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Hey Blogger, Are You Insured?

Hey Blogger, Are You Insured?

The beauty of social media is that everyone has a venue that is capable of catching fire and getting the words you write in front of the masses. But with this new-found power comes great responsibility – and perhaps the need for a lawyer.

According to the Media Law Resource Center, the number of libel lawsuits is on the rise.

Even if you are a law-abiding blogger who always speaks the truth, a lawsuit can be filed against you at any time by anyone – that’s just the way the system works.

Before you air your grievances in public about a person, place or thing, try taking a deep breath.

According to an article from Tribune Media Services:

This year, a court awarded $129,794 to an Ohio woman after a blogger said her property was haunted, reports Media Law. Another blogger was ordered to pay $1.8 million after referring to someone as a “failed lawyer.”

Wow! A juicy headline can lead to more clicks and more followers, but you can bet your bottom dollar that your online friends won’t pitch in for legal fees if you get slapped with a monstrous lawsuit.

Blogging has become such a risk, that several well-known insurance agencies have begun including libel protections under certain homeowner’s and umbrella policies.

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Even if your current plan does not cover such legal problems, you can likely add a rider to your current policy.

Under $1,000 a year can give you the peace of mind to speak your mind!

You can also check out BlogInsure.

View Comments (3)
  • The quote from that article is misleading. In both cases those judgments were default judgments because the defendant failed to make an appearance at all. In the case of the haunted mill, for example, the judge ruled a defendant who had also made the haunted claim in a book had not committed libel, but entered a default judgment for the blogger because he or she failed to appear.

    In both cases if the defendant had actually bothered to appear, the court almost certainly would have ruled in their favor since neither statement rises to the U.S. standard of libel.

    There’s only one case that the Media Law Resource Center says it is aware of a blogger getting sued and actually losing and having to pay damages, and that was clearly a legit case of libel where the idiot posting should have known better — a man upset with is lawyer over a monetary dispute claimed in his blog that the lawyer was engaged in a bribery scheme with a local judge (http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1173363835339)

    So unless you’re going to be posting maliciously false items about people, libel insurance seems like a waste of money for the average blogger.

  • Always important to have a great lawyer on your side just in case anything crazy comes up! You never know what could happen these days!

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