Paul Walsh, the Irish Opportunist

As someone who was part of the Blognation network and who believed in it and who blogged for it and who is owed money by Sam, I’d just say - cor, phewee, blimey, knock me down with a kipper, where will it all end.
There were some great people involved in Blognation and it was fun at the start, but boring at the end.

Ivan - it had the best of the best, with the exception of one or two, writing for it. It had great sponsorship potential and a great brand. How could it fail… cashflow - exactly how so many businesses go bust unfortunately! Such a shame.

I’ve been at various sides of legal tussles in the past and there are a few constants: 1) It’s stressful 2) It’s expensive and 3) Morality or popular perception of what is Right or Wrong is different to what is legally correct - a crack legal team will tie you up for months on these grey areas with only the richest surviving, but at a cost.

The real tragedy here is that this case is being fought as (an increasingly nasty) PR campaign in public. There will be no winners but very possibly two losers.

Oh no wait, I’m wrong, there will be one winner: the lawyers.

Walk away chaps, walk away.

I never met with the Blognation legal team. I talked with Sam over the phone and never once talked seriously about joining him. Please keep this factual, thanks.

Is this just a default judgment, reflecting solely Arrington’s ‘refusal to participate’? If so then Sethi can hardly be said to have ‘proved’ anything.

I don’t know the facts myself, or any of the participants, so this isn’t a loaded question.

Auctualy its travel to the EU he may have problems with.

MM ime sure his Mum will arange for a freindly MD to diagnose MA with aspergers.

Good Job for MA that the extradition treatey with teh states is so lopsided.

Arrington made a big mistake not defending this case - he’ll likely have all sorts of problems with travel in the future.

Hey Scoble why don’t you get your mate Arrington to just pay up so that Marc Orchant’s widow and the other editors get paid.

Sethi won the case even if it was by default only because Arrington, the ex-lawyer, was to arrogant or stupid to understand the libel case and contest. He probably knew he could not win and chose this route to defend himself.

The bonus is Arrington cannot come to FOWA, Le Web or other European events in case he gets arrested by the new e-border police initiative - Maurice is correct.

On that note can the travelling geeks not come back again either ESPECIALLY Scoble and Lacey. Wasn’t that a cop show in the 70’s?

@Alex: what everyone is missing here is that Arrington said he doesn’t want to participate. You can interpret that whatever way you wish. What matters is that a UK judge made the not unreasonable assumption that Arrington/TC’s claims were spurious. Otherwise why not defend? That’s why the law is said to be blind. Others may see this as dopey, but the fact remains Arrington took a decision that has backfired and from which his only remedy - as I understand from three different legal sources - is to pay up. In essence and whatever anyone wants to spin - this puts the financial problems of Blognation back on TC/Arrington. Given what is claimed about the term sheet, does that seem so unreasonable?

What matters is that a UK judge made the not unreasonable assumption that Arrington/TC’s claims were spurious. Otherwise why not defend?

Guilty until you prove yourself innocent?

Michael has made the right decision (morally) in my book. Let’s say you write something blasphemous about an imam in Saudi Arabia that’s not defamatory by British standards. When a lawsuit is filed in Saudi, should you go and defend yourself against claims made under their ridiculous laws? I lean towards “no” on this and Michael shouldn’t need to defend himself against our idiotic plaintiff-friendly libel laws either.

Winning a libel case in the US is far harder than in the UK and even if he’s totally in the clear with his claims, Michael would have had a hard time here nonetheless simply due to how our system is organized. In the US, however, I doubt the case would take long at all to find in his favor.

Guilty until you prove yourself innocent?

In a civil court, yes. I don’t believe it’s any different in the states. Two key things - if contested it’s on balance of probability rather than reasonable doubt, and the ‘burden of proof’ in libel (certainly in the UK) is on the person who libeled to prove their statements were true - in effect making them guilty by default. To do otherwise would make te claimant (the ‘victim’) guilty of whatever had been alleged by default…

When a lawsuit is filed in Saudi, should you go and defend yourself against claims made under their ridiculous laws?

If you’d like to be able to visit that country in the future, then yes!

As somebody else said, just be glad the extradition laws are so one sided. If it was the other way around they’d probably have Mike extraordinarily renditioned!

(IANAL)

Note that the judgement is against MA & Techcrunch. Perhaps the sheriff will be in hot pursuit of the TC presence here on the ground in the UK? mbites loses iphone/laptop/hat to Sethi settlement pot! LOL

Hey Paul:

Tell Sam that people in Chicago sympathize with his battles against Mike Arrington and Techcrunch.

In October 2008 a Chicago-based technology company called Earthcomber filed a lawsuit against Loopt, accusing it of infringing on Earthcomber’s patent for mobile social network technology.

Mr. Arrington’s response? First: he directed his former intern to write a hatchet piece denouncing the lawsuit as “absurd” and personally referring to Earthcomber’s patent offering as “weak”. No problem there, from an opinion perspective.

Except for one bit of information Mr. Arrington failed to disclose to his readers. Techcrunch during the summer of 2008 entered into a business deal with Loopt whereby the two companies combined to form a separate product–called Loopt-TC. The two companies launched Loopt TC in the Apple Store just a month prior to Earthcomber’s lawsuit.

Earthcomber, stunned by the blatantly negative coverage–which was blindly picked up by several newspaper publications–did some research and discovered that Mr. Arrington didn’t just have an opinion of the lawsuit. He had a financial stake in the outcome of it.

Appropriately, Earthcomber amended its lawsuit and sued Techcrunch because it was marketing a distinct separate product in the Apple store and thus was also violating Earthcomber’s IP.

Mr. Arrington–again in an effort to sway opinion rather than present the facts as they were laid out to him–wrote a venimous follow-up hit piece accusing Earthcomber of suing him out of spite, and personally referring to Earthcomber CEO Jim Brady as “an asshole” in his commentary section. In the second article, Mr. Arrington claimed ignorance as to why TC was being sued, referring to TC as a search engine. Mind you, he failed to mention his co-branded product Loopt TC to his readers, and inaccurately portrayed a telephone conversation he had with Earthcomber president Jim Brady.

Also, he stated in the follow-up article that he instructed his attorneys to counter sue Earthcomber “back into the stone ages.”

That was last October.

What has happend since? He has not counter sued Earthcomber. In fact, the so called “legal team” he referred to in his articles doesn’t exist. Loopt’s attorneys are representing TC. He has no individual representation. And he is on the lineup of deponents if this trial goes to discovery. The lawsuit remains ongoing.

None of this, mind you, justifies some idiot spitting at him. But the Earthcomber case illustrates many people’s complaints about Mr. Arrington, and his way of doing business and reporting the facts—particularly when they involve friends of his or business relationships with which he has a financial interest.

Most telling, it illustrates Mr. Arrington’s attempts to be both bully and victim at the same time. You can’t be both Mike. It simply isn’t possible.

The lesson: words have meaning, power, influence. People work hard to create businesses and don’t take kindly to being trampled upon by someone with the power and influence Mr. Arrington clearly has.

So congratulations Sam, for stepping up and fighting a bully. And winning.

And let us know if there is anything we can do in the states to assist you in the capture and arrest of Mr. Arrington—the pudgy, frightened, punchless, fugitive that he is.