Post on 04-Jul-2015
Sued ….
or Not Sued?Limiting Liability on Social Media
Rebecca Taylor, J.D.
Siena College
Libel False LightIntrusion into
Seclusion
Publication of Private
Facts
Emotional Distress
CAUSES OF ACTION
•Break into Teams
•Pick your position
Sued … or Not Sued?
• You are the ND at a radio station. Your
reporter was on a ride-along with a
medical chopper unit when they stopped
to treat and transport a shooting victim.
Your reporter has sound of the medics
treating the patient in the air chopper en
route to the hospital. You air the sound.
Sued … or Not Sued?
• You are in the control room at the TV station covering breaking news of a shooting at a junior high school. Your photog in the field has an exclusive live shot of a shooting victim. In the frame, you can see a young girl shot in the shoulder hiding in a tree as police slowly approach. You air the footage live.
Sued … or Not Sued?
• You take a break from the control room
and, angry over a recent
breakup, decide to look at the intimate
photos you took of your then-girlfriend
using your I-phone. Bitter and
alone, you upload them to a site for
voyeurs.
Sued … or Not Sued?
• You just aired a package on your TV
station about drug use on college
campuses. The package featured a shot
of two random college students, Bill and
Ted, sitting in the quad eating
sandwiches while the reporter’s voice-
over stated “one in five college students
has tried meth.”
Sued … or Not Sued?
• You take another break, still smarting
from your breakup. This time you tweet
a picture of your ex-girlfriend (wearing
clothes) along with the caption, “Don’t
date a slut.”
• You have 4 followers.
Sued … of Not Sued?
• You are the ND at a television station. You just published a web story about about an area teacher arrested for having sex with a student. You incorrectly identify the principal as the offender, when in fact the math teacher was the culprit.
Sued … or Not Sued?
• What if you tweeted the erroneous
information, but you removed the
deleted the tweet within an hour of
learning it was incorrect?