6 ms·

When Truth Survives Free Speech

deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
droithomme 15y ago
Having, like the NYT journalist, read the decision and various information about the case, I take almost the opposite tack. It's not the ruling on whether she is a journalist that is irrelevant, that's actually the key point. The person probably did engage in defamation. The problem is the judge used this case to make a wide ranging and unnecessary determination that bloggers are not journalists because they don't work for big traditional organizations like the NYT. Now the NYT, the employer of the author of this article, is, like many traditional media organizations, financially threatened by independent bloggers who have been gaining massive traction and readership over the last decade that draws away from traditional large media. The publisher and supporters of giant consolidated media are threatened by loss of consolidated points of media control which special interests can leverage. Completely independent journalists, including many bloggers, have been threatening the status quo for some time. Overreaching court rulings that only those working for corporate agencies are "legitimate" certainly serve the interests of those in power. Whether the independent journalist/blogger in question was guilty of defamation didn't require such a finding about their status as a journalist so the decision is certainly overreaching. On the issue of the Oregon Shield Law, the judge certainly misrepresented it since by stating (exact quote from ORS 44.510) "'Medium of communication' has its ordinary meaning and includes, but is not limited to, any newspaper, magazine or other periodical, book, pamphlet, news service, wire service, news or feature syndicate, broadcast station or network, or cable television system.", it says INCLUDES BUT IS NOT LIMITED TO, in its definition of "Mediums of Communication". The definition of "medium of communication" is critical because in ORS 44.520 the law reads "No person connected with, employed by or engaged in any medium of communication to the public shall be required by a legislative, executive or judicial officer or body, or any other authority having power to compel testimony or the production of evidence, to disclose, by subpoena or otherwise..." Not just employed by, but connected with or engaged in any medium of communication to the public. Any reasonable reading of this law will include independent journalists and bloggers. Full text of Oregon Shield law: http://www.orenews.com/web/legal/shieldslaw.php http://www.orenews.com/web/legal/shieldslaw.php
- ChuckMcM 15y ago
  If the NY Times has the right facts I'm wondering if the judge was trying to give Mr. Padrick some justice. Anyone know what Oregon's shield law has to say about magazines that are defamatory?
  - RyanMcGreal 15y ago
    The shield law "do[es] not apply with respect to the content or source of allegedly defamatory information, in civil action for defamation wherein the defendant asserts a defense based on the content or source of such information."
- andylei 15y ago
  how are shield laws relevant? shield laws protect journalists sources from subpoenas; they don't give blanket protection against defamation
  - _delirium 15y ago
    That's the point, I think: the judge shouldn't have decided the question of whether the shield law applied to bloggers, because it wouldn't have provided a shield in this case anyway. edit: Though come to think of it, maybe the judge though that was the easier question (wrongly, imo), and so looked at it in the other direction: since we can decide that bloggers aren't journalists, we don't need to unnecessarily decide the question of what behavior the Oregon Shield Law shields.
  - 2arrs2ells 15y ago
    "Oregon law provides special legal protections against defamation lawsuits to journalists associated with traditional media outlets. Such publications are immune from defamation suits unless the defamed individual first requests a retraction. Journalists at recognized media outlets are also protected from revealing confidential sources. Cox argued that she was eligible for protection under both provisions and asked the judge to set aside the verdict." From http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/12/judge-blogger-not-eligible-for-oregon-media-shield-law.ars http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/12/judge-blogge...
danso 15y ago
Carr ends with: >> Then again, I’ve got some institutional muscle when it comes to how I’m perceived on the Web. All Mr. Padrick had was his good reputation. Too bad there’s no algorithm to measure truth. I know he's a writer and needs to end with a real zinger, but it's a cheap shot against algorithms and their role in helping us make correct assessments. 1. There are algorithms which can gauge truth and accuracy. There's few modern psychological theories so consistently proven than how algorithms can outperform experts in making judgements. 2. Despite a blanket dismissal of algorithms in general, Carr is of course taking issue with companies like Google. Ignoring that truth-judgement over a body of data as diverse as the web is going to be a very, very tricky problem for computers and humans... is the Google search engine's only directive to find "truth"? Ideally, the top search results contain the truth, but Google makes a philosophical judgment that other factors (such as link popularity and location) need to be considered when retrieving the most relevant results...because relevance is easier and safer to judge than truth. In the same vein, the New York Times would like to say that the advertisements they run all contain truth. But truthiness is not the main criteria they use when deciding which ads to run: advertisements are printed because companies/interest groups/candidates put their money behind it.
- byrneseyeview 15y ago
  Are there really algorithms for judging the truth? I think the closest we can get is heuristics for identifying whether or not something is being actively deceptive, but it's a big epistemological leap to say that we can definitely determine truth in an algorithmic way. Google is very good in these situations, but Google has a hard time differentiating between a popular movement and a single determined astroturfer. I'm sure Google would rather display a commitment to good journalism ("You want to know about topic X? Here's what people are saying about it.") rather than a pursuit of the truth, at least when it comes to organic results.
  - danso 15y ago
    Sure, if the thing to be judged has a limited number of inputs and factors and outcomes...which is something that does not apply to the content of the Web, of course. But in other cases where the answer is basically, "yes" or "no"...if an algorithm chooses the right answer, doesn't that count as truth? Take for example, the Apgar score, which consists of giving a newborn a score of 0 to 2 for five categories: complexion, pulse rate, reflex, muscle tone, and breathing. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apgar_score http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apgar_score A baby that scores 8 is considered to be doing well. A baby with just 5 merits additional examination. This simple numerical score is credited with revolutionizing obstetric medicine and is still used today, even though it was first published in 1953. http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2006/10/09/061009fa_fact?currentPage=all http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2006/10/09/061009fa_fact?cu... I guess it's debatable whether this counts as an "algorithm"...but it involves the mechanical evaluation of a "score", with set guidelines for when such score is dangerously low. The fact that the scoring is done through human judgment is peripheral to the matter...it's not hard to imagine a machine being able to perform the same test (perhaps more accurately) were it cost-practical to build such a machine. One more interesting note: The Apgar score was not developed by an expert. It was developed by a female doctor who had never delivered a baby (nor had a baby) herself, but felt that doctors were giving up too quickly on sick babies.
djackria 15y ago
I dont know... http://dicka-berbagi.blogspot.com/2011/12/c.html http://dicka-berbagi.blogspot.com/2011/12/c.html
darksaga 15y ago
I think the more interesting part of this is why Google has allowed this woman to manipulate the SERP's in order to bash this guy for so long. They usually have an itchy trigger finger when it comes to burying sites like hers for using keyword stuffing and other questionable SEO techniques. Likewise, I'm surprised Mr. Padrick never contacted Google to have these pages removed either. Had either Google or Mr. Padrick done their due diligence, I hardly think this case would have gotten as far as it did.
- drinkzima 15y ago
  Google doesn't editorialize. What do you mean allowed?
  - MartinCron 15y ago
    Observing gratuitous link-stuffing and content farming as such isn't editorializing.
  - zem 15y ago
    it's not a questionn of editorialisation; it's whether one person using bad-faith seo tactics can manipulate front-page results like cox did.
    - chc 15y ago
      It's not entirely clear to me that what she was doing was SEO. I mean, if repetition and overuse of style tags is all that's necessary to be accused of keyword stuffing, we'd have to acknowledge the Time Cube guy as the father of modern SEO. And anyway, it doesn't require a lot of Google love to rank for the query "Kevin Padrick of Obsidian Finance Group." That's about as long-tail as it gets.
MortonL 15y ago
And this is why I stopped reading Mashable. They should have done research ( like the NYTimes did) before publishing their story. Pete, publishing first doesn't make you guys a news organization- unbiased writing, research, and accuracy do.
losethos 15y ago
Ask yourself why your life sucks. It's because God is just.
lisper 15y ago
"She didn’t so much report stories as use blogging, invective and search engine optimization to create an alternative reality." And "real" media outlets NEVER do that. Oh, wait...
wingo 15y ago
It may well be defamation. The courts should definitely look at it, after they examine the case of the NYT selling the U.S. a war. (Which one? All of them, actually.) I know this sounds facile, but it does indicate the kind of journalism cases that the court is interested in.
- MartinCron 15y ago
  The court is interested in cases that are brought to them. It's hard for anyone to have standing in suing the NYT for not doing enough due diligence leading up to the war(s).
  - wingo 15y ago
    Point granted, though it is also true that financial investors are interested in bringing cases. I'm still left with a bad taste in my mouth; maybe it's a gut reaction to side with the weaker party. Or perhaps I'm just being contrarian.
    - danso 15y ago
      Nothing wrong with being contrarian, but this is just a cheap rhetorical tactic that turns a legitimate, specific debate into less useful clashing of egos and worldviews. How is: "Well, look how the New York Times editorial board in 2003 incited the entire country into war" ...a legit rebuttal to: "A 2011 columnist for the New York Times points out that a blogger was primarily engaged in defamatory speech and so shouldn't be given the legal protections afforded to journalists." ?
lywald 15y ago
I don't think it surprises anyone, and it didn't require a 2-pages analysis. After reading one line on her blog everybody realized she's either crazy or trying to scam. But I don't think it justifies a $2M fine...
smoyer 15y ago
I don't believe that journalists are shielded from defamation and libel laws either ... So the judge's ruling must just mean she's a lousy writer?
spodek 15y ago
Perhaps beside the point, but part of journalism is good writing and the topic of the article includes writing quality. "... turned out to be a MacGuffin, a detail that was very much beside the point..." -- is the reporter showing off he knows the word MacGuffin? He simply defines it immediately afterward making the word needless. As Strunk and White says, "Avoid fancy words: Avoid the elaborate, the pretentious, the coy, and the cute. Do not be tempted by a twenty-dollar word when there is a ten-center handy, ready and able. Then "Even a broken clock is right twice a day, but there is nothing in Mr. Padrick’s professional history or the public record that I found to suggest he is any of those things..." ... using old cliches doesn't help either. It just adds words with no meaning.
mcantor 15y ago
I honestly do not understand this constant back-and-forth about credibility and validity between "real journalists" and "bloggers". It's as if "real journalists" are some kind of supernatural entity that descend from the universe of Platonic truths to dispense objective information which we can internalize and process without further judgment. Journalists and bloggers share a fatal flaw: They're human. Someone signs their paychecks. They have goals, dreams, and motives. Who cares whether they're a "journalist" or not? What difference does it make?
- brc 15y ago
  Exactly. I see so many journalists complaining about blogs. And I ask : if you're so underappreciated, why not start your own blog? Journalists insist they have the training and wave memberships and credentials around as if they mean anything more than paying dues and agreeing with other people. When any cursory examination of media will find it riddled with errors, not only of the typographical kind, but of the completely-incorrect-facts kind. It's just like any other industry that starts to get threatened by disruption from new technology - all the new people coming in are 'unworthy' 'wrong' and 'bad for the industry'. If you ever want to hear a tale of woe, talk to an old-school photographer about digital cameras and the explosion of part-time hobbyists who do a little bit of work on the side with their $500 SLR. In reality they are all people just trying to make their way in the world using whatever means they can.
AndyKelley 15y ago
This may sound a bit radical, but I'm not even sure I want the government stepping in and doing anything about libel. It's already true that you can't trust everything you read, and this includes articles from "official" journalism institutions. It does hurt to have your reputation damaged, though. That's a tradeoff that is a bit disconcerting, but may be worth it in order to have a more strict, black-and-white definition of what the government can and cannot censor. The more things that the government is legally able to censor, the more subjective freedom of speech becomes, and the more it gets in danger.
- Lukeas14 15y ago
  Defamation has always been an exception to free speech. It is also not a criminal offense so the government doesn't have the ability to use it for censorship. Cox is still free to write what she wants without repercussions from the government. Being a civil case all the plaintiff had to do was prove the defendant maliciously inflicted significant harm to his reputation in order to be awarded a monetary judgement.
  - forensic 15y ago
    The real issue here is not so much the defamation, which happens all the time, but the nature of Google, which gives this lady a giant amplifier for no good reason.
curiouskat 15y ago
How is that different that Glenn Beck going after Google in "unaccountable ways"? (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/17/glenn-beck-google-soros_n_824446.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/17/glenn-beck-google-s..., http://www.foxnews.com/on-air/glenn-beck/transcript/beck-three-reasons-be-wary-google http://www.foxnews.com/on-air/glenn-beck/transcript/beck-thr...)
mathattack 15y ago
It's a tangent, but David Carr is an interesting bird, spanning both old and post-Twitter journalism. You can get some insights on him in the recent NY Times documentary -> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Page_One:_Inside_the_New_York_Times http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Page_One:_Inside_the_New_York_T...
niels_olson 15y ago
So, my ears pick up every few days while listening to NPR on the way to work when reputation.com assures me as a physician that they can "delete unwanted information from the internet". Has anyone had any experience with this or another company?

deleted 15y ago

[deleted]

Having, like the NYT journalist, read the decision and various information about the case, I take almost the opposite tack. It's not the ruling on whether she is a journalist that is irrelevant, that's actually the key point. The person probably did engage in defamation. The problem is the judge used this case to make a wide ranging and unnecessary determination that bloggers are not journalists because they don't work for big traditional organizations like the NYT. Now the NYT, the employer of the author of this article, is, like many traditional media organizations, financially threatened by independent bloggers who have been gaining massive traction and readership over the last decade that draws away from traditional large media. The publisher and supporters of giant consolidated media are threatened by loss of consolidated points of media control which special interests can leverage. Completely independent journalists, including many bloggers, have been threatening the status quo for some time. Overreaching court rulings that only those working for corporate agencies are "legitimate" certainly serve the interests of those in power. Whether the independent journalist/blogger in question was guilty of defamation didn't require such a finding about their status as a journalist so the decision is certainly overreaching. On the issue of the Oregon Shield Law, the judge certainly misrepresented it since by stating (exact quote from ORS 44.510) "'Medium of communication' has its ordinary meaning and includes, but is not limited to, any newspaper, magazine or other periodical, book, pamphlet, news service, wire service, news or feature syndicate, broadcast station or network, or cable television system.", it says INCLUDES BUT IS NOT LIMITED TO, in its definition of "Mediums of Communication". The definition of "medium of communication" is critical because in ORS 44.520 the law reads "No person connected with, employed by or engaged in any medium of communication to the public shall be required by a legislative, executive or judicial officer or body, or any other authority having power to compel testimony or the production of evidence, to disclose, by subpoena or otherwise..." Not just employed by, but connected with or engaged in any medium of communication to the public. Any reasonable reading of this law will include independent journalists and bloggers. Full text of Oregon Shield law: http://www.orenews.com/web/legal/shieldslaw.php http://www.orenews.com/web/legal/shieldslaw.php

ChuckMcM 15y ago
If the NY Times has the right facts I'm wondering if the judge was trying to give Mr. Padrick some justice. Anyone know what Oregon's shield law has to say about magazines that are defamatory?
- RyanMcGreal 15y ago
  The shield law "do[es] not apply with respect to the content or source of allegedly defamatory information, in civil action for defamation wherein the defendant asserts a defense based on the content or source of such information."
andylei 15y ago
how are shield laws relevant? shield laws protect journalists sources from subpoenas; they don't give blanket protection against defamation
- _delirium 15y ago
  That's the point, I think: the judge shouldn't have decided the question of whether the shield law applied to bloggers, because it wouldn't have provided a shield in this case anyway. edit: Though come to think of it, maybe the judge though that was the easier question (wrongly, imo), and so looked at it in the other direction: since we can decide that bloggers aren't journalists, we don't need to unnecessarily decide the question of what behavior the Oregon Shield Law shields.
- 2arrs2ells 15y ago
  "Oregon law provides special legal protections against defamation lawsuits to journalists associated with traditional media outlets. Such publications are immune from defamation suits unless the defamed individual first requests a retraction. Journalists at recognized media outlets are also protected from revealing confidential sources. Cox argued that she was eligible for protection under both provisions and asked the judge to set aside the verdict." From http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/12/judge-blogger-not-eligible-for-oregon-media-shield-law.ars http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/12/judge-blogge...

danso 15y ago

Carr ends with: >> Then again, I’ve got some institutional muscle when it comes to how I’m perceived on the Web. All Mr. Padrick had was his good reputation. Too bad there’s no algorithm to measure truth. I know he's a writer and needs to end with a real zinger, but it's a cheap shot against algorithms and their role in helping us make correct assessments. 1. There are algorithms which can gauge truth and accuracy. There's few modern psychological theories so consistently proven than how algorithms can outperform experts in making judgements. 2. Despite a blanket dismissal of algorithms in general, Carr is of course taking issue with companies like Google. Ignoring that truth-judgement over a body of data as diverse as the web is going to be a very, very tricky problem for computers and humans... is the Google search engine's only directive to find "truth"? Ideally, the top search results contain the truth, but Google makes a philosophical judgment that other factors (such as link popularity and location) need to be considered when retrieving the most relevant results...because relevance is easier and safer to judge than truth. In the same vein, the New York Times would like to say that the advertisements they run all contain truth. But truthiness is not the main criteria they use when deciding which ads to run: advertisements are printed because companies/interest groups/candidates put their money behind it.

byrneseyeview 15y ago
Are there really algorithms for judging the truth? I think the closest we can get is heuristics for identifying whether or not something is being actively deceptive, but it's a big epistemological leap to say that we can definitely determine truth in an algorithmic way. Google is very good in these situations, but Google has a hard time differentiating between a popular movement and a single determined astroturfer. I'm sure Google would rather display a commitment to good journalism ("You want to know about topic X? Here's what people are saying about it.") rather than a pursuit of the truth, at least when it comes to organic results.
- danso 15y ago
  Sure, if the thing to be judged has a limited number of inputs and factors and outcomes...which is something that does not apply to the content of the Web, of course. But in other cases where the answer is basically, "yes" or "no"...if an algorithm chooses the right answer, doesn't that count as truth? Take for example, the Apgar score, which consists of giving a newborn a score of 0 to 2 for five categories: complexion, pulse rate, reflex, muscle tone, and breathing. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apgar_score http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apgar_score A baby that scores 8 is considered to be doing well. A baby with just 5 merits additional examination. This simple numerical score is credited with revolutionizing obstetric medicine and is still used today, even though it was first published in 1953. http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2006/10/09/061009fa_fact?currentPage=all http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2006/10/09/061009fa_fact?cu... I guess it's debatable whether this counts as an "algorithm"...but it involves the mechanical evaluation of a "score", with set guidelines for when such score is dangerously low. The fact that the scoring is done through human judgment is peripheral to the matter...it's not hard to imagine a machine being able to perform the same test (perhaps more accurately) were it cost-practical to build such a machine. One more interesting note: The Apgar score was not developed by an expert. It was developed by a female doctor who had never delivered a baby (nor had a baby) herself, but felt that doctors were giving up too quickly on sick babies.

djackria 15y ago

I dont know... http://dicka-berbagi.blogspot.com/2011/12/c.html http://dicka-berbagi.blogspot.com/2011/12/c.html

darksaga 15y ago

I think the more interesting part of this is why Google has allowed this woman to manipulate the SERP's in order to bash this guy for so long. They usually have an itchy trigger finger when it comes to burying sites like hers for using keyword stuffing and other questionable SEO techniques. Likewise, I'm surprised Mr. Padrick never contacted Google to have these pages removed either. Had either Google or Mr. Padrick done their due diligence, I hardly think this case would have gotten as far as it did.

drinkzima 15y ago
Google doesn't editorialize. What do you mean allowed?
- MartinCron 15y ago
  Observing gratuitous link-stuffing and content farming as such isn't editorializing.
- zem 15y ago
  it's not a questionn of editorialisation; it's whether one person using bad-faith seo tactics can manipulate front-page results like cox did.
  - chc 15y ago
    It's not entirely clear to me that what she was doing was SEO. I mean, if repetition and overuse of style tags is all that's necessary to be accused of keyword stuffing, we'd have to acknowledge the Time Cube guy as the father of modern SEO. And anyway, it doesn't require a lot of Google love to rank for the query "Kevin Padrick of Obsidian Finance Group." That's about as long-tail as it gets.

MortonL 15y ago

And this is why I stopped reading Mashable. They should have done research ( like the NYTimes did) before publishing their story. Pete, publishing first doesn't make you guys a news organization- unbiased writing, research, and accuracy do.

losethos 15y ago

Ask yourself why your life sucks. It's because God is just.

lisper 15y ago

"She didn’t so much report stories as use blogging, invective and search engine optimization to create an alternative reality." And "real" media outlets NEVER do that. Oh, wait...

wingo 15y ago

It may well be defamation. The courts should definitely look at it, after they examine the case of the NYT selling the U.S. a war. (Which one? All of them, actually.) I know this sounds facile, but it does indicate the kind of journalism cases that the court is interested in.

MartinCron 15y ago
The court is interested in cases that are brought to them. It's hard for anyone to have standing in suing the NYT for not doing enough due diligence leading up to the war(s).
- wingo 15y ago
  Point granted, though it is also true that financial investors are interested in bringing cases. I'm still left with a bad taste in my mouth; maybe it's a gut reaction to side with the weaker party. Or perhaps I'm just being contrarian.
  - danso 15y ago
    Nothing wrong with being contrarian, but this is just a cheap rhetorical tactic that turns a legitimate, specific debate into less useful clashing of egos and worldviews. How is: "Well, look how the New York Times editorial board in 2003 incited the entire country into war" ...a legit rebuttal to: "A 2011 columnist for the New York Times points out that a blogger was primarily engaged in defamatory speech and so shouldn't be given the legal protections afforded to journalists." ?

lywald 15y ago

I don't think it surprises anyone, and it didn't require a 2-pages analysis. After reading one line on her blog everybody realized she's either crazy or trying to scam. But I don't think it justifies a $2M fine...

smoyer 15y ago

I don't believe that journalists are shielded from defamation and libel laws either ... So the judge's ruling must just mean she's a lousy writer?

spodek 15y ago

Perhaps beside the point, but part of journalism is good writing and the topic of the article includes writing quality. "... turned out to be a MacGuffin, a detail that was very much beside the point..." -- is the reporter showing off he knows the word MacGuffin? He simply defines it immediately afterward making the word needless. As Strunk and White says, "Avoid fancy words: Avoid the elaborate, the pretentious, the coy, and the cute. Do not be tempted by a twenty-dollar word when there is a ten-center handy, ready and able. Then "Even a broken clock is right twice a day, but there is nothing in Mr. Padrick’s professional history or the public record that I found to suggest he is any of those things..." ... using old cliches doesn't help either. It just adds words with no meaning.

mcantor 15y ago

I honestly do not understand this constant back-and-forth about credibility and validity between "real journalists" and "bloggers". It's as if "real journalists" are some kind of supernatural entity that descend from the universe of Platonic truths to dispense objective information which we can internalize and process without further judgment. Journalists and bloggers share a fatal flaw: They're human. Someone signs their paychecks. They have goals, dreams, and motives. Who cares whether they're a "journalist" or not? What difference does it make?

brc 15y ago
Exactly. I see so many journalists complaining about blogs. And I ask : if you're so underappreciated, why not start your own blog? Journalists insist they have the training and wave memberships and credentials around as if they mean anything more than paying dues and agreeing with other people. When any cursory examination of media will find it riddled with errors, not only of the typographical kind, but of the completely-incorrect-facts kind. It's just like any other industry that starts to get threatened by disruption from new technology - all the new people coming in are 'unworthy' 'wrong' and 'bad for the industry'. If you ever want to hear a tale of woe, talk to an old-school photographer about digital cameras and the explosion of part-time hobbyists who do a little bit of work on the side with their $500 SLR. In reality they are all people just trying to make their way in the world using whatever means they can.

AndyKelley 15y ago

This may sound a bit radical, but I'm not even sure I want the government stepping in and doing anything about libel. It's already true that you can't trust everything you read, and this includes articles from "official" journalism institutions. It does hurt to have your reputation damaged, though. That's a tradeoff that is a bit disconcerting, but may be worth it in order to have a more strict, black-and-white definition of what the government can and cannot censor. The more things that the government is legally able to censor, the more subjective freedom of speech becomes, and the more it gets in danger.

Lukeas14 15y ago
Defamation has always been an exception to free speech. It is also not a criminal offense so the government doesn't have the ability to use it for censorship. Cox is still free to write what she wants without repercussions from the government. Being a civil case all the plaintiff had to do was prove the defendant maliciously inflicted significant harm to his reputation in order to be awarded a monetary judgement.
- forensic 15y ago
  The real issue here is not so much the defamation, which happens all the time, but the nature of Google, which gives this lady a giant amplifier for no good reason.

curiouskat 15y ago

How is that different that Glenn Beck going after Google in "unaccountable ways"? (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/17/glenn-beck-google-soros_n_824446.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/17/glenn-beck-google-s..., http://www.foxnews.com/on-air/glenn-beck/transcript/beck-three-reasons-be-wary-google http://www.foxnews.com/on-air/glenn-beck/transcript/beck-thr...)

mathattack 15y ago

It's a tangent, but David Carr is an interesting bird, spanning both old and post-Twitter journalism. You can get some insights on him in the recent NY Times documentary -> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Page_One:_Inside_the_New_York_Times http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Page_One:_Inside_the_New_York_T...

niels_olson 15y ago

So, my ears pick up every few days while listening to NPR on the way to work when reputation.com assures me as a physician that they can "delete unwanted information from the internet". Has anyone had any experience with this or another company?