Mother Sues After Bebo Story Hits Press

slick_shoes notes a story out of England: a woman named Amanda Hudson is suing six national newspapers for defamation and breach of privacy after they ran stories based on her 15-year-old daughter's exaggerated claims about her party, published on her Bebo site. The party was held at the family's £4m villa in Spain, and the daughter's account claimed that jewelery had been stolen and furniture and a television set thrown into the swimming pool; in addition there were claims of sex and drug use. The mother says that this was all falsehood and exaggeration. A number of newspapers picked up claims and photos from Bebo and ran them nationally. From the article: "The case is expected to have far-reaching consequences for third parties who use or publish information from social networking sites. Lawyers say it could place a duty on all second-hand users to establish the truth of everything they want to republish from such sites."

Comments

Editors?

[TheSkyIsPurple]

> Lawyers say it could place a duty on all second-hand users to establish the truth of everything they want to republish from such sites

Isn't that what newspaper reporters and editors are for?

Re:Editors?

[spun]

Fact checking is so last century. In the NEW and CONNECTED world of WEB 2.0, flash-mobs in the blogosphere fact check everything for you!

Re:Editors?

[Joe the Lesser]

That reminds me of how Fox News is constantly discussing crazy online rumors as if they were credible facts.

'Reports say that Obama has a taste for kittens! What a devastating blow to his campaign! Surely he will lose ground in the animal rights voting bloc. We'll cover this next on our 3 hour special "Barack-uriosity Killed the Cat."'

Hannity comes in: "So is the cat out of the bag on the Obama campaign? MySpace reports....." and so on and so forth

Re:Editors?

[Spuds]

You'd think that having incorrect information would tend to dissuade customers from parting with their money

You'd think, but sadly, no.

Re:Editors?

[Bloke down the pub]

You'd think that having incorrect information would tend to dissuade customers from parting with their money

If that was true most of the tabloids would have gone bankrupt years ago.

Re:Editors?

[Bloke down the pub]

Tabloids occasionally print the truth.

A stopped clock is occasionally right.

And they occasionally do fact checking... more than can be said for the "establishment" mouthpieces that are the newspapers and media "outlets" of today.

Do you find that when you say that face to face, people nod as if they agree with you, then their eyes sort of glaze over, then they start glancing at their watch and ... umm, gotta go - dental appointment!

Re:Editors?

[Zemran]

You are argueing with someone that cannot get through 3 words without swearing about what is insightful??? You will not last long here :-))

would it make a difference

[Altus]

If they had written a story about the blog entry?

It seems to me that you couldnt possibly get in trouble for saying "According to her blog on myspace.com little suzy rich girls party got out of hand and someone threw a TV out the window"

I mean, thats certainly a true statement. If that would be acceptable to print without verifying the truth of the actual event then this isnt going to have much of an impact one way or another.

Personally I dont like the idea of a news paper regurgitating a blog as truth. Its one thing to refer to the blog, they way you might refer to another publication (ie "ABC news called florida for bush at 10:30").

typical irresonsible parent

[speedtux]

The only relevant fact that newspapers needed to check was that it was actually the 15-year old daughter that put it up for the world to see. Other than that, as the legal guardian, if the mother didn't want her daughter to post this information, she should have been a better parent.

There might actually be a case others have against the mother for defamation of character, since she is responsible for the actions of her daughter, and her daughter might have defamed them.

I wish parents would stop blaming other people for their own failings. Until their children come off age, what the kids do and what happens to the kids is the parents' sole responsibility.

I can see the headlines now...

[FlyingSquidStudios]

Bebo Babe's Barcelona Bash: Burglary, Buggery, Breaking

Freedom of speech doesn't mean freedom to BS

[Madman]

Newspapers have always had the responsibility to verify their stories, why should that change simply because the information's off the web?

Re:What an age we live in.

[daedae]

Although it's true the papers should have fact-checked... isn't the daughter ultimately the one responsible for the false information? I guess suing one's own, minor, daughter probably doesn't make the same ch-ching sound.

Re:Rich teenage girl parties are news?

[pha7boy]

The fact that newspapers published the account is not "news for nerds." The story is just background for what actually is important news - namely that there could be precedent in the UK for holding news organizations accountable for publishing second hand information without fact checking.

I wonder if the "compromise" will be that from now on newspapers will add "as reported on [insert blog name here]" on every such story meaning that they would pass responsibility for accuracy to the original source.