Legal Action

[chriswatson]

A few members on my web site have received very bad service from a company so they started a thread to express their views.

The thread is located here

I have now received an email from the company threatening legal action against me if I do not remove the thread from my web site and also remove all references to his business from my web site. Can anybody give me advise how I stand on this matter ?

Regards
chris.

[Floris]

You have to get a lawyer to check which posts made are causing direct damage to that company. But, everybody is free to express their personal opinion or share their experience. This is not against the law. It also depends on your forum rules, if you do not allow it you can just remove it. You can also decide to just soft delete the thread in question and play nice. Or choose to support your community and wait for a court order which require you to remove it (or fight that even). You're the provider of the content, you can't always moderate it and aren't liable for the content.

[birdie]

Invite the company to respond to the allegations in the thread, then lock it.

[Chazel]

I, personally, wouldn't do anything.

1) You aren't breaking the law. Even if a post was breaking the law, it is the responsibility of the poster and not you, since you are simply providing the service but they're posting the content. You can't moderate all content.

2) Don't fall for someone's trick. I'm the kind of person that won't go down without a fight, and that includes people threatening me with litigation.

If I were you, I'd first go to a website like Digital Point and seek help from someone who knows what they're talking about. If you're not breaking the law, regardless if they have 20-lawyers they can't do anything.

[birdie]

If I were you, I'd first go to a website like Digital Point and seek help from someone who knows what they're talking about.

I have not laughed this much in a while! Digital Pointless!! I stopped visiting there a while back because there were so many who did not know what they were talking about! They have also been over run with scammers.

[ManagerJosh]

I would kindly reply back and invite them to share their side of the story and work in reaching a mutual agreement with your members rather than threatening you with legal action. I would point out that it is in their best interest to work with your members rather than sue the pants off you or your members.

Think of how much good will it would generate and how much stronger their company would be as a whole. Because in the end, suing you would probably more than likely generate more repercussions against the company.

[Floris]

I would kindly reply back and invite them to share their side of the story and work in reaching a mutual agreement with your members rather than threatening you with legal action. I would point out that it is in their best interest to work with your members rather than sue the pants off you or your members.

Think of how much good will it would generate and how much stronger their company would be as a whole. Because in the end, suing you would probably more than likely generate more repercussions against the company.

I would not even reply to the email .. if they are serious they can send a postal mail letter to your home address. To which you can then reply explaining you're the service provider and not the author of such content and can't be hold liable.

[Jingus]

I have now received an email from the company threatening legal action against me if I do not remove the thread from my web site and also remove all references to his business from my web site. Can anybody give me advise how I stand on this matter ?

Bad service, bad reviews.
What are they going to do, take you to court for complaining about their poor service?
I doubt if he will take you to court, it would be bad publicity.
Crooks like that don't want to draw any undue attention to their business practices, which is the reason why he doesn't want you talking about his company on your website.

R.Fahad wrote me declaring in non uncertain terms:
The Cam cannot be repaired, and as it was working when he send it out he will not replace it or refund me.

Write back and tell him you are going to take him to small claims court and watch how fast he folds.
Take a look at his cheap website, it looks like a tiny import business with a big corporate sounding name.
Their forum only has 5 active members.
It's probably the 4 Fahad brothers working out of the shabby apartment they all share.
That's why he said it was working fine when he sent it out.
The owner of this big electronics firm is packing out the merchandise?
I'm going to take a wild guess at this and say that this company (the 4 Fahad brothers) is buying back door merchandise from electronics factorys in Asia.
They buy equipment that has been rejected by quality control and sell it to the ususpecting public as fast as they can, then they take the money and run.