In January, Freetail Brewing founder, Scott Metzger, paved the way for how to send a response to a cease-and-desist letter with panache. Remember the Dinosaur.

Earlier this month, the makers of Jack Daniel’s Tennessee Whiskey paved the way for how to send a cease-and-desist letter with class. The company issued a cease-and-desist letter to the publisher of a book titled, Broken Piano for President. The author of the book writes:

What follows is, perhaps, the most polite cease and desist ever written. If it wasn’t signed by some lawyer, I’d imagine ol’ Gentleman Jack penning it himself, twirling his bushy mustache.

You can read the letter here.

Despite the notion that communications between parties must contain “required formal language” that could be construed as insulting by the other party (or others that see them), no such requirement exists.

Increasingly, these communications are surfacing in public as journalists gain better access to public records. When they do, companies are not only accountable to the law, in the conventional sense, but the laws of society, in general. The ones that govern, to steal President Obama’s words, “how we choose to treat each other and how we love one another.” The “but we had to send it to protect our trademark” routine isn’t going to cut it with some folks.

Society can sometimes be less forgiving than the court system.

Something to think about before your lawyer sends out that next cease-and-desist letter…craft it with the possibility (or even expectation) that it could later be scrutinized in the public eye.