Who is responsible.

jimbo123p

Well-Known Member
With the current crop of posts, established companies are being trashed on this site by foreign persons who possibly feel safe by distance. Right or wrong is not the question. If the estate or business in question is affected in a negative manner by blatantly malisious posts and they took legal action, proving there was no case to answer could the site owners be held liable. Remember the lad giving info on free downloads getting done because he allowed it to happen on his site even though it was others posting the links. Jim
 
Right or wrong is the question Jim. It`s called customer reviews. If the chap is correct in his review then we as a community should be aware of it, if he is wrong then the company need to reasure us about the level of service they provide and back it up.
 
I believe (and that is the important part) that any review is valid, as long as it is the perception of the person giving it. We all have different opinions of the service provided at any event, your perception may be based on how long you have had to save up for the event, or you have been elsewhere, where the service was vastly different, (better or worse). As long as no untrue statements are made the spin you impart on your comments are valid.
It is then up to the supplier of services to put their side.
However if untrue statements are made then that is a different matter. There may be legal issues from libel to attempting to pervert the course of justice if a criminal act is alleged.
Liability for the site will be limited by the disclaimer in the terms and conditions that were signed/accepted when we joined.
 
It is not so much the review as the posts that follow. And no the disclaimer does not absolve the site. When a person ends up in court so does the newspaper for printing it. More and more the postings on the internet are becoming viewed in the same way. Allow poison to remain you are liable for the fallout. Look at the number of posts being deleted acros many forums. Facts are safe. Many support posts sail close to fiction disguised as support for OP. all three main trial by forum posts had support by users but the denigrating posts continued unabated by people who could not tell you where the estates were. Jim
 
A company on here offered a service, I expressed an interest and they replied saying an information pack would be sent.

I never heard another thing and to this day I look at all their postings on this site , remember how I was treated, and think negative thoughts

You are in business,
I ask for something
You say that for price X , Y will happen/be done

If it doesn't, you - perhaps wrongly- will be seen to be to blame and since you are only as good as the last job you did, you need to make sure the client is as happy as possible when they leave .

It's not rocket science, it's been going on since man started providing a service for money.

The outcome may sometimes be unfair but that's what happens.- I've had 2 jobs where the client failed to meet his responsibilities (as written in the conditions of the contract) and I ended up refunding his money rather than have a public bust up.
Not fair, but long term it was sensible for my business.

For me, the best providers are the ones who remember that clients are people and not cash cows!
 
As a long term member of marlin owners, which used to be owned by marlin rifles,they decided to close the site, due to posters giving information about home loading which could have injured someone following that information and them being liable for damages. So I suppose in a liable case the site owners could be held liable for deformation of character, if they could not prove that they had monitored the site properly. The liable laws regarding the Internet are difficult and would vary from country to country. If a poster wrote say from Belgium is he covered by British law or Belgian.take the BBC who quote everyday what has been posted from Syria etc, how do we know it's true, that's why the word" alleged" crops up so much on news reports.
 
Perhaps someone in the legal profession could offer advice on the legal situation regarding libel on the internet.
My personal thoughts are that surely you could be committing an offence to write something about soeone that is untrue with or even possibly without malicious intent?
Dealing with such things on a U.K. based site used by U.K. posters shouldn’t be too much hassle for the offended person. Dealing with such matters by a poster based in Europe and answerable to European warrants may be a little more involved but is still achievable. In the case of someone posting from outside of the EU it may be a bit more difficult but there is also the fallback that the website might bear some responsibility (sorry site owners) if they failed to rectify a wrong?
 
When is a wrong not a wrong?, any potentially injured party would have to prove their case before taking any actions against websites??.... granted a blatantly injurious post would be removed forthwith?, something that needed to be proven / disproved, would not leave websites open to punishment?
 
Thinking along the lines of the recent spate of threatening and hate filled comments posted on social network sites and aimed at specific football persons, I know that the writers of such material have been prosecuted and in some cases jailed but I have never heard of the operators of such social networking sites being taken to task. I would think it difficult to prove the actual person who wrote the comments. People have come on this site using anothers passwords etc.
Surely if the comments made are opinion based on fact and not just derogatory or malicious there should be no problem but as always, is a forum such as this the correct way to deal with a complaint.
 
jimbo123p, are you saying because a company is established this infact means they should be seen in a better light than anybody wishing to complain about the service they had recieved.

Right or wrong IS the question as this is an open forum and members are entitled to give an opinion or can members only be expected to post positive comments in the future

It seems one company is so full of b**** that i myself had been unlucky not becoming part of their team.

The comment has amazed me as at no time did i fill out an application form or pay any money and did not want to be a part of their team

Some companies it seems are more professional in both their trading and integrity than others....
 
I don't know what degree of proof would be required finnbear, but I'm fairly sure that the website could possibly be seen as continuing to facilitate a wrong if it's operators were made aware of something which later was proven to be libelous and did nothing to remedy the situation. I think a situation arose some time ago on the Guntrader forum where a trader took extreme offence at something he/they were accused of and threatened legal action with the intention of following it through if nothing was done. The result unfortunately or fortunately depending on your personal opinion appears to be a much more conservative "no risk" forum.
 
You grow a pair of balls and pursue it yourself, it don't have to be a company being slated, were it you would you be happy, mud sticks and should anyone be unaware of whats going on, they have no means of replying until after everyone has jumped on the bandwagon and adds his bit of misinformation. Seems to be a cowards way of doing things, likened to playground activities by schoolboys . The small claims court is there, in business I have used it, its a fair, correct, and impartial way of doing it through the courts, unlike the kangaroo courts we've had lately by people who light a fuse then clear off and never post an interesting /informative thread again. This is not face-book or twitter, most of us have balls, the ladies have grace, move on from these posts and forward. deerwarden.
 
I would be interested to know if the IP addresses of these posters match that of their location.

Maybe the Admins could confirm this?

It comes across as a bit strange to me that 2 people would sign up and start these threads 2 days apart.
 
I have no idea how the law applies in these cases, but diverting slightly these posters were not happy with the service they received, fair enough.

If a member of this forum feels he has been hard done by by a company and wants to post his grievance he should be able to do so.

But these posters were not members of the forum at least not until they wished to use it as a vehicle for their grievances, they were obviously aware of it as they were quick enough to join when they had a problem,

Personally I would have more respect for a poster whom had been a member for sometime and had posted on other matters rather than one that joined just to complain.

There have been many replies to these posts both from those supporting the OPs and those defending the company's, truth is its all speculation we don't know the truth, only the party's involved know that.

One of the original posters asked if anyone could tell him of any other forums where he could make the same complaint on.
IMO thats not an attempt to inform others of what happened nor an attempt to get compensation , it is in fact malicious and an attempt to discredit and cause as much trouble for the company as possible.


AND IF THATS NOT ILLEGAL IT SHOULD BE.

If you feel that you have had a bad deal, first try to sort it out with the supplier, if that fails there are legal channels to deal with it.

Yes post the details on the forum if you must, but stick to the details of the transaction you will achieve nothing by bad mouthing people.


In fact it can have the opposite effect, the stalking world is a close knit community, and word gets passed around, just because you have a user name on a forum does not mean that your real identity will not become
known to other providers, and you could rightly or wrongly be seen as a potential trouble maker and better to be avoided.
 
To answer the original question, legally responsibility can be any or all of: the author who made the post, us (the site) and our internet service providers depending on how the material was posted, what steps were in place to try to reasonably prevent libellous content, the motives behind the post etc.

We moderate the site to the best of our ability and when we get complaints about potential libel we always follow them up. On average we probably get a "you'll be hearing from my solicitor" email every couple of months or so. In such an instance we will contact the author of the post in question and ask them whether they will stand behind their remarks and provide contact details, name, address etc. to the complainant.

If they are unwilling to do so and we have no other way of verifying what has been posted (e.g. we will look for other witnesses etc) then we will either remove the post, or edit out the contentious content or otherwise come to a mutual agreement about what remains on the site.

However, if they ARE willing to stand behind their comments then we go back to the complainant and inform them. If we can be confident the post is genuine then we will do our best to uphold it and not remove it as we believe that the value of this site comes from the ability to give fair and accurate feedback about businesses and services.

Not once has anyone gone on to attempt legal action because after working through this process in each case a) there is no substantive case for libel and b) they know it.

Also, please be aware that just because someone posts a bad review or even just says "I don't like XYZ Ltd and wouldn't recommend them because..." this does not make it libellous and often the privilege of "honest comment" will apply. Put simply, you are allowed, without malice, to say you don't like a company or a product and give your reasons for it, even if others don't agree with those reasons.

We try our best to keep a balance on this site and we moderate it as carefully as reasonably possible (too much for some maybe) but the aim is to try to keep the site open for honest feedback whilst stopping those who are doing so for personal or malicious reasons. It's not an easy thing to do, but the alternative would be to simply ban all negative feedback and I am sure this would be less desirable for the majority of our members and would devalue our whole purpose.


Alex



I would be interested to know if the IP addresses of these posters match that of their location.

Maybe the Admins could confirm this?

It comes across as a bit strange to me that 2 people would sign up and start these threads 2 days apart.

I checked it the moment I saw the posts, in the case of the Jelen post the IP was from Belgium and in the case of the Mallard Bard post the IP was British, but this was consistent with what the poster had said about his current location.
 
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I checked it the moment I saw the posts, in the case of the Jelen post the IP was from Belgium and in the case of the Mallard Bard post the IP was British, but this was consistent with what the poster had said about his current location.

Thanks Alex.
 
I liken this place to the pub....people can say what they like up to a point...you can choose who you drink with and what you read/comment on. If someone steps out of line you have the bouncers (admin :) ) to chuck out the offenders......if it goes further then the police could be involved. I suppose if there was trouble on a regular basis the landlord (admin) could be done for keeping a disorderly house but I cant see how any legal process could reach the brewery (ISP) but then anything seems possible in law these days
 
I like the analogy limulus but in a pub the conversation is normally unlikely to spread beyond your immediate crowd or group of drinking companions. The web is a little bit broader than that and if you badmouth someone word will quickly spread over a vast area. Comparing the Brewery or should we say the Premises License Holder (under certain conditions) these days responsible to an extent is a fair comparison to the ISP situation and to some extent valid. Both could be held legally responsible to a certain extent and subject to penalties.
 
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