Gripe online about your dealership - get sued for defamation.

I

imported_Pats300zx

New member
First, to the mods, I apologize for the nature of this post - it is clearly off topic to the purpose of this board. But this board attracts those with a passion for their vehicles and access to the net, and this story affects those people.

Second, I don't lurk much anymore (until recently), so this may have been posted here already. Apologies in advance if so.

Third, I'm posting this so that those of you on other car boards can link to it - the information should be spread around.

In a nutshell: A VW owner was upset at the quality of the service he recieved at a particular dealer. He posted his observations, comments, and, frankly, rants, on the "main" VW board, VWVortex, in or about July of 2001. As of this writing, that thread has over 12k views. Anyway, the dealer didn't take kindly to this public airing of his complaint. So they sued him for defamation.

Read the Atlanta Journal Constitution Newspaper Article (link will expire in on Friday, I believe):

http://www.accessatlanta.com/ajc/epaper/editions/saturday/metro_b36fb002844b70b60008.html

Thee original thread that started this suit
http://forums.vwvortex.com/zerothread?id=52126

Results of Monday, november 19 Hearing on injunction can be found on page 6 of this thread.

Spread the word and judge for yourself - we're all affected.
 
The letter was very informative, until the last few paragraphs. He could have avoided a lot of this hassle if he had just stated the facts and asked people to make their own determinations on dealing with them.
 
im not a lawyer but i dont see anything in there thats not opinon and i guess VW would have to prove loss of revenue directly associated to that post..which is really hard to do...of course the "i want revenge" part of the post didnt help...even though totally understandable....the problem is a big dealer can afford to overload you with legal hassles and even if they lose they wasted all your time and $ fighting it.....the bottom line is you can anything you want to...malicious or not....as long as you afford the person(delaer0 your attacking the same opportunity....if the poster would have just said that i told the dealer i was going on to this site and they didnt care...or they refused to offer a response......the best thing to do is to email a letter to the dealer than copy it into a post.....no matter what this person got screwed...as usual....im sure the poster will be vindicated....but meanwhile you have to take off work...disrupt your whole life probably for a yr...unbelievable
 
you didnt get my supeona yet...;) :p damn server was supposed to catch u yesterday....i told him to look for the house with an awesome walk light setup...a shiny VW and invisible front glass door......and of course...the guy on the block kicking his tires from underneath his car....:D
 
Just to point out a couple of things:



1. this is the DEALER suing, not VW. I can't imagine the suits at VWOA like this one bit - bad press is bad press.



2. Like I noted above, it is a bit of a rant; If you take the time to read the entire thread (I did), there are some other "facts" that come out that indicate "we" don't have the entire story. That the "stay away" TRO was granted is but one.



3. The dealer was forwarded the thread - they could have chosen to reply. At least one person claiming to work there did post.



4. Forgot to mention this supra., but the site itself is also being sued for "publishing" the defamation.



Bad deal, all the way around.
 
Just remember... in the good ole US of A, we are entitled to our opinion. So, any time you rant, make sure you say "My opinion is... YOU SUCK!", not "YOU SUCK!" After all, it's only my opinion.



;)

db
 
that kind of lingo will not be tolerated here....we are an upscale board and such gutter speak/parlor room antics connott...and will not be stood for...then again...your the moderator...so..........the gloves are off boys....weeeeeeeeee!!!
 
WOW!



There are some angrl VW owners in Atlanta huh.



Goes to show you that you cannot put a price on great service. Great service is what makes me willing to pay a little more for a good product.



Oh In my opinion of course.



Can I now disclaim that everything I have ever said in my entire life is my opinion?
 
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