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But 230 wouldn’t even come into this discussion because the standard of libel for Stossel, as a public figure, is significantly higher. He has to prove that Fac

But 230 wouldn’t even come into this discussion because the standard of libel for Stossel, as a public figure, is significantly higher. He has to prove that Facebook/the fact checkers had actual malice in stating its claims. Meaning, the Facebook/fact checkers had to be intentionally lying or acting in reckless disregard for whether the statement was true or not. It’s a more interesting situation if he wasn’t a public figure, but even then, I doubt Facebook would be the one deemed responsible for the so-called libel, it would come down to the fact checked. In fact, in the similar Candace Owens lawsuit (which the court threw out), she sued USA Today and the fact-checking company, not Facebook. And her claims were still thrown out, both because she couldn’t show there was actual malice involved or that the claims that her statement was “false” was untrue. That opinion is here: https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/21068070-owens https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/21068070-owens Owens is of course a public figure, but that wasn’t even a large part of the reason her lawsuit was thrown out on its face. Stossel is getting press time by suing but he’s a public figure and suing Facebook because a fact checking service elicited an opinion/notation that didn’t have the nuance he wanted is laughable.

tschwimmer 5y ago
I feel like the malice standard makes libel essentially impossible to prove in the US. Are there any cases where malice has been proven? I imagine they would have had to look at private conversations by the accused indicated that they really didn't like alleged victim or something.
- phrz 5y ago
  "Actual malice" is a confusing term for a layperson because it doesn't mean what it sounds like. It doesn't mean "not liking" the plaintiff. Instead, it is the defendant's knowledge or reckless disregard of the statement's falsity.
Aerroon 5y ago
While this might not work in the US, it might work elsewhere. Other countries have legal protections for platforms from their users too, but that usually have lower standards for proving defamation of public figures than the US.
- cafard 5y ago
  That's why David Irving sued an American historian in England. It did him no good.
shkkmo 5y ago
> Stossel is getting press time by suing but he’s a public figure and suing Facebook because a fact checking service elicited an opinion/notation that didn’t have the nuance he wanted is laughable. Really? From his filing it sounds like Stossel has explicit evidence that the fact checkers admitted that he didn't make any false claims and still refused to correct their speech. We'll see if that counts as "deliberate malice" or no, but it does seem to be a case with much stronger claims than Owens'
- mcguire 5y ago
  On the other hand, from the evidence presented in the filing I would guess Facebook didn't act with deliberate malice; some automated or sound-bite-level manual system caught a bit of the video that did make a false statement and hit the label button. (I haven't seen the original video, but from what I have read I don't think it could be done without a "some people believe X but they're wrong" style statement, X being the false statement.) So the question is, does Facebook's gross incompetence at fact-checking satisfy the negligence part of the malice definition?
cblconfederate 5y ago
he s a journalist, like the fact-checkers, no? how does 'public figure' work? So, it's like a barber libeling another barber? (btw it's ridiculous to call them 'fact-checkers' -- all journalists are factcheckers, some are good some bad)
- xxpor 5y ago
  It's highly fact specific. "Determining who is a public or private figure is not always easy. In some instances, the categories may overlap. For example, a blogger who is a well-known authority on clinical research involving autism may be considered a public figure for purposes of controversies involving autism, but not for other purposes. " https://www.dmlp.org/legal-guide/proving-fault-actual-malice-and-negligence https://www.dmlp.org/legal-guide/proving-fault-actual-malice...
  - filmgirlcw 5y ago
    This is correct, but by any standard or definition, Stossel is a public figure. He's a television host (and was a correspondent and then co-anchor for one of the biggest newsmagazine programs in the US), he's been an author, a syndicated columnist, he’s won 19 Emmys. He’s an incredibly famous libertarian (I would argue he was probably the most prominent libertarian commentator in the media until he left television). He's a public figure. The fact that he’s on this website with a headline that includes his name is proof that he’s a public figure. But yes, it can be very fact specific.
- smoe 5y ago
  In news organizations fact-checkers are separate roles or department to independently check the statements made by journalists in their work. It's an additional layer. Same as there are grammar and style checkers although journalist can write correctly, some better some worse. And journalists work is not limited to checking facts alone. At least that was the case before the checkers started to get fired to save cost because online you can easily change errors after publication.
  - cblconfederate 5y ago
willis936 5y ago
>acting in reckless disregard Negligence is a motive. Considering the influence facebook has a compelling argument could be made on the chilling effects of a "sleepy code writer".
JPKab 5y ago
The fact checking services are wrong, a LOT. They are not ideologically neutral, particularly the ones used by Facebook. For a specific example of the abusive and censorious nature of this business model, see Glenn Greenwald's recent article on the subject, specifically in regards to the blanket denunciation of the New York Post's Hunter Biden laptop story as Russian disinformation. Greenwald isn't a right-wing hack, and in fact he is aggressively pro-Palestinian, anti-war, and has been a loud critic of Bolsonaro despite being a resident of Brazil. https://greenwald.substack.com/p/new-proof-emerges-of-the-biden-family https://greenwald.substack.com/p/new-proof-emerges-of-the-bi... Edit: Yes, a parade of downvotes without any refutations. Pay no attention to the fact that the guy in charge of censoring and fact checking operations at Facebook is a lifelong Democratic Party operative who literally worked for the Democratic House Majority PAC, and before that Senator Barbara Boxer, before going to work for Facebook. https://www.linkedin.com/in/andy-stone-7575b34a https://www.linkedin.com/in/andy-stone-7575b34a
- justinzollars 5y ago
  I'm receiving downvotes too, but keep sharing your thoughts with details! I provided a life experience based on changing political parties, and people obviously aren't comfortable that they have created an illiberal web.
- gorwell 5y ago
  Narrative violation detected. -4 applied to your social credit score. Have a good day, comrade.
- kcplate 5y ago
  > Greenwald isn't a right-wing hack, and in fact he is aggressively… Correct, he isn’t and technically more liberal than a lot of folks on the left, but then again the left is no longer liberal. He speaks truth to power without regard to political party/leaning and is therefore generally hated now by the left because he doesn’t follow the orthodoxy.
baryphonic 5y ago
> Stossel is getting press time by suing but he’s a public figure and suing Facebook because a fact checking service elicited an opinion/notation that didn’t have the nuance he wanted is laughable. If the facts alleged in Stossel's initial filing are true, they are fairly damning against the defendants[0]. The Candace Owens initial complaint, by contrast, is kind of a mess [1]. Re: Owens: One of her claims was that a manager at one of the defendant companies had once held a prominent position at CNN, and CNN has an obvious Democrat bias. Even if all of those things were true, the suit doesn't allege any sort of causal connection, not even "upon information or belief," between that claim and her being demonetized or otherwise sanctioned by Facebook. Her complaint was 50 pages long with 50 pages of exhibits, and yet a lot of it was used just to make political grandstanding statements. It just reads like a poorly-drafted lawsuit meant to generate publicity insofar as it exceeds a lawyer's duty not to file frivolous nonsense. For what it's worth, the judge also seems to kind of give Owens short shrift by asserting in his judgment that no reasonable person would conclude the words "hoax alert" and "false" attached to Owens' post imply that Owens was intentionally lying. (This was backed by case law involving claims of "blackmail" to be judged more hyperbolic and rhetorical than alleging the commission of a crime. The two cases seem pretty different. Thin gruel, IMO.) Regardless, I can't help but think that Owens really did fail to state a claim. Stossel's claims are much tighter. He published two videos on Facebook, and both were "fact checked" by one particular organization. In the first video, Stossel claims that climate change, forestry management and other practices are each partly responsible for the 2020 CA wildfires to varying degrees. Per the complaint, the defendants then attached a "fact check" claiming that Stossel did not mention the effects of climate change on the fires. Stossel made efforts to contact the fact checking organization and interviewed two of the three employees who were listed as reviewers for his video. Neither of them had even seen the video, and each admitted after watching the video that it was factually accurate, though one later changed his mind after Stossel again contacted the manager of the organization. Moreover, the article cited as the reason for why Stossel's post was flagged lists climate change and forest management as two partial reasons for wildfires, quite similar to Stossel's actual claim. The second item in the complaint involves another video with a similar fact pattern. Stossel again secured an interview with one of the putative reviewers, who concluded the factual representations in the video were correct. IMO it's less damning than the first, but interesting if true. Stossel does seem to state a claim, he does seem to allege sufficient facts to prove actual malice (e.g. posting a fact check without reviewing the underlying material with reckless disregarding the truth). It's also only 25 pages with the relevant exhibits in the text, and tells a much clearer story as to why Stossel was injured by this. I still would give him long odds at winning, but he might actually survive a motion to dismiss and get to discovery. This one at least doesn't seem like a stupid publicity stunt. [0] https://docs.reclaimthenet.org/John-Stossel-vs-facebook.pdf https://docs.reclaimthenet.org/John-Stossel-vs-facebook.pdf [1] https://www.factcheckzuck.com/assets/10-19-2020-Owens-Complaint.pdf https://www.factcheckzuck.com/assets/10-19-2020-Owens-Compla...
lr4444lr 5y ago
I don't know from where you are getting that libel in most US states requires malice. IANAL, but I am pretty sure it's just saying something provable to be factually wrong that can be demonstrably linked as the precipitating cause to damages against the plaintiff.
- pvg 5y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_Times_Co._v._Sullivan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_Times_Co._v._Sullivan
- mongol 5y ago
  Fun fact. In Sweden, telling something truthful can be libel. A Swedish politician was sentenced for libel for pointing out, in a Facebook post, that a legal representative in a civil lawsuit she was involved with had earlier had been sentenced for a crime of sexual nature involving children. (I can't recall the details). This was a true fact, but since she said it with the intent to defame (according to the court) she was sentenced for defamation.
  - cafard 5y ago
    Under English common law, truth is no defense against libel. "Mansfield said it, it's true as the Bible,/The greater the truth, the greater the libel." But since late colonial times, American precedents allow truth as a defense.
  - oh_sigh 5y ago
    I'm sure there is not an exact equivalent between Swedish "defame" and English "defame", but wouldn't airing any negative news about a person be defamation? If Löfven was found sexually abusing a child in flagrante delicto, wouldn't it ruin his otherwise fairly good reputation to let the public know this fact?
    - mongol 5y ago
      It certainly would.

tschwimmer 5y ago

I feel like the malice standard makes libel essentially impossible to prove in the US. Are there any cases where malice has been proven? I imagine they would have had to look at private conversations by the accused indicated that they really didn't like alleged victim or something.

phrz 5y ago
"Actual malice" is a confusing term for a layperson because it doesn't mean what it sounds like. It doesn't mean "not liking" the plaintiff. Instead, it is the defendant's knowledge or reckless disregard of the statement's falsity.

Aerroon 5y ago

While this might not work in the US, it might work elsewhere. Other countries have legal protections for platforms from their users too, but that usually have lower standards for proving defamation of public figures than the US.

cafard 5y ago
That's why David Irving sued an American historian in England. It did him no good.

shkkmo 5y ago

> Stossel is getting press time by suing but he’s a public figure and suing Facebook because a fact checking service elicited an opinion/notation that didn’t have the nuance he wanted is laughable. Really? From his filing it sounds like Stossel has explicit evidence that the fact checkers admitted that he didn't make any false claims and still refused to correct their speech. We'll see if that counts as "deliberate malice" or no, but it does seem to be a case with much stronger claims than Owens'

mcguire 5y ago
On the other hand, from the evidence presented in the filing I would guess Facebook didn't act with deliberate malice; some automated or sound-bite-level manual system caught a bit of the video that did make a false statement and hit the label button. (I haven't seen the original video, but from what I have read I don't think it could be done without a "some people believe X but they're wrong" style statement, X being the false statement.) So the question is, does Facebook's gross incompetence at fact-checking satisfy the negligence part of the malice definition?

cblconfederate 5y ago

he s a journalist, like the fact-checkers, no? how does 'public figure' work? So, it's like a barber libeling another barber? (btw it's ridiculous to call them 'fact-checkers' -- all journalists are factcheckers, some are good some bad)

xxpor 5y ago
It's highly fact specific. "Determining who is a public or private figure is not always easy. In some instances, the categories may overlap. For example, a blogger who is a well-known authority on clinical research involving autism may be considered a public figure for purposes of controversies involving autism, but not for other purposes. " https://www.dmlp.org/legal-guide/proving-fault-actual-malice-and-negligence https://www.dmlp.org/legal-guide/proving-fault-actual-malice...
- filmgirlcw 5y ago
  This is correct, but by any standard or definition, Stossel is a public figure. He's a television host (and was a correspondent and then co-anchor for one of the biggest newsmagazine programs in the US), he's been an author, a syndicated columnist, he’s won 19 Emmys. He’s an incredibly famous libertarian (I would argue he was probably the most prominent libertarian commentator in the media until he left television). He's a public figure. The fact that he’s on this website with a headline that includes his name is proof that he’s a public figure. But yes, it can be very fact specific.
smoe 5y ago
In news organizations fact-checkers are separate roles or department to independently check the statements made by journalists in their work. It's an additional layer. Same as there are grammar and style checkers although journalist can write correctly, some better some worse. And journalists work is not limited to checking facts alone. At least that was the case before the checkers started to get fired to save cost because online you can easily change errors after publication.
- cblconfederate 5y ago

willis936 5y ago

>acting in reckless disregard Negligence is a motive. Considering the influence facebook has a compelling argument could be made on the chilling effects of a "sleepy code writer".

JPKab 5y ago

The fact checking services are wrong, a LOT. They are not ideologically neutral, particularly the ones used by Facebook. For a specific example of the abusive and censorious nature of this business model, see Glenn Greenwald's recent article on the subject, specifically in regards to the blanket denunciation of the New York Post's Hunter Biden laptop story as Russian disinformation. Greenwald isn't a right-wing hack, and in fact he is aggressively pro-Palestinian, anti-war, and has been a loud critic of Bolsonaro despite being a resident of Brazil. https://greenwald.substack.com/p/new-proof-emerges-of-the-biden-family https://greenwald.substack.com/p/new-proof-emerges-of-the-bi... Edit: Yes, a parade of downvotes without any refutations. Pay no attention to the fact that the guy in charge of censoring and fact checking operations at Facebook is a lifelong Democratic Party operative who literally worked for the Democratic House Majority PAC, and before that Senator Barbara Boxer, before going to work for Facebook. https://www.linkedin.com/in/andy-stone-7575b34a https://www.linkedin.com/in/andy-stone-7575b34a

justinzollars 5y ago
I'm receiving downvotes too, but keep sharing your thoughts with details! I provided a life experience based on changing political parties, and people obviously aren't comfortable that they have created an illiberal web.
gorwell 5y ago
Narrative violation detected. -4 applied to your social credit score. Have a good day, comrade.
kcplate 5y ago
> Greenwald isn't a right-wing hack, and in fact he is aggressively… Correct, he isn’t and technically more liberal than a lot of folks on the left, but then again the left is no longer liberal. He speaks truth to power without regard to political party/leaning and is therefore generally hated now by the left because he doesn’t follow the orthodoxy.

baryphonic 5y ago

> Stossel is getting press time by suing but he’s a public figure and suing Facebook because a fact checking service elicited an opinion/notation that didn’t have the nuance he wanted is laughable. If the facts alleged in Stossel's initial filing are true, they are fairly damning against the defendants[0]. The Candace Owens initial complaint, by contrast, is kind of a mess [1]. Re: Owens: One of her claims was that a manager at one of the defendant companies had once held a prominent position at CNN, and CNN has an obvious Democrat bias. Even if all of those things were true, the suit doesn't allege any sort of causal connection, not even "upon information or belief," between that claim and her being demonetized or otherwise sanctioned by Facebook. Her complaint was 50 pages long with 50 pages of exhibits, and yet a lot of it was used just to make political grandstanding statements. It just reads like a poorly-drafted lawsuit meant to generate publicity insofar as it exceeds a lawyer's duty not to file frivolous nonsense. For what it's worth, the judge also seems to kind of give Owens short shrift by asserting in his judgment that no reasonable person would conclude the words "hoax alert" and "false" attached to Owens' post imply that Owens was intentionally lying. (This was backed by case law involving claims of "blackmail" to be judged more hyperbolic and rhetorical than alleging the commission of a crime. The two cases seem pretty different. Thin gruel, IMO.) Regardless, I can't help but think that Owens really did fail to state a claim. Stossel's claims are much tighter. He published two videos on Facebook, and both were "fact checked" by one particular organization. In the first video, Stossel claims that climate change, forestry management and other practices are each partly responsible for the 2020 CA wildfires to varying degrees. Per the complaint, the defendants then attached a "fact check" claiming that Stossel did not mention the effects of climate change on the fires. Stossel made efforts to contact the fact checking organization and interviewed two of the three employees who were listed as reviewers for his video. Neither of them had even seen the video, and each admitted after watching the video that it was factually accurate, though one later changed his mind after Stossel again contacted the manager of the organization. Moreover, the article cited as the reason for why Stossel's post was flagged lists climate change and forest management as two partial reasons for wildfires, quite similar to Stossel's actual claim. The second item in the complaint involves another video with a similar fact pattern. Stossel again secured an interview with one of the putative reviewers, who concluded the factual representations in the video were correct. IMO it's less damning than the first, but interesting if true. Stossel does seem to state a claim, he does seem to allege sufficient facts to prove actual malice (e.g. posting a fact check without reviewing the underlying material with reckless disregarding the truth). It's also only 25 pages with the relevant exhibits in the text, and tells a much clearer story as to why Stossel was injured by this. I still would give him long odds at winning, but he might actually survive a motion to dismiss and get to discovery. This one at least doesn't seem like a stupid publicity stunt. [0] https://docs.reclaimthenet.org/John-Stossel-vs-facebook.pdf https://docs.reclaimthenet.org/John-Stossel-vs-facebook.pdf [1] https://www.factcheckzuck.com/assets/10-19-2020-Owens-Complaint.pdf https://www.factcheckzuck.com/assets/10-19-2020-Owens-Compla...

lr4444lr 5y ago

I don't know from where you are getting that libel in most US states requires malice. IANAL, but I am pretty sure it's just saying something provable to be factually wrong that can be demonstrably linked as the precipitating cause to damages against the plaintiff.

pvg 5y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_Times_Co._v._Sullivan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_Times_Co._v._Sullivan
mongol 5y ago
Fun fact. In Sweden, telling something truthful can be libel. A Swedish politician was sentenced for libel for pointing out, in a Facebook post, that a legal representative in a civil lawsuit she was involved with had earlier had been sentenced for a crime of sexual nature involving children. (I can't recall the details). This was a true fact, but since she said it with the intent to defame (according to the court) she was sentenced for defamation.
- cafard 5y ago
  Under English common law, truth is no defense against libel. "Mansfield said it, it's true as the Bible,/The greater the truth, the greater the libel." But since late colonial times, American precedents allow truth as a defense.
- oh_sigh 5y ago
  I'm sure there is not an exact equivalent between Swedish "defame" and English "defame", but wouldn't airing any negative news about a person be defamation? If Löfven was found sexually abusing a child in flagrante delicto, wouldn't it ruin his otherwise fairly good reputation to let the public know this fact?
  - mongol 5y ago
    It certainly would.