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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.
They claim that each defendant cost them the *entire amount* of one lost job. Is that a thing? If I had 100 bad Yelp reviews and it cost me a $1000 job, could I claim $1000 from each of them for $100,000?
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
It's already illegal to intentionally make false statements in writing for the purpose of causing harm. It's called Libel, and it's not new. This is not an "on the internet" law, this is just a law.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
There is a difference between "I think these guys suck" and "These guys ripped me off." The first is always free speech since it is an opinion. The second is a fact and is only legal to say if it is true.
1. Freedom of speech is a government thing.
2. Freedom of speech does not mean freedom from the consequences of such speech. Whether you're Anita Sarkeesian, the Dixie Chicks or Sir Tim Hunt - anything you say can and will be used against you in the court of public opinion - and potentially in the court of law if a target of your speech feels that your speech crossed the boundary into libel / slander / defamation.
In this particular case, the business owner believes that the reviews are malicious, fake, the act of a single person, etc. etc. (read the actual document). Now it's up to the court to decide whether or not Yelp will have to notify the author(s) of those reviews, or hand over personal information directly, etc.
What ever happened to free speech?
You should read the article. If this is what they claim it is it might be contract trolls operating out of some shithole in the Philippines, Russia, Eastern Europe, Nigeria or some other overseas location. There are companies over there that dozens of people working a full time job at 'liking' , 'tweeting' and creating false friend and follower lists. I'm pretty sure you can also hire them to wreck your competitor's Yelp page with a cleverly timed surge of poor reviews. I'm all for free speech but stuff like that is just wrong.
Are you relating two seperate issues or does the EPA ruling have something to do with Free Speech?
Also, you think buisnesses should be bound by the 1st ammendment? Do you understand the point of the Bill Of Rights and what it was suppose to be limiting (Goverment..)
Once it was deemed to interfere with commercial activity it got trumped.
Somewhere along the line it became illegal to say "I hired this company and they gave shitty service".
No it didn't, at least not if the statement is factual. Given how Yelp is the 8 defendants may well be competitors who were just trying to knock the competition down a couple of notches.
I see crap like that all the time on smaller businesses around here with which I am familiar. There'll be 5-star ratings that look like they were written by an employee and then 1-star ratings that look like they were written by someone who's never been there.
Do you have ESP?
I know, I know who reads TFA. Still, the company in question is suing alleging these reviews are FAKE. That is they are not suing for negative reviews, they are suing unknown people for posting fake negative reviews.
Sounds like the war cry of the butt hurt to me.
Well GP was reviewing a colonic irrigation service
At what point does exercising one's right to free speech become vigilantism? IMHO, there's a lot of the latter going on these days. Say you don't like some business owner's view on a particular issue. Does that give you the right to destroy that person's career? Do they not have an equal right to free speech? Why is it okay to destroy that person's career through activism and social media when you can't do it through the law?
Writers get sued.
After reading the reviews it sounds more like an ex-girlfriend being spiteful, but who knows.
It's already illegal to intentionally make false statements in writing for the purpose of causing harm. It's called Libel, and it's not new. This is not an "on the internet" law, this is just a law.
Come on, you've been around long enough to know that facts and law doesn't matter when posting to /. What matters is ranting about how "Our freedoms are being taken away" when some idiot gets hit with a clue by four for doing something stupid on the internet.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
So libel laws are all state laws?
Even the Supreme Court ruled yesterday that the EPA had to consider cost when determining what was "necessary and proper." Cost trumps the freedoms guaranteed in the bill of rights. If my free speech costs someone money, the Bill of Rights has no standing. Government at least is prevented (heavily restricted) from prosecuting people for their speech. Business has no such Constitutional amendment restraining its desire to quelch speech it thinks offensive.
Business is fundamentally undemocratic and unconstitutional.
No, business behaves a sociopath because much of it is being run by a small, avaricious and sociopathic clique of oligarchs. You can run a business in a pretty democratic and egalitarian way. There are plenty of examples of that in may different forms, even in the USA. Such organizations just get dumped on a lot by right wing nuts for being 'socialists' but they exist and some are quite successful.
Does freedom of speech automatically grant the ability to defame someone? We have one filing hearing one side of the case. Not enough information is available to decide the merits of the case.
Some of the reviews appear to be opinions so not defamation. Some of the reviews make statements that may be false which could be defamation. If the reviews are based mostly on fact sprinkled with the typical amount of hyperbole for a review site, it does look like the contractor has a case of the butt hurts.
Actually, depending on the content of the article and the work-relationship with the paper, the writer of an article can be sued. Also, if you're writing for a newspaper that has any sort of real coverage (not some local market shopper or low circulation paper), then a lot of those articles... especially the ones that might jump-start a lawsuit are vetted, edited and checked multiple times.
Mind you, if they're just repeating something off of the AP wire, then that tends to pass the buck back up the food chain.
Letters to the editor skip past this with the "The views expressed in these letters are not the views of this paper" boilerplate.
As for why these reviewers could get sued. Well, it's the U.S. You can initiate a lawsuit against practically anyone for practically any reason. Actually winning the lawsuit can be a lot trickier, though.
Also, a lot of these review sites, especially ones like Yelp, typically contain some legal boilerplate saying that the reviewer is the one responsible for the content of their review, you have to be honest about it, etc.
So, if these are fake reviews (the reviewer never actually used the business in question), and are just badmouthing the business to be jerks... well, that's actionable.
Mr. Hu is not a ninja.
You need to be MUCH more precise in your language, as that speech has to be fraudulent, violate some contract, or involve some other kind of tort. If this review were accurate, for example, it could cost Link money, but it would not be actionable.
This is my signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
I know we've all seen too many cases of companies trying to abuse Yelp reviewers to shut down criticism, but in this case they may have a point.
A number of the reviews are from accounts that have no other reviews, and use images from stock photo sites - attached to ethnically stereotypical names (Shlomo the Jew, Sassy the black woman, and Jenyu the Asian) complete with racist stereotypical stories - Shlomo's Jewishness was insulted, Sassy got CPS called on her, and Jenyu said in stereotyped Asian style "Plumber he work four days he finish, pipe make noise."
We might be smart enough to realize they're bullshit reviews at first glance, but we're not representative of the general public.
No, if your speech is untruthful, and causes someone harm, financially included, then it's illegal. It's been this way for as long as history can remember. This isn't even a law that was born with the US as it far predates the existence of the US.
You're aware that you're complaining that you might be held legally responsible for lying about somebody or something. It's not unreasonable to punish somebody for lying if it causes harm.
It sounds like your butt hurt because there's laws that limit your ability of being a dick. Be honest. If a company screws you, and you complain about it, that's perfectly legal, because it's true. But if the company didn't screw you, but you claim they did, that's where the problem comes in.
it would seem the defendant(s) would have a pretty good defense if they can show receipts for rework, notices of failed inspections, proof of injury to the daughter and the resultant investigation, etc. Since each instance has a $165,000 amount tagged to it I'm guessing it's all one job. As such, they sound a bit extreme.Some sound like a bit of did, did not such as the "they said bad things..."
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
Freedom of Speech has never implied freedom from responsibility.
Freedom of speech is a government thing.
Court orders to reveal someone's identity are also a government thing.
anything you say can and will be used against you in the court of public opinion
And the real courts have fuck-all to do with that. Using them as a tool to out your enemies goes against everything we supposedly believe in.
In this particular case, the business owner believes that the reviews are malicious, fake, the act of a single person, etc. etc.
I "believe" Google should pay me for beta-testing their various products that almost never leave beta. When can I expect the courts to make them send me a check?
So the 14th amendment incorporates the limitations on the federal government onto the states as well. It only happened in 1868, so it's understandable that some people might not yet be up to speed on the concept.
I wish I could sue those "image management" services that post fake positive reviews.
This has nothing to do with free speech. Defamation is a well-established 'exception' to free speech. The plaintiff is likely under the belief that if they can prove the reviews are factually wrong, then they can prove defamation. Looking at the review page that's linked, I think they may actually have a case.
A shocking number of these 1-star reviews happen in rapid succession, and by people who have no other Yelp activity (they have 0 friends, only 1 review). Certainly not enough to damn them, but it doesn't look good for the defendants. They also use stock photos for the account photo, to make it look like a real person, but reverse image search on google shows the stock image sites pretty readily. That's certainly odd for a lot of accounts - it's likely the case there is one culprit behind the reviews who has a vendetta against this business. They were 'smart' to choose a wide variety of cities in California, but if they can be traced to a single IP address or geographic area there'd be strong evidence of defamation.
Delving deeper...It's also noteworthy that the owner of Link is responding to a lot of low-star reviews and attacking the reviewers. That will hurt them a lot in court, because it proves the owner is a belligerent asshole(which is what a lot of reviews are saying - he's difficult to work with). You can't claim defamation when someone calls you an asshole if you're actually an asshole(well, defamation doesn't work on things like that anyways because it's opinion-based, but you get the gist).
It gets worse. He's definitely racist - "You must be part of a Nigerian scam" - to a reviewer named Cedric J (Who is black). He specifically says things like " This guy is on drugs". Wow. So, it looks like the defendants might have a case for defamation against the plaintiff. He should just stfu and stop talking on Yelp.
I could see it going either way. Especially if all these accounts originate from the same person.
The 1st amendment doesn't apply, as libel is a civil infraction.
You're still free to say/write whatever the hell you like, but if you do so maliciously and mendaciously and it causes articulable damages to another person, then they have grounds to bring suit. It's not the government that acts against you, it's the injured party.
This is clearly a case for you to think before you speak. Read the suit, it contains the fake negative reviews which reads like a textbook case of libel.
Famous last post...
No it didn't. What you wrote would almost certainly be considered opinion. But you cannot maliciously lie about someone without consequence. If you wrote, say, "They threw rocks at me and broke my windows" when they did not actually do that, it might be libel. If you know they didn't do it and you wrote it anyway, that's a malicious lie and certainly libel.
Certain consequences yes, It does not protect you from another individual suing you.
Sorry, teleporters just kill you and then make a copy. A perfect, soul-less copy.
You don't seem to understand the difference between criminal and civil law.
Criminal statutes establish some conduct as illegal (theft, rape, murder, etc.), and commission of such offenses will cause the state to act against you.
Civil law establishes rules under which individual parties may sue each other for relief, damages, etc. Libel is a civil infraction. If you write something that is maliciously untruthful about another person (and though it creeps me right the fuck out, businesses *are* legally considered persons for these purposes) and it damages them in some way, they have standing to sue you in court.
In short, the state is not telling you that you are subject to criminal prosecution for lying, but the law does allow for anyone who you lie about to sue the pants off you.
Free speech is not the same thing as saying anything you want at any time without consequence. There are (for very good reasons) certain types of speech that are exceptions to the protections of the First Amendment.
Libel is not protected speech. Neither is obscenity, defamation, incitement, incitement to riot, fighting words, fraud, threats, speech covered by copyright, some forms of commercial speech and speech integral to criminal conduct.
Once it was deemed to interfere with commercial activity it got trumped.
Somewhere along the line it became illegal to say "I hired this company and they gave shitty service".
No, it becomes libel when, rather than stating an opinion that you were not happy with the results you make up things to harm the other's reputation. It's been that way a long time before this internet thing...
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
Did I say freedom of speech?
I will say it is not defamatory to make the factual statement you hired someone and got bad service, no batter what the business thinks.
Bullshit. Do you have facts to support this? Or are you just asserting it?
Me, I'm as likely to think this is a bullshit SLAPP lawsuit designed to intimidate people from making negative reviews.
If those people actually did hire this company, and if they are giving actual negative reviews, this lawsuit is nothing but intimidation tactics by assholes.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
A completely different government thing. You can't just link them together and suggest that the government should intervene in a civil law case just because pudding is delicious.
You'd think I would have followed that up with a reference to something about courts. Oh wait, I did :)
By all means, file a suit.
IANAL, and certainly not yours. Yes, I know you're just trying to make a point and/or trying to be funny - but ultimately it's up to a lawyer to plead your case and the courts to decide whether the point you're trying to make has merit.
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.
the business owner believes that the reviews are malicious, fake, the act of a single person
I'm betting on spiteful ex-girlfriend but it could be a disgruntled ex-employee.
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
If this review were accurate, for example, it could cost Link money, but it would not be actionable.
Not strictly true -- it's possible to make a series of true statements but present them in a way that is misleading or inappropriately singles out a person or company in a misleading way. If there is evidence that this was done deliberately and maliciously, there could still be basis for an action. Contrary to popular belief, truth is not an absolute defense to defamation, especially if truth is presented in a selective and deliberately misleading way.
But it doesn't stop Jane from decking you if you scream "Jane, you ignorant slut!" at her. Nor does that stop you from suing her for the medical costs associated with the black eye resulting from you being decked. Nor does that stop her from counter-suing for the slanderous defamation of her character. It only stops the government from putting you in prison for the rest of your life simply because of your opinion on Jane's promiscuity.
(which is silly because you can yell fire in a theater if, you know, the theater is on fire).
Actually I don't believe you can legally. The law was created in the belief the panic from hearing fire yelled would do more harm than good as panic stricken patrons trampled over each other to get out.
/s
I'm not sure how you notify them without striking fear into them but I'm sure the law addresses that in the details
"A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it." - K
That's not because of speech; it's because of consequences. You repeatedly tell some gay faggot he's a gay deepthroating faggot giving everyone AIDS and he has severe emotional issues because you're an asshole? LAWSUIT FOR HARASSMENT! You make up a bunch of shit about a dude having sex with 11-year-old girls? LAWSUIT FOR FUCKING UP HIS SOCIAL LIFE! You scream into a crowd and cause panic and rioting? CHARGES FOR CAUSING PERSONAL DAMAGE, PROPERTY DAMAGE, AND CIVIL UNREST!
Lawsuits come from standing; criminal charges come from criminal intent, such as hiring someone to murder people.
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If you are making a factual statement - and I interpret that to mean a statement of fact that is actually the truth - then by all means. In this case, the business believes that the statement is not the truth, and further believes it has damaged their business.
Whether or not that is actually the case (either way), let the courts decide.
Do I have facts to support that the business believes something? No. I can't read their minds, and neither can you.
So can I say with certainty that the business actually believes in what they write in the allegations - e.g.:
- no, I can't say with certainty that they actually believe this, and aren't just using these and other allegations to try to silence critics. The suit is the evidence before me on which I base the description that they believe it. If you want to split hairs and suggest that I should have said that these are the allegations, fair enough.
That's two ifs that would end up being at the core of either this or follow-up lawsuits, now wouldn't it?
If those people are actually just 1 person and if their reviews are anything but honest, then this lawsuit is well-founded, the reviewer is nothing but an asshole, and additionally in legal trouble?
How do we find out which of those scenarios apply?
Nothing. It's you and others like you that think it is something it isn't - never was, never was intended to be.
I can't mod up, so just a reply then: thanks for the additional information.
I think it falls back to my second point, though; "inform the standards by which private conduct is judged" in no way suggests that you can't be sued, and "truth an absolute defense to defamation" is still a defense that would have to be brought before the court?
Why are others' actions my responsibility? If I post something, and someone else makes a decision, that decision is also influencable by someone else's (i.e., the corporation's) speech. Why don't they use free speech to fight free speech they find offensive? Why do they try to ban it?
Right after you: 1) File a lawsuit against Google for this, 2) prove just WHY Google must pay you money using currently applicable laws (bonus if you cite legal precedents), 3) win said lawsuit against Google and get a judgement awarded.
Step 1 is easy. Anyone can do this. Step 2 is a bit harder. Especially if your claim has no legal merit (for example "Google should pay me for all of their freely available products"). You might be able to spin some law to fit, though. Step 3 would be even harder.
In the case of the Yelp reviews, the company is claiming that these reviews were fake reviews by one individual. The court should order Yelp to turn over the information on these users to a third party - chosen by the court and sworn to secrecy. This party would review the records (perhaps in cross referencing the company's customer list) and come back with a report detailing whether or not they were one person and whether or not they were customers. The report wouldn't personally identify anyone. If the company's claims were disproved by the report, the case would be tossed (and the company would need to pay costs for the third party). If their claims held up, the case could proceed and the Yelp identities might be revealed to the company (and Yelp might wind up on the hook for the third party's report costs).
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Nobody read your reviews. All you did was help an extortionist.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
True and true. I meant judged in the judiciary sense, but there are always consequences to speech, even (especially?) protected speech. And you are correct that you can still be sued (for just about anything), and you still have to present your defense to the court.
If the truth of your statement isn't materially in dispute, or its clearly a statement of opinion not fact, then you can potentially get the case thrown out early on in summary judgment. It doesn't obviate court entirely, but it's much cheaper than going through discovery and (heaven forbid) trial.
Nothing posted to
going on yelp to say that you got ripped off is NOT basis for a libel suit
Yes. It is. And unless you can prove it's true it's also the basis for a libel suit that you will lose.
Saying you were "ripped off" is pretty much saying you were robbed, and therefore tantamount to criminal libel (if you have such a thing). It's certainly a serious accusation.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
2) It is appropriate to sue for fake, defamatory reviews. I only wish it was legal to sue for fake promotional reviews. That it basically just business as usual.
3)They are suing for the full amount 8 times not because they want to get paid x8, but because they are concerned that they might only be able to prove one review is fake. I fully expect that once the identities are revealed, the law suits will be consolidated from 8 to fewer, probably only 1. This way if they prove even a single issue they will get fully paid.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
If the person(s) posting the review can provide evidence that the reviews were based on fact, they could counter-sue for Malicious Prosecution. Some of the owner's responses on Yelp are potentially actionable as well (particularly defamation). While no reputable attorney would take on a suit just for the potential defamation (it would be virtually impossible to prove damages against an anonymous reviewer), if the reviewer(s) sue for Malicious Prosecution, they'd probably throw in the defamation charges just to get the owner's responses in front of the jury.
Last post?
Libel/slander is not protected speech.
(which is silly because you can yell fire in a theater if, you know, the theater is on fire).
Actually I don't believe you can legally. The law was created in the belief the panic from hearing fire yelled would do more harm than good as panic stricken patrons trampled over each other to get out.
I'm not sure how you notify them without striking fear into them but I'm sure the law addresses that in the details /s
You asked that with the sarcasm flag, but seriously if the fire alarm system doesn't sound, and only you noticed the fire, I would go to the movie theater staff and alert them so they can follow their emergency procedure. I'd imagine that procedure involves something like stopping the movie and asking patrons to exit the theater calmly and quietly, perhaps with the theater staff offering a partial or full refund or tickets to a later showing and implying (or outright stating) that the reason for the stoppage is nothing more than technical difficulties with the projection system.
I "believe" Google should pay me for beta-testing their various products that almost never leave beta. When can I expect the courts to make them send me a check?
When you can point to a law that says it's illegal for them to not pay you.
The difference between you and the owner is that he has legal recourse since libel is illegal. You on the other hand have no legal recourse. What could possibly make you think these two things are even remotely comparable?
Pretty much, yes. Mind you, this starts getting into the same line of thinking that laws and police and prisons don't help, because arresting and imprisoning someone happens after a crime: some people surmise there is no deterrent effect, and so we would have exactly as much crime and as many murders and thefts and assaults and rapes if we just gave up on policing and shut down all the prisons.
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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.)
If the images are anything to go by, then one of them is a Hasidic Jew from Israel, another is an actress in Chicago, and another is some guy in New York.
Unless they aren't, in which case their picture icons are being used in violation of Copyright, unless they have written permission from the image owners...
Freedom of Speech has never implied freedom from responsibility.
It does if by "responsibility" you mean "consequences". And especially if by "consequences" you mean "government will do nasty things to you".
Hint: libel laws are an exception to free speech, not a "responsibility".
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
There has to be some way to figure this problem out. It should be especially easy with restaurants since they all use software to track orders. Maybe something like a new Diners Club Card where the Restaurant/Server and Customer can rate each other based on real data. For instance if the customer complains about waiting too long the data should show when they were seated and ticket was opened and when the food was served. If the customer complains about the soup but didn't order it the customer's other reviews be suspect. If the customer claims the server was rude but that server otherwise gets great reviews then they should be suspect. If the restaurant owners could get that kind of feedback on which dishes/servers were liked or disliked it would help them as well. And if you present the card when you show up and you have a good reputation as a diner you could get higher ranked servers.
I love Jesus, except for his foreign policy.
Did you do a Google Image search too?
On Yelp, this guy is Deepak Patel http://www.yelp.com/not_recomm...
But at Norwest Venture Partners, he's Sanjay Rao https://angel.co/norwest-ventu...
They also had no complaints at the BBB. http://www.bbb.org/losangeless...
Also, I looked on Google for the lawsuit National Collection Agency, Inc. Vs Link Corporation, Et Al Case Number 1-08-CV-129441
Couldn't find it.
If you caused harm to someone, such a business, by saying a false thing, then you are at fault and liable.
But if the thing you said was true, then the someone cannot blame you for saying a true thing.
Reviews having a greater likelihood of being contentious may need a stricter legal standard before finding fault, but the potential is still there and rightfully so.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
And yet preventing or stopping harassment and damage from fake malicious rules is also completely reasonable thing for a business to do and within their rights.
If he's wrong and simply trying to intimidate people, then he is then leaving himself open to a countersuit.
There is no problem here.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
I have no idea why anyone visits Yelp. It is well known they are a scam, holding hostage companies that refuse to pay to remove bad reviews, and refusing to remove fake good reviews of companies that do pay.
Actually I kind of hope the lawsuit turns up that Yelp itself created the bad reviews.
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
But that still leaves the most important question unanswered.
Is it legal to shout "Theater" in a crowded firehouse ?
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *
Yep, guys like him should really try lying under oath in a court and then claiming "Freedom of speech" as a defence against the resulting perjury charges...
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *
Actually that conclusion doesn't follow even if you accept the premise. Most severe crimes are committed by repeat offenders who commit them many times - over and over.
So even if you accept the premise that prison has no deterent effect (a premise not entirely without merit I guess) it still doesn't follow that without a justice system crime rates would be unchanged - simply because it doesn't account for the crimes not committed while serving your sentence.
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *
Well he said "or" not "xor" so that's okay.
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *
Well yes. People are insane, and have all kinds of ludicrous arguments, especially those which see the world as a single absolute. I often compare ghettos to suburbs in death penalty arguments: in the ghetto, so many murders and so much gang crime make it hard to investigate and identify murderers, and, besides, the murderers are like 99% likely to die by gang rival murder, and 1% likely to even get arrested by police for murder; whereas in suburbs, people aren't as exposed to crime, and reflect on themselves as criminals in terms of "the police will find me, and they will give me the chair", and so encode deep into the core of their subconscious that committing murder means death by state execution. People want to argue that human psychology doesn't contain any such thing that would identify, interpret, and react to the threat of execution for a crime, or that it's absolutely a deterrent.
Ludicrous people are ludicrous.
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Then the contractor will lose and a zillion more people will know they're a bad contractor because they sued and it became a news story.
True but both are VERY hard to prove. For Libel the accuser has to prove what was said was not true. For slander the defendant has to prove what they said was true (or vice verse). In any case it just makes lawyers money. It does make review site look kinda dangerous and in the end does stifle speech. Yelp and other review sites may go away due to the number of these cases popping up. Why risk getting a civil suite filed against you just for a review you didn't get payed for (assuming)?
Oddly, murder and sex-offenses have the lowest rates of recidivism. That does not detract from your point, I do not think, but it is an interesting statistic and one might consider those the most severe crimes. See rates of recidivism - the stat is mentioned on Wikipedia a number of times. I was a little shocked by the information but not totally surprised. I also did not dig into it to find the methodology in the case of the murder statistic. I am assuming that they only counted those who got out of prison after their murder conviction sentence was completed but I never looked into that.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
The difference between libel and slander is that libel is written and slander is spoken. The legal burden is the same for both. In this case all the plaintiff alleges that none of the transaction actually occurred. The defendant(s) have to show that they did have the transaction with the plaintiff and show evidence that the rest of the factual representations in the reviews are also true and the judgement will go against the plaintiff.
It does make review site look kinda dangerous and in the end does stifle speech.
Libellous speech needs to be stifled. How else does a company fight against people who try to ruin their business through posting on review sites?
Why risk getting a civil suite filed against you just for a review you didn't get payed for
Tell the truth and if it goes to court win and counter sue for costs.
You told him why he got a crappy review.
Did you post in the review that he owned up and (presumably) made good on fixing the issue?
I argue this. Lets say hypothetically that they are not fake. And the company is just plain out bad at what they do. Deformation laws are such where they can contest just about anything, true or untrue. E.G you did a crap job for someone and they complained truthfully so you sue. In effect you can win that provided you can demonstrate clear loss of income.
Where I feel this gets sticky is not this issue though since my above example is not common. What the issue is for me is that lets say it was one person who made these bad reviews and used Sock Puppet accounts to do so. If Mr Sock-Puppet can find another disgruntled customer who posted a bad review albeit on Google Places, Facebook, TripAdvisor or whatever.
The argument would be why was this guy taken to the courts? A sock puppet issue should be by definition a breach of terms and conditions on Yelp! and those comments therefore should be removed on that basis. It's a bad precedent for the plaintiff to make these claims and I see this case a loser anyway you sell it.
If that is the methodology then indeed it would be the lowest - since they have the longest sentences, and so the the biggest gap where you can't repeat the crime, also that long gap in it must reduce the risk of going back to it (if only because it breaks your networks).
I strongly suspect that if you count "number of times the crime was likely committed before you were caught the first time" that for rape it is near the top - the rate of rapes occurring versus the amount of actual rapists suggest this almost has to be the case.
Murder is interesting as it's usually a very high profile crime with a lot of media attention - so police tend to have a lot of motivation to get the guy, this may reduce the number of times you can get away with it before you are caught. But even then it varies by who the victim is.
The likelihood of getting away with killing a white girl is simply much lower than if you kill a black man - society just cares less in the latter case, and so the police does as well.
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *
I suspect that the death penalty is different from incarceration however - in that I truly believe it doesn't have much deterrent effect at all.
In areas where you have gang violence and the like - why be scared of execution your chances of being killed is so high to begin with that if anything sitting on death row increases your life expectancy.
For the suburb case there are basically three common motives for murder.
Crimes of passion: by definition these cannot be deterred, a crime of passion is an emotional act done in the moment, it doesn't include any rational thought - if it had, it wouldn't be a crime of passion, so since there is no rational consideration, there is no deterrence for it.
Crimes of insanity: again, a crazy person isn't thinking rationally, since their acts are not rationally considered, no rational consideration can deter them.
Crimes of greed: the guy who murders out of greed did make a rational decision - but he also believes he will get away with it (nobody murders out of greed if he expects to get caught) - so the punishment isn't a deterrent as he strongly expects never to experience it.
It's unlikely the death penalty has any deterrent effect whatsoever. I'm still not sure incarceration does - though like I said in the original post, it obviously reduces your odds of committing the crime again if only by making it impossible for a while.
Comparing crime rates across countries is never a very useful comparison (just look at every gun control debate) as there are simply too many factors (socio-economic, environmental etc.) which influence crime rates but are not being factored in for, but a more useful comparison is to look at countries where the death penalty was banned - and see how crime rates before and after compared.
The answer in every country I know about is - immediately before and after they were the same, over the longer term crime rates declined, but only by the same rate they were declining before.
So the conclusion appears to be that banning the death penalty had no impact whatsoever on crime rates anywhere it's been done.
Interestingly - here in South Africa the death penalty was banned in 1994. At the time South Africa had the highest crime rate in the world (a murder every 17 seconds). It declined rapidly over the next few years, but this is likely because so much of that crime was political in nature and the politcal environment had changed. Since 2000 there has been a steady decline (while the crime rate is still unacceptably high we are nowhere near the top of the list anymore) - yet calls to reinstate the death penalty remain incredibly popular among the population, one of the few things South Africans of all races actually agree on.
Personally I'm opposed to it, but I find it interesting that it's such a popular concept despite the fact that it very obviously had no impact on crime rates at all - yet it's deterrent effect is the most commonly cited reason for bringing it back. Which proves, I suppose, that what we consider "common sense" will trump facts and evidence every time.
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *
Problem solved.
From the very limited research I have done and without separating the types of invasive sexual offenses into different categories (instead, calling them all rapes) I would suspect that you are right on the money. Ignoring, for the sake of reality and not for the sake of statistics, those who are caught drunkenly urinating in public (I suspect they would actually inflate the numbers, who pisses outside only once in their lives?) then I believe that number would be quite high.
I am not sure how high it would be in the case of what we traditionally call just plain rape. In other words, those folks who jump out of bushes, grab some random lady, and rape them. I do not know how many crimes they have likely committed before they are caught. It seems likely to be a fairly low number except in extreme cases. I imagine that date rape would also fall into that category and have similarly low numbers before they are caught.
On the other hand, and inflating these statistics, everything I have read or watched on the subject indicates that many sexual predators have a lengthy history before they are finally caught. Child molesters are, for example, one of the worst. They often have a history of abusing many many children many many times before they are finally caught and arrested. I do not have the numbers at hand nor do I recall the exact figure but a documentary on the subject indicated that child sexual predation is done by people who have a history of something along the lines of an average of 30ish victims.
While interesting this is not really about recidivism. Few of the sick bastards go on to commit more offenses after they are released or, more accurately because we can not be certain, very few of them are caught committing more offenses after they have been caught the first time.
Anyhow, with murder I am assuming that they are not looking at the total number but rather the percentage so the overall numbers should have little effect on the total. Given the severity of the crime and the long incarceration sentences it may also be reduced simply because of the age of the person when they are finally released. One is seemingly far less passionate, energetic, and prone to violence when one ages. Old men are the seeming minority when it comes to roaming the 'hood' with the gang (though I now have an image of a guy with a walker representing on the corner and throwing up MS13 gang signs) nor are they jilted lovers engaging in crimes of passion. I doubt they are taking part in a lot of robberies that go wrong or kidnappings gone awry. I suspect that has as much to do with the numbers as anything else but I really have not looked into it. It only stands to reason (as if that matters) that they are not counting those still incarcerated into their recidivism statistics.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
Wow, I hope the contractor that fucked up my mother's bathroom doesn't read the review she left.
You can be sued for leaving bad reviews, or for calling tehcyder an idiot on Slashdot, in the sense that someone could file suit against you. How far those lawsuits would get is another matter.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
This would require tracking all restaurant customers and not having any anonymous or pseudonymous reviews. That looks to me like serious attacks on privacy.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Crimes of passion: by definition these cannot be deterred, a crime of passion is an emotional act done in the moment, it doesn't include any rational thought
False.
When you have a hard-on, why don't you sleep with a gay dude? What pushes you away when you have that emotional feeling of "I need to bone"? Something is embedded deep in your brain to reject that thought right out.
Inside the brain, all rational thought goes through the prefrontal cortex. This is where you reason. Actions flow through areas such as the basal ganglia, which associates memory together--smells, sounds, visual images, facts. Encountering facts conflicting with other facts shuts the PFC down and causes the Amygdala to power up, because the basal ganglia finds a conflict and attempts to avoid reconciliation (energy-demanding).
It's a lot more complex than just that; the short of it is that the brain employs many automatic reasoning centers. One such center is the reasoning of trained consequence: if you do X, some consequence Y will occur. Without thinking about it, you have a fear for your life if you commit a certain crime, because you will have this secret that threatens to tear away freedom or even life. This subconscious impulse overrides your other subconscious impulses until they become demanding enough to, in turn, override it.
This is why people are sharply against killing other people, yet will murder the fuck out of you if you try to kill their child, and then have a psychotic episode as they come to terms (poorly) with having killed someone. The immediate need overrides the other, more established feelings. A trained fear of state execution--created merely by its presence with a sharp lack of other ways you might die today--will intrude on emotional impulses to kill at all levels, right up until the impulse to kill carries such a powerful driver as to smash those other impulses flat.
Deterrent doesn't mean a 100% cure.
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Last summer, Yelp got binged for offering to remove a negative review for money. I no longer take any comments from Yelp with a sincere heart. The idea of Yelp was a good idea, but not in the hands of the unscrupulous
"And I explained in the review that the reason it wasn't a 1-star review and is a 2-star is because he admitted his mistake and contacted his insurance agent that day."
I did say some look fake.
Sorry, teleporters just kill you and then make a copy. A perfect, soul-less copy.