Scripting News: Russo & Hale threatens defamation suit

Scripting News, the weblog started in 1997 that bootstrapped the blogging revolution.

Russo & Hale threatens defamation suit

Earlier today my lawyers received a letter from Jack Russo, my former attorney and former friend, demanding that I retract statements I made here on Scripting News.

I just had a conference with my attorneys, and read some background on libel law as it applies to bloggers, from the EFF, and California's anti-SLAPP statute.

I'm not going to, at this time: 1. Publish their letter; 2. Link to the portions of articles they want retracted; 3. Retract anything previously published.

I am going to spend some time thinking about this, studying, and learning about libel law to find out what the options are.

I am going to solicit the opinion of readers of this site, especially those who are lawyers.

I take my integrity as a blogger seriously. I only say things I believe to be true; and if there's any doubt, I label opinions as such. I have at times made mistakes, and when that happens, I retract and apologize. If I have done this, in the matter of Russo & Hale and its lawsuit against me, UserLand and VeriSign, I will both retract and apologize. But anything I do is going to be done openly and in consultation with the readers of Scripting News.

Last update: Thursday, June 3, 2010; 4:00:40 PM

~About the Author~

Dave Winer, 55, is a visiting scholar at NYU's Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute. He pioneered the development of weblogs, syndication (RSS), podcasting, outlining, and web content management software; former contributing editor at Wired Magazine, research fellow at Harvard Law School, entrepreneur, and investor in web media companies. A native New Yorker, he received a Master's in Computer Science from the University of Wisconsin, a Bachelor's in Mathematics from Tulane University and currently lives in New York City.

"The protoblogger." - NY Times.

"The father of modern-day content distribution." - PC World.

One of BusinessWeek's 25 Most Influential People on the Web.

"Helped popularize blogging, podcasting and RSS." - Time.

"The father of blogging and RSS." - BBC.

"RSS was born in 1997 out of the confluence of Dave Winer's 'Really Simple Syndication' technology, used to push out blog updates, and Netscape's 'Rich Site Summary', which allowed users to create custom Netscape home pages with regularly updated data flows." - Tim O'Reilly.

Mail: scriptingnews1mail at gmail dot com.

Mar May