A Case That Has It All: Kim Kardashian, Twitter, Libel, Cookie Diets... And The New FTC Sponsorship Rules
from the i-want-a-cookie dept
Oh boy. Here's a fun one. You had to expect that there would be more defamation lawsuits about Twitter following the first one involving Courtney Love, but this one is quite impressive, considering of all the twists and turns that must be followed. It involves some company promoting something called "The Cookie Diet" (which appears to be exactly what you would think) suing Kim Kardashian for libel. If you don't keep up with pop culture, Kim Kardashian is one of those people famous for being famous. The details of the lawsuit, though, are somewhat complex, and it's difficult to figure out who to side with in this trainwreck in progress (and, yes, it seems pretty likely that the whole thing is a publicity stunt for all involved, but that doesn't mean it's not worth covering).So, basically, the story is that this "cookie diet" supposedly has some fans in Hollywood, and a variety of media have covered the story. Some of those media reports claimed that Kardashian (among many others) were fans of the diet. The Cookie Diet people -- like you would expect -- have a page on their website that links to news coverage, including a story (which they had nothing to do with) that said Kardashian used the diet. At some point, they also sent Kardashian's publicist a box of the cookies.
At some point towards the end of last year, Kardashian saw the link on the website and got upset, posting two Twitter messages saying the following:
- "Dr. Siegal's Cookie Diet is falsely promoting that I'm on this diet. NOT TRUE! I would never do this unhealthy diet! I do QuickTrim!"
- If this Dr. Siegal is lying about me being on this diet, what else are they lying about? Not cool!"
OK. So far we've already got some confusion about whether a link to a news article is actionable, combined with a Twitter libel claim. But then the story gets even more bizarre. You see, there's been a lot of talk lately about Kardashian being the most high profile client of some company that gets people to post sponsored Twitter messages. In fact, reports claim that some companies are paying her $10,000 per sponsored message. This may or may not be true, but if it is true, then the companies paying that money are likely getting seriously ripped off because they don't understand how Twitter works and how follower counts are grossly inflated.
So, what does this have to do with the cookies? Well, the cookie people are noting in the legal filing that Kardashian is paid to promote QuickTrim, but that she failed to note this. How does that become important? Well... you may recall last year's kerfuffle over the new FTC "guidelines" about paid endorsements online. While the cookie people don't specifically bring this up, it's certainly implied that Kardashian's paid sponsorship had something to do with her messages against the cookie people.
It's hard to see either side as being worth defending here, but sit back, grab a cookie and enjoy watching the legal arguments fly.
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Filed Under: cookies, diets, disclosure, kim kardashian, libel, sponsorships, twitter
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Are you *trying* to induce all of us to blow our New Year's resolutions with all this talk of cookies?!?
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Well hey
That said, I'm still unsure what the complaint is here.
As for the cash-for-tweets, yeah, it's a thing. Wil Wheaton and Felicia Day both mentioned it this past week (they're not doing it.)
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Yeah, I've no idea who this KK is.
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Really?
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That's exactly what I was thinking. The only reason she's upset about it is because she's being paid to promote QuickTrim...without that, this whole thing is a non issue. Who cares what diet she's on....when it comes to Kim Kardashian, my only thoughts are when is the next sex vid or Playboy spread coming out b/c her ass is AMAZING!
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Well...
Okay, here's the way it can be actionable:
It's well known among those that have even had the slightest rub with select industries that their trade and even consumer magazine journalists are essentially pay for publication. Even those that don't outright pay to have these artiles written and published pay for it some other way, usually in the form of a list of business partners that are then hit up for advertising revenue. It's an extremely unethical and dirty business. Industries known to partake in this practice include: Construction, dietary suppliments, health/pharma, and (you guessed it) health/diet programs and suppliments.
So, if the basis for such an article in which KK was listed as a believer was an "interview" with these cookie diet folks, and those folks either paid outright for the article to be written or in the form of a vendor/partner list for advertising revenue, then a link could be made and one could very easily infer that they were the ones who supplied KK's name to begin with.
Muscle suppliments are the worst of the industries, where EAS or another company list on their website all of these "articles" they directly paid for. This smells the same to me....
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You too can accomplish your New Years Resolutions with Freshology!
You should check them out. For a limited time, I believe they're giving 15% off for all TechDirt commentators and also free shipping. Just enter promo code "ImASecretJew".
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Re: You too can accomplish your New Years Resolutions with Freshology!
Okay, I have to say, despite all my best efforts, that had me giggling for several minutes....
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Yeah..
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