July 28th, 2009
Company sues for defamation over tweet
So Amanda Bonnen tweeted about her apartment, rented from Horizon Realty Group. She said:
Who said sleeping in a moldy apartment is bad for you? Horizon realty thinks it’s okay.
That made the realty company really mad. So they sued her for defamation to the tune of $50,000, as the Sun Times reports. In the complaint the company worries that the tweet has been “distributed throughout the world” and that it has been “greatly injured in its reputation.”
That seems to me a vast overstatement. In a sea of tweets, what impact does one little comment have moving through people’s screens? The plaintiff seems to overlook one critical piece of evidence of their damages:
29 Following 20 Followers
Since Amanda only has 20 followers, the defamatory statement was only distributed to 20 people. While that is enough for per se defamation, to get $50,000 the company should have to show something like actual damages. If 20 people now think badly of them, how much damage is that? I’m not saying I know the answer, but it seems like a tough argument.
In any case, the plaintiff attached a printout of her tweets, which are of the typical boring variety, but somehow focusing a case on someone’s tweets makes them more interesting.
A dog smaller than a pigeon tried to attack me last night.
I look like rudolph but except it being just my nose its all over.
Pardon my language but i have a really big problem with dickheads
Whatever.
...
