Courtney Love Wins Defense Verdict in Twibel Suit by Her Former Lawyer

What do you get when you Tweet a purported libelous statement?  Twibel, of course.

Last week rock star Courtney Love went to trial last week in one of the nation's first, and certainly most publicized, case of libel over Twitter.  She was accused of defaming her own lawyer in a series of 2010 tweets.

After only three hours of deliberation, the jury returned a verdict for Love and against the plaintiff, her former lawyer Rhonda J. Holmes.  The lawyer had been hired to pursue fraud claims against those handling the estate of Love's late husband, Kurt Cobain, the legendary lead singer of Nivana who committed suicide.  But Ms. Love posted a series of tweets inferring implying that Ms. Holmes mishandled the matter.

The problem with attacking a lawyer on Twitter -- lawyers know the way to the courthouse.

The jury concluded that Ms. Love made the Tweets, but that the plaintiff failed to prove that Love knew the statements were false by the enhanced clear and convincing standard, a necessary element in a lawsuit by a limited purpose public figure such as Ms. Holmes.

No word yet on whether there will be an appeal.

Love is not a stranger to being sued for Tweets.  In March, 2011 she settled a defamation lawsuit by fashion designer Dawn Simorangkir for $430,000 stemming from tweets that accused the designer of theft and having a criminal background.

photo credit: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/caliorg/6882839119/">cali.org</a> via <a href="http://photopin.com">photopin</a> <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/">cc</a>

Copyright, Twitter, the DMCA and Takedowns

Twitter is not a copyright free zone!

You can violate copyright on Twitter just as you can on your blog - or any place else.

This was made clear when Twitter announced that upon a complaint from a copyright holder, Twitter would take down tweets which were asserted to violate copyright. The policy is Twitter's effort to comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA).

The policy was recently modified when Twitter sent out the following tweet:

"We now offer more #transparency in processing copyright reports by withholding Tweets, not removing. Learn more: https://support.twitter.com/articles/15795 . "

I guess this would be classified as a Twitter tweaked tweet. 

But there is no humor in the policy.  Twitter will take down the purported offending tweets.  The tweet will not simply disappear into the ether, though.  Rather, the tweet will be "withheld" with a notice appearing instead of the tweet.

The full policy and procedure of Twitter is set out in the Twitter Help Center.  It is rather detailed, but not filled with a bunch of legal jargon.

The real lesson is that even in this era of social media, retweets, reposts, sharing, and even copy and paste, copyright laws still apply, whether its a photo, an article, or a 140-character tweet. 

I would set out the entire policy here . . . but there's that copyright thing.  So instead, just CLICK HERE to go to the Twitter Help Center's Copyright policy.

Photo under Creative Commons license.  photo credit: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/cobalt/7217055290/">cobalt123</a> via <a href="http://photopin.com">photopin</a> <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/">cc</a>