Tulsa World sues Bates

[Renaissance]

quote:Originally posted by Conan71

quote:Originally posted by deinstein

UTW are wimps for retracting what they printed.

If it wasn't correct information, why would they be wimps to publish a retraction?

I can hear it now:

"I may be wrong, but I think I'll blow $25K on legal fees so people won't think I'm a wimp!"

I believe the offending sentence by Mr. Bates was:

quote: The steep drop between the paid consultant's March 2005 [circulation] count and the March 2006 ABC numbers suggest that the World was inflating its circulation by as much as 20 percent.

Is this a demonstrably false sentence?  No.  Given that falsity is a required element of the tort of defamation, it seems to me that Bates and UTW have a prima facie defense against this bullying lawsuit.

Does anybody know if UTW carries libel insurance (as most media outlets do) and if so, whether it covers Bates?

[sgrizzle]

quote:Originally posted by Floyd

quote:Originally posted by Conan71

quote:Originally posted by deinstein

UTW are wimps for retracting what they printed.

If it wasn't correct information, why would they be wimps to publish a retraction?

I can hear it now:

"I may be wrong, but I think I'll blow $25K on legal fees so people won't think I'm a wimp!"

I believe the offending sentence by Mr. Bates was:

quote: The steep drop between the paid consultant's March 2005 [circulation] count and the March 2006 ABC numbers suggest that the World was inflating its circulation by as much as 20 percent.

Is this a demonstrably false sentence?  No.  Given that falsity is a required element of the tort of defamation, it seems to me that Bates and UTW have a prima facie defense against this bullying lawsuit.

Does anybody know if UTW carries libel insurance (as most media outlets do) and if so, whether it covers Bates?

The dates on when they were/were not using ABC were false. He also should've conveyed and quoted facts and let the reader draw the conclusions. He stated that the facts allude to fraud on the part of TW, that is libel.

[Renaissance]

quote:Originally posted by sgrizzle


The dates on when they were/were not using ABC were false. He also should've conveyed and quoted facts and let the reader draw the conclusions.

If the dates were wrong it may be an issue.

quote:Originally posted by sgrizzle He stated that the facts allude to fraud on the part of TW, that is libel.

No, it's not.  A required element of a claim for defamation (in print, libel) is falsity.  Get on teh internets and check it out: http://www.expertlaw.com/library/personal_injury/defamation.html  

Truth is a defense, and so is opinion.  Stating a possibility is different than stating something as fact.  He noted that the number jump suggested inflated circulation.  That isn't libelous.  It's not a provably false statement.  It's simply one person's opinion about what the numbers mean.  Bates made this clear by phrasing his sentence the way he did.

This is a scummy lawsuit by the World.  No reason to jump to their defense.

[Gold]

It's a pretty scummy article by Bates.  Why write that if you don't know all the facts?  He's had this coming for awhile.

Bates suggests some incorrect facts about the heart of the World's business.  They have every reason to defend themselves.  Was a lawsuit the best vehicle for that?  It certainly got a quick retraction from Urban Tulsa.

And perhaps there is something in Bates' writing that the World wants to learn about through the discovery process.

[cannon_fodder]

Gold:

Do you think this article is more about getting a retraction and "made whole" or about getting critics of the Tulsa World to shut up?

Personally, I agree with you that anything published in the UTW probably has a negligible impact on the Tulsa Worlds ad revenue.  They also know their fees from such a suit would bury Bates and the UTW, they aren't going to get any money.  And in general, a retraction is pretty meaningless.  

They wanted to make sure people knew they were in charge.  By making this a "big deal" more people are now aware that the World has a massive circulation drop AND they have lost a lot of journalistic credibility by filing a libel suit against another paper.  Personally, I think they had a right to file the suit but doing so was the wrong decision.

And I think we all agree that we won't ever see the merits of this case.

[Gold]

I don't think this will have much of an effect on the World's credibility. Most people in the area have no clue who Bates is, including the subscribers who had the article on their front page.  A couple of geeks on the interwebs blogged about it and we're quickly contradicted by UTW's retraction.

I think they had to do something or they'd have an article out there questioning their business.  In the past, Bates has pasted their cease and desist letters to his blog and acted like a folk hero -- that wasn't going to cut it.  And I'm guessing here -- unlike Bates, I portray my guesswork as just that -- but I do know that the discovery process gets you some access that you may not otherwise have.  Maybe there is something they want to follow up on with Bates.

Something else I'd guess to be a factor is deterrence.  They probably want UTW and Bates to leave them alone.  This suit at least ensures that UTW's editors will think twice about their commentary on the World.

I agree, this case likely won't reach a final judgment.  Most cases don't.  That alone isn't a reason not to take action to defend your business.

Does the World have more resources than UTW and Bates?  Of course.  They also have a lot more to lose.

If the World had done nothing, they'd have a problem in that a "journalist" had questioned the viability of their business.  If the World had sent a cease and desist letter or simply asked for a retraction, they may well run the risk of having to debate Bates and his ilk on the merits of the article.  We've all seen how Bates can get when he's cornered and doesn't want to admit he's wrong.  

I can't fault the World for doing something different here.  It worked.  UTW retracted the article.

[tim huntzinger]

What did Mark Twain say, 'A lie can go all the way around the world by the time the truth is still putting on its shoes?' The national attention is proof to the need for action, especially after the plagiarism of its former cartoonist.

[Conan71]

quote:Originally posted by cannon_fodder

Gold:

Do you think this article is more about getting a retraction and "made whole" or about getting critics of the Tulsa World to shut up?

Personally, I agree with you that anything published in the UTW probably has a negligible impact on the Tulsa Worlds ad revenue.  They also know their fees from such a suit would bury Bates and the UTW, they aren't going to get any money.  And in general, a retraction is pretty meaningless.  

They wanted to make sure people knew they were in charge.  By making this a "big deal" more people are now aware that the World has a massive circulation drop AND they have lost a lot of journalistic credibility by filing a libel suit against another paper.  Personally, I think they had a right to file the suit but doing so was the wrong decision.

And I think we all agree that we won't ever see the merits of this case.

So are you saying it's more-or-less a legal b!tch-slap?

[Renaissance]

quote:Originally posted by Gold

I don't think this will have much of an effect on the World's credibility. Most people in the area have no clue who Bates is, including the subscribers who had the article on their front page.  A couple of geeks on the interwebs blogged about it and we're quickly contradicted by UTW's retraction.

Have you ever been involved in a settlement of any kind?  A "retraction" by UTW has NOTHING to do with the allegedly defamatory nature of Bates' article.  It just means they didn't want to spend money fighting it.

quote:Originally posted by Conan71

So are you saying it's more-or-less a legal b!tch-slap?

I believe the correct term is bench-slap. [/lawgeekery]

[Gold]

quote:Originally posted by Floyd

quote:Originally posted by Gold

I don't think this will have much of an effect on the World's credibility. Most people in the area have no clue who Bates is, including the subscribers who had the article on their front page.  A couple of geeks on the interwebs blogged about it and we're quickly contradicted by UTW's retraction.

Have you ever been involved in a settlement of any kind?  A "retraction" by UTW has NOTHING to do with the allegedly defamatory nature of Bates' article.  It just means they didn't want to spend money fighting it.

quote:Originally posted by Conan71

So are you saying it's more-or-less a legal b!tch-slap?

I believe the correct term is bench-slap. [/lawgeekery]

Yes, I've been involved in a settlement.  UTW's retraction was a lot more than "we're sorry."

[Conan71]

Floyd, I wish I were at liberty to say more publicly. A) It might shine a light on my own identity and B) If the owners/publishers ever want anyone to be privvy to the inner-workings of UTW, it's up to them, not me to tip the hat on that.  Knowing what I do of the publication and the publisher (I've known him for close to 25 years) Skrzypczak would not have capitulated/retracted so easily if he even remotely thought he was right, it's not in his ego.

Take the retraction at his word.  TW had him beat and could prove Bates used bum info.

[Renaissance]

Fair enough.  If Bates' supposition was dead wrong, it was dead wrong.  But on its face it still looks like a supposition and not a statement of fact.  

I guess if he were negligent in considering the facts he's basing his supposition on, I could see it.  Like, if the premises underlying his suppositions were misstated negligently or deliberately.  But if that's not what happened, and the conclusion he suggests is objectively reasonable though not actually true, I still think he would have a strong defense.

Conan, do you know if they have libel insurance?  I thought most publishers did for this exact contingency.

[Neptune]

Bah, as soon as UTW picked up Bates, they guaranteed themselves irrelevancy.  They were just interested in picking up Bates' captive radio audience.  That the Tulsa World, or any other paper in the US is struggling is not news.  Except, for Bates maybe.  "They're in decline and not telling you...tee hee, tee hee."  Bates reminds me of a wanna-be Snidley Whiplash.



I mean, come on Snidley, you're chasing a semi-retarded Canadian Mountie, what's the deal?  You don't have anything better to do?

Honorable mention for Dick Dastardly.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EnGy38MFtY8
Though, then you'd have to ask what that Pigeon ever did to Bates?  Well, unless it was what pigeons do best.  

Did the pigeon poop on ya?  Did it?

[Gold]

quote:Originally posted by Floyd

Fair enough.  If Bates' supposition was dead wrong, it was dead wrong.  But on its face it still looks like a supposition and not a statement of fact.  

I guess if he were negligent in considering the facts he's basing his supposition on, I could see it.  Like, if the premises underlying his suppositions were misstated negligently or deliberately.  But if that's not what happened, and the conclusion he suggests is objectively reasonable though not actually true, I still think he would have a strong defense.

Conan, do you know if they have libel insurance?  I thought most publishers did for this exact contingency.

Isn't UTW out of the case?  (Hasn't come up that way on OSCN, but the World ran an article saying just that.)

Looks like the World is going after Bates individually, at least long enough to make it hurt.  The big question I have is whether Bates is an independent contractor and/or has some sort of funky agreement with UTW to assume individual liability.  If I were Bates, I would likely scream bloody murder over such an arrangement and think about leaving UTW.

[Rico]

"Ask Mayor LaFortune about his rumours."


What's that you say about the "Big Bopper"