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8 Yelp Reviewers Hit With $1.2 Million Defamation Suits
New submitter goodboi writes: A Silicon Valley building contractor is suing 8 of its critics over the reviews they posted on Yelp. The negative reviews were filtered out by Yelp's secretive ranking system, but in court documents filed earlier this month, Link Corporation claims that the bad publicity cost over $165,000 in lost business.
I wish I could sue those "image management" services that post fake positive reviews.
But what if it isn't? What if its 8 different honest reviews? Does their privacy get eviscerated because some corp has money for lawyers?
It sounds like he is pretty sure they are false, so yes, libel trumps privacy in this case. If the reviews are honest they can go to court and request to be dropped from the suit if named or provide proof to Yelp and ask not to be unmasked.My guess and TFA indicate he has agog idea who it is based on work he has done but needs Yelp to verify who did it prior to naming them.
And $8m for $165k damages? CA is a failed state.
Actual and punitive damages. He can ask but may not get anywhere near that number.
Personally, this sounds like a project that, for whatever reason, went south and rather than cut their losses one side decided to get revenge and is now finding out that may not have been a good idea.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
How can you tell? Just because the plaintiff says so? Some of those reviews look legit and yes a few look fake. I notice he doesn't complain about the obviously fake good reviews (how does a company in Cali get a positive review from a teen in New Jersey.)
I like how he got Yelp to remove EVERY bad review, and some of those are very obvioulsy not fake.
I know we all like to hate yelp but this guy really seems to be gaming the system.
Sorry, teleporters just kill you and then make a copy. A perfect, soul-less copy.
1. Freedom of speech is a government thing.
That rejoinder gets tossed around quite a bit. While it is technically true, it's misleading--the First Amendment (along with the rest of the Constitution) does inform the standards by which private conduct is judged.
The Supreme Court in Hepps decided that not only is truth an absolute defense to defamation*, but also that the burden is on the plaintiff to prove the defendant's statements are false (ie presumption of truth). This is contrary to old English common law (presumption of falsity) and a direct result of First Amendment protection.
For the same reason you have to prove actual malice in the case of a public figure (Sullivan), and are protected from foreign judgments that would be contrary to the 1st Amendment (2010 SPEECH Act).
Other amendments also have things to say about private conduct. In Shelley, SCOTUS applied the for-government-only 14th Amendment to racially restrictive property covenants. It may be a contract between two private parties, but enforcement of a contract or judgment is a government thing.
*Public interest/public figure, if we're being exact.
Nothing posted to
So those 8 may or may not be fake (one in particular looks to be a possibly valid review, but hard to know). Why were the other 9 removed as well. Funny that ALL his bad reviews were removed when only 8 are actionable. (but you know the obviously fake good review stays up. Hard for a California construction company to get a valid review from some kid in Princeton, NJ.)
Sorry, teleporters just kill you and then make a copy. A perfect, soul-less copy.