This is a slightly edited version of a genuine email I received in May 2012:

Dear Mr. Stenberg –

I recently came across the text you co-authored with Michael Schrenk, Webbots, Spiders, and Screen Scrapers, and was wondering if you might be interested in being a paid expert witness in a lawsuit we’re handling.

One of the major claims in the suit is unauthorized computer access in the form of a massive, multi-year campaign of screen scraping, and we’re looking for a qualified expert who can make the activity make sense to a jury (in the unlikely event that this matter reaches trial; fewer than 2% of cases do, in federal court).

We’re in Los Angeles, California, as is the case (and naturally would cover travel expenses, an hourly or per diem expert witness fee, etc). If you’re interested (or even if you’re not), please let me know? You can reach me via email or at (xyz) xyz-xyzx.

Many thanks,
[withheld]

Link to the book.

I responded to this mail saying that I’d rather not due to the distance and travel it’d require, but I never heard back from them again so I have no idea whatever happened in this case or who got to be the expert in the end…