Arianna Huffington Sued For 'Stealing' The Idea For The Huffington Post

from the you-can't-steal-ideas dept

Apparently two political consultants, Peter Daou and James Boyce, thought they had a deal back in 2004 to help create a blogging site with Arianna Huffington and Ken Lerer -- and they're now suing both of them for "idea misappropriation" over the Huffington Post. The whole filing is quite a read: Of course, you can't own an idea, so it's a bit silly to claim otherwise. There's also a breach of contract claim, which also seems like a huge stretch. While it is possible to have a verbal contract, from the filings, it's going to be very difficult for Daou and Boyce to prove that there was any official verbal contract at work here. It sounded like early stages of planning, before Huffington and Lerer decided to go in their own direction.

Also quite damning is the fact that the lawsuit is being filed more than 5 years after the events took place. Daou and Boyce try to explain this away by claiming that a public legal fight would hurt their ability to get other work, which doesn't really make much sense. On top of that Daou and Boyce have been regular contributors to The Huffington Post. In the lawsuit, they suggest that they still wanted it to be a success and hoped that Huffington and Lerer would make things right. It's difficult to see this court case getting very far, but it may scare people off from having any conversations with Daou or Boyce about potentially working together on any kind of project, as it seems they might sue you in the future if you don't automatically cut them in on it if you decide to go off and do it on your own.

Filed Under: arianna huffington, execution, ideas, james boyce, peter daou
Companies: huffington post