Legal News

Cards? La Russa Settles Twitter (Copyright? Defamation?) Suit

By Chris Herring

Just when we were starting to think that almost every pro sports figure was in love with Twitter, along came Tony La Russa, who actually found reason to sue the social networking site.

In response to a made-up Twitter profile of La Russa, the St. Louis Cardinals manager filed what appeared to be the first celebrity lawsuit against the 32-million-user site. It’s true, one celebrity got sued over her Twitter use. And another announced litigation on Twitter. But, until now, never had a celebrity sued Twitter. Click here for the complaint.

The case was settled early Friday — Twitter will apparently cover La Russa’s legal fees and donate an undisclosed amount to the Animal Rights Foundation on the coach’s behalf.

The settlement left us wondering, however. Had the case gone to court, what might have been made of the suit? Keep in mind that La Russa nearly went into the field of law before passing it up for the Field of Dreams.

Prior to the settlement, The Law Blog talked with Stanford Law School professor Mark Lemley, an intellectual property expert who focuses on technology and the law, to get his take on the suit.

Lemley said his first thought was, “This is very interesting.” His second thought: that La Russa was arguing not a copyright suit but a defamation suit, as he’d alleged that someone pretending to be him was speaking and, as a result, hurting his reputation. Says Lemley: “He’s basically repackaged a defamation suit to make it look like a trademark suit.”

Lemley’s got nothing per se against defamation suits, but Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act prohibits plaintiffs from suing a site like Twitter for defamation. Says Lemley: “La Russa’s claim would only be valid if he could prove that Twitter is using La Russa as a brand to market its services or something. It doesn’t look like that’s the case. But that’s what La Russa would have to prove to win the suit.”

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on June 08, 2009 (boomark / email).