Remember MonkeyParking? It's the app that lets you auction your parking space in San Francisco to the highest bidder. We called it a dick move, and the SF City Attorney agrees. They just sent the app's creator a cease-and-desist.
The letter sent by San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera to Paolo Dobrowolny, the CEO of the Rome-based startup, explains that the app violates Police Code section 63(c) which prohibits people from buying, selling, or leasing publicly owned on-street parking.
For every instance it's used, MonkeyParking can be fined up to $2,500 under California's Unfair Competition Law. Even worse – or more just – is anyone that uses it can be fined up to $300.
Herrera has also sent the cease-and-desist to Apple, asking the company to remove MonkeyParking from its App Store, as it violates several of the company's own review guidelines, specifically those that say that apps must adhere to local laws.
Two other apps – Sweetch and ParkModo – that do something similar are also in the city's crosshairs, with the latter upping the dick quotient even further by paying a driver to park in a space in the Mission District for $13.00 an hour to save it for the "renter".