsta rap under her name. Then it was operated by somebody named "Johnny." It was also taken over by somebody using the name "Ashley" who was seeking "Old bald guys" with whom she could have anal sex.

Dupre's MySpace page became a hot item following allegations that Spitzer, who resigned Wednesday as New York's governor, used a high-end, internet-based prostitution service to book Dupre as a $1,000-a-night call girl. The media harvested Dupre's  MySpace profile for biographical info and photos, and visitors posted messages of support through the site.

A MySpace source says the company "accidentally" deleted the profile Thursday in response to the flood of traffic converging on the profile. When a MySpace profile is deleted, the custom, user-friendly MySpace web address selected by the owner is immediately available for reuse, so pranksters were quick to claim the ninavenetta URL.

"I actually heard on the radio that she had deleted her MySpace, so I came online to see if it was serious," one of the pranksters told THREAT LEVEL in an e-mail interview. "Then I saw the alleged stand-up comedian named Barry from Memphis had it, then a 31-year-old guy named John from New Hampshire had it, so I was just waiting for the account to get deleted again so I could try to take it and I did.

"I just used this bullshit Gmail account to sign up for it.  I had it for maybe 15 minutes, enough time to put up some shit ... Then, the account got deleted and someone else jumped on it.  I will probably try to get the account name again, cause I am bored on a Thursday in March."

He was spurred by the supportive comments Dupree was garnering on her profile before in disappeared.  "I thought it was hilarious this morning when I looked at her MySpace ... and there were comments from her 'friends' saying shit like 'all this pressure is gonna make you a diamond, girl, SHINE ON' and cornball shit like that.  I had messages like that coming to me but I unfortunately didn't have the name long enough to make them public."

Users identifying themselves from across the globe briefly latched onto the domain for minutes at a time. MySpace began canceling their use and warning the pranksters with terms-of-service violation e-mails.

Dupre's account was restored about 2:30 p.m West Coast time, ending the competition.

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