10 Million Dollar Lawsuit Filed Against Forum

[Outdoor-Fishing]

While browsing the Internet, I ran across a very interesting topic that may be of interest to forum admins. A large forum by the name of scubaboard.com, was sued by a Gundi Holm for 10 million dollars. Here's a quick summary of the scenario.

If you are a forum owner / operator this concerns you.

Over the years I have had people threaten to sue me because they didn't like something that was posted in my forums, and I know a number of others that have been threatened as well. Up until now (as far as I know) there have only been threats.. This has now changed and it could set a president which could affect all of us, no matter the size or topic of our community.

A 10 Million Dollar lawsuit has been filed in Federal Court against Intermedia Publications, which owns www.ScubaBoard.com , Brian Verbonac (member of ScubaBoard), and potentially up to 100 other members (once they can identify them), by Maldives Scuba Diving, Pvt. Ltd. , and Gundi Holm.

A link to the papers filed in U.S. District Court and served to Pete (NetDoc) Murray, who operates ScubaBoard, are located here:
http://gundisuit.scubaboard.com/gundisuit.html

Links to the threads that are the basis for this lawsuit are:
http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/acc...ay-2008-a.html
http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/acc...it-thread.html
http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/acc...it-thread.html

The short version is that a couple of threads were created covering the death of a diver on a live-aboard diving boat, and the sickness of 10 others during a charter. One of the threads was started by a member who was actually on the boat when this happened.

A considerable amount of discussion ensured about who was to blame, why the diver died and others became ill while diving. Carbon Monoxide poisoning was at the top of the list along with apparent shoddy maintenance of the SCUBA tank compressors on the boat.
For the majority of you who are reading this that are not SCUBA divers, this may mean little to you; however, for those of us who are divers, your life depends on what you breath and who you dive with. Obviously, the ongoing debate in these threads was not good for business. You can Google "Gundi Holm" (I believe she is the Travel Agent for these boats and I have read possibly has ownership stakes as well) and ScubaBoard is #1.

I have not gone back and re-read the threads in their entirety but there were a few members who may have been pushing the speculation a bit, and making comments that were over the top. If that is the case, then it is a company's right to sue that person and seek damages. What is different here is they are not only suing the members who took part in the thread, but the owner of the community as well. To get around the protection we are provided as Internet Service Providers / Networks, they are alleging:

"Plaintiffs are informed and believe and based thereon allege that the ScubaBoard members posting under the usernames "Leslie Finnegan," "BrianMered," "peterbj7," "DandyDon," and "Apollo" are all agents or eployees of Intermedia, or made the postings at issue at Intermedia's direction. Therefore, Intermedia is responsible, in whole or in part, for the creation or development of the false and defamatory content provided through ScubaBoard"

I am an active member of the ScubaBoard community and a friend of the owners. I know how that community is run.. None of the members listed above are staff members, nor are they "agents" who were enlisted by the owner of ScubaBoard (or staff) to advance an agenda such they state in their complaint. They take a hands off approach unless someone violates the policies. The staff is professional and does not have an interest or the time to get involved with game playing or attaching a dive operation on the other side of the planet.

I think the purpose here is clear.. To stifle bad press and shut down the conduit of communication.
I find it disturbing that the plaintiff's attorneys are attempting to make an end-run around the protections we are afforded as forum operators by claiming there was some sort of conspiracy between the staff and members. How easy would it be for other plaintiff's attorneys to claim the same to bring us into a lawsuit, especially if these people somehow prevail in court?

The one thing I will be doing as a proactive measure is to make doubly sure all of our staff members remain uninvolved in any type of negative feedback thread. I'm not sure there is much more we could do other than censor threads like this - which I am completely opposed to doing. Removing threads such as these not only would do our members a disservice, but make me feel personally complicit should someone get hurt either financially or physically.

David

Original summary thread: Here

Personally, I doubt the offender will have any luck in winning in court. I agree such cases are rare, but if they do happen out of the blue then it's not something that I would enjoy having to go through. (This actually came as a surprise to me, some people just have no life. Or maybe no friends?) So, what are your feelings and thoughts about this incident? Possible insurance to prevent incidents like this from happening?

[Nick]

Thread moved to Security and Legal Disputes.

Personally, I think the plaintiffs have no chance. Their claim that the offending posts were submitted at the direction of Intermedia Publications can easily be refuted. Once that happens, the company should be free from any chance of losing. How the rest is handled all depends on the site's Terms of Service. I make sure in my TOS to explicitly state that the forum administration is in no way responsible for anything posted on the forums (including by moderators), and that individual users are responsible for what they post.

[bucket]

Originally Posted by Nick

How the rest is handled all depends on the site's Terms of Service.

how much would it cost to make that argument in federal court?

[Outdoor-Fishing]

Originally Posted by bucket

how much would it cost to make that argument in federal court?

That's exactly what I was wondering. If I read correctly, the offender is located out of the United States so the ScubaBoard admin has to pay the advocate for the trip to get there, and the additional fees/charges. I caught a few posts on there forum saying that the donation fund may not be enough to cover the fees. Something like 40,000 dollars would be my guess.

Nick- Thanks for moving the thread. Apologies for putting it in the wrong category.

[Outdoor-Fishing]

Originally Posted by Nick

Thread moved to Security and Legal Disputes.

Personally, I think the plaintiffs have no chance. Their claim that the offending posts were submitted at the direction of Intermedia Publications can easily be refuted. Once that happens, the company should be free from any chance of losing. How the rest is handled all depends on the site's Terms of Service. I make sure in my TOS to explicitly state that the forum administration is in no way responsible for anything posted on the forums (including by moderators), and that individual users are responsible for what they post.

Heres more food for thought. If you state in your rules that the users are responsible for what they post, would you give out their personal information for someone like Gundi Holms (offender)? That's what the controversial issue might be here. It's not so much about what the admin said, rather it's about the members being responsible for what they post. I think it would be very hard to bring "striker1234" to court. This can easily be argued that you, the admin, hold responsibility for what a user posts only because you contain their private information. It would be interesting to see how this all plays out in court.

What are your thoughts?

[Nick]

Originally Posted by Outdoor-Fishing

Heres more food for thought. If you state in your rules that the users are responsible for what they post, would you give out their personal information for someone like Gundi Holms (offender)? That's what the controversial issue might be here. It's not so much about what the admin said, rather it's about the members being responsible for what they post. I think it would be very hard to bring "striker1234" to court. This can easily be argued that you, the admin, hold responsibility for what a user posts only because you contain their private information. It would be interesting to see how this all plays out in court.

What are your thoughts?

My opinion is that again, it depends on the site's policies... particularly the Privacy Policy and what kind of information protection/privacy the site promises to users of the forum. Regardless, I'm pretty sure a court can subpoena the forum administration for the information of user accounts. As such, I am sure to include in my Privacy Policies that user information account will be given to authorities should the need arise:

Personal Information
By registering with us, you might be submitting personal information to the website. This information is kept private and is not released to any outside parties. Upon request, information will be given to authorities should the need arise. Information that might be collected includes, but is not limited to, e-mail address and date of birth. Optional information, given at the user's discretion, may include, but is not limited to, location, first name, and instant messenger contact information. All information may be displayed publicly unless the user specifically requests otherwise. The display of this information can be toggled in the User Control Panel.

There are so few legal cases involving forums that actually go to court, that there's not really a precedent set, so it's hard to predict what will happen.

Why can't the administration simply delete the posts that the plaintiffs have issues with? I know it's essentially throwing all dignity down the drain, but if it saves you tens of thousands of dollars, time, and stress, I'd think it's worth it.

And for the record, I am not a lawyer nor do I have any legal expertise in any form. I'm merely stating my opinions and thoughts on the matter (i.e., what seems logical to me).

[50calray]

Originally Posted by Nick

Why can't the administration simply delete the posts that the plaintiffs have issues with? I know it's essentially throwing all dignity down the drain, but if it saves you tens of thousands of dollars, time, and stress, I'd think it's worth it.

It would probably be unethical of me but I would have done this a long time ago. Although I don't think the plaintiff has a chance in hell, why waste money and risk helping the plaintiff out?

Also, this isn't the first time a forum has been sued. Black Mustang Club was sued by Ford Motor Co. The was making a calender using pictures of forum member's cars. Well Ford blew a fuse and decided to sue saying people didn't have any say of pictures of their own vehicles. A Ford tech was smart enough to change the blown fuse at Ford Motor Co and Ford later dropped the law suit.