AMC made a bit of a fanboy faux pas earlier when it demanded that fictional versions of its "Mad Men" characters be removed from Twitter, the popular social networking site. The response was so overwhelmingly against AMC's move that they've already retracted their demand and in-character twitterings have resumed.

This news comes just a day after Rich Johnston's fantastic "Lying in the Gutters" column over at Comic Book Resources where he reveals that he secretly established a Twitter account mimicking a character's account in Warren Ellis' new "Astonishing X-Men" series. The response? Twitter had the account canceled at Marvel's request, explaining that they couldn't afford to be entangled in legal issues.

So the big question right now is what should be considered fair game. There are laws that exist that protect intellectual property as far as websites are concerned. Had I, for instance, registered pepsi.com way back in first stages of the internet game it would still be considered copyright infringement and the company could make the case that they are legitimately entitled to the domain.

But Twitter characters? This feels more like some bizarre paranoia on the part of major corporations about just how influential Twitter may be. (How influential is it, anyway? Somebody Twitter me a pizza!)  They've got a point that, in the world of increasingly viral marketing, how are we to know what's real and what isn't? (And by real, I mean corporately-owned. It's still all fiction.)

Take, for instance, www.megalottojackpot.com. It's the official website of the lottery company that Hurley wins on "LOST". Like ABC's www.oceanic-air.com, it looks just like official viral marketing. The catch, though, is that it's not. The site was fan created and designed to mimic the other "real" sites. Even fiction can be hi-jacked and my argument would be that studios need to look beyond the law and check out the intention before they rush to speedy cease and desists. Canceling Twitter accounts is like telling Anime fans that they can't legally cosplay. (Yes, I know some people would be all for this, I'm just making a point.)

The good news is that ABC has realized the error of its ways and cares about how the fans feel. In an age where FOX can shut down Whedon-sanctioned screenings of the Buffy musical and Lucasfilm can regularly shut down internet fan-fiction sites, that's a good thing.

Check out The Live Feed here and Rich Johnston's Lying in the Gutters here.