Monday, March 02, 2009

Online defamatory statements can be libellous too

Part of the joy of using any particular medium for communication is working out who the audience are, what’s appropriate to say. Just because social networking tools like Bebo, Facebook and Twitter - never mind blogs - seem informal and chatty doesn’t mean the normal rules of libel don’t apply. Many of your witterings will be in the public record, have influence, and any defamation can be visible to those you talk about and their solicitors!

Suspect that’s maybe what’s behind the following list of comments that were tweeted this morning: I’ve crudely obscured the names to limit embarrassment as you don’t really need to know the details of who was involved to get the picture! (Five minute’s searching will turn up the original messages if you’re really curious.)

Sometimes best to learn (or be reminded) by other people’s mistakes.

Retraction of tweets

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