The high cost of Internet (de)fame

14.09.2009
If it seems like Notes From the Field is turning into the Notes From the Land of Internet Defamation and Anonymity, my apologies. But this is a topic that I've sunk my teeth into and now I can't seem to unsink them.

After my recent posts about Liskula Cohen ("") and TCI Journal (""), I had the opportunity to chat with attorney Anne W. Salisbury of . She answered a number of questions I had about both cases, as well as those from some Cringesters who wrote in. So thought I'd share her insights with the rest of you out there in Cringeville.

[ Also on InfoWorld: "" and "" | Stay up to date on Robert X. Cringely's musings and observations with InfoWorld's . ]

Salisbury is the attorney who defended then-anonymous Skanks in NYC blogger Rosemary Port in her unsuccessful efforts to keep her identity out of the public eye. (She is not, however, representing Port in for spilling the beans.)

Among other things, Port called former cover girl Liskula Cohen "" on her short-lived blog. (Salisbury adds that before Cohen's suit became public knowledge, that blog had a handful of page views -- half of them from Salisbury. The morning the news of the lawsuit hit the Web, it clocked 16,000.)

But what does and doesn't constitute defamation is a complicated question, says Salisbury. The answer depends on who's doing the defaming, who's allegedly being defamed, whether it's a statement of fact or clearly an opinion, whether the person making the statement believes it's accurate (even if it isn't), and so on.