Media + Entertainment

In a case that continues to attract considerable attention from the press and from First Amendment legal practitioners, Pryor Cashman is representing internationally renowned singer Courtney Love-Cobain in a California lawsuit arising out of allegations of libel disseminated over the Internet, specifically on popular social media outlets such as Twitter and MySpace.

The action, entitled Dawn Simorangkir v. Courtney Michelle Love, was filed in the Superior Court of the State of California for the County of Los Angeles on March 26, 2009. The plaintiff, a fashion designer named Dawn Simorangkir a/k/a “Boudoir Queen,” is a former seller of vintage clothing to Love-Cobain over the Internet marketplace known as etsy.com.  

After growing dissatisfied and frustrated with Simorangkir’s business practices, Love-Cobain made a number of negative postings about her over the social media sites Twitter and MySpace. The questions in the case include whether Love-Cobain’s postings constitute actionably false statements of fact (particularly given the context in which they were made, the reputations of the parties and the media over which the postings were delivered) and whether Simorangkir suffered any harm entitling her to damages.

The Pryor Cashman team representing Love-Cobain includes Litigation Partners James Janowitz, William Charron and Michael Niborski.

The case has been the subject of substantial press attention, both in the U.S. and abroad, specifically the scope of First Amendment protection afforded to statements posted on social networking sites such as Twitter, and the future increase in potential “Twitter defamation” lawsuits. On this subject, partner James Janowitz has been quoted in the National Law Journal saying: “People say things unheedful of the consequences, in the heat of the moment, without thinking there could be tens of millions of people who see these things. And its in the context of social networking, which they regard as not so serious.”