Star to apologise to Ashley Cole

Posted by Martin Stabe on 15 March 2006 at 13:03
Tags: Ashley Cole, Journalism, Libel, News of the World, Online, Privacy, Star, Sun

The Daily Star is to apologise to Ashley Cole for retelling the “gay orgy” allegations about the footballer made by another tabloid, according to Pink News, a web site at the heart of the increasingly complex legal dispute.

The Arsenal and England star’s suit for libel, harassment and “false privacy” against the News of the World and the Sun emerged when Pink News revealed that a highly distorted photograph that the NoW had printed with stories making allegations about an unnamed gay footballer showed Cole.

The other man in the photograph, Ian Thompson (better known as DJ Masterstepz), later announced that he, too, would be suing the tabloids. Lawyers for the DJ also indicated that they may pursue an action for breach of copyright, since the photograph belonged to Thompson.
Neither man intends to sue Pink News, but the News of the World has indicated that it might pursue the web site under the Civil Liability (Contribution) Act 1978.
Cole’s lawyers are advertising an online survey about the case on Pink News.

Ashley Cole uses Internet to find libel witnesses

Posted by Martin Stabe on 9 March 2006 at 11:58
Tags: Journalism, Libel, News of the World, Photography, Privacy, Sport, Sun, copyright

Lawyers for footballer Ashley Cole are turning to the Internet to find potential witnesses for his libel case against News of the World or Sun.

In February, the NoW claimed two footballers and a “pal in the music industry” had been involved in a “homosexual orgy” involving a mobile phone. The paper later ran a heavily-pixelated image of two men along with further insinuations.

Pink News, the web site which appears to have prompted the case by publishing the original and unobsured image showing Cole and Ian Thompson, also known as DJ Masterstepz, carries an advert linking to the online survey, which is being run by law firm Teacher Stern Selby.

As we reported earlier this week, Thompson will also be suing the tabloids. In a new twist to the case we report in Press Gazette today, the Thompson is also considering an action for breach of copyright because the picture belonged to him.

News sites’ .eu domain names

Posted by Martin Stabe on 8 March 2006 at 14:04
Tags: Daily Mail, Daily Telegraph, Economist, Financial Times, Guardian, Independent, Independent on Sunday, International, News of the World, Observer, Online, Sun, Sunday Mirror, Sunday Times, Times

Kieren McCarthy — one of the blogging freelances recently mentioned in a Press Gazette feature — had a story in yesterday’s Times about the new .eu top-level domain for European web sites. The story behind the story is on his blog today.

At present, only registered trademark owners and others who can document a legal claim to a particular name can register with the European names registry EUrid. Owners of big online brands like Amazon and Skype, McCarthy reports, are fretting over whether they will be able to secure their .eu domain names before 7 April, when registration is expanded to a free-for-all “landgrab” for the general public:

… they have good reason to worry, according to EURid, the company behind the domains. “We will give the domain to the first company that applies with a valid trademark,” explained spokesman Patrik Linden.

That means even big names are not necessarily safe. Linden confirmed that Amazon had now been approved as owner of its .eu namesake, but pointed out that there was a Volvo Amazon car in the 1960s, so the car manufacturer could well have a legitimate claim.

Another car manufacturer, Volkswagen, has won a battle of the brands over Polo.eu. It beat both Ralph Lauren and Nestle to the name by a matter of minutes, according to domain name management company NetNames.

Clearly this also affects news organisations’ web sites? Are their European domain names safe?

The Telegraph has won a race for telegraph.eu. Associated Newspapers controls dailymail.eu. The Beeb has registed bbc.eu and skynews.eu is controlled by BSkyB. Also secure are itv.eu and itn.eu.

Surprisingly, perhaps, News International has grabbed thesun.eu, newsoftheworld.eu, sundaytimes.eu and thetimes.eu. But one RM Peddemors, a resident of the Netherlands, has staked claims to timeonline.eu. The same individual is also claiming economist.eu and observer.eu. Only Guardian Newspapers is appears to be challenging the claim to their trademark.

The German postal service has registered express.eu, and four companies (not including Trinity Mirror) are claiming mirror.eu.

The domain ft.eu is set to host a salmon-coloured financial news web site, but some of the other more Euro-friendly papers seem to have missed out.

Neither the Irish or British incarnations of the Indy will have independent.eu: That went to Swedish bank Independent Finans AB. Even normally web-savvy Guardian seems to have missed out: although they have secured guardianunlimited.eu, Guardian Flachglas GmbH, a glass manufacturer in Thalheim, Germany, has snapped up guardian.eu. One other domain name that a Guardian employee has recently been diligently buying up in various TLDs is still available on .eu.

Straight from the horse’s mouth

Posted by Zoe Smith on 3 March 2006 at 13:19
Tags: Journalism, Libel, Privacy, Sport, Sun

So now we have a chance to find out what’s really going on with Ashley Cole.

In an amusing twist of fate, The Sun today revealed that future Mrs. Ashley Cole, pop star Cheryl Tweedie, will feature in an exclusive Sun webchat next week.

Tweedie and her fellow Girls Aloud band mates will take part in an online Q&A session courtesy of the The Sun.

The paper cheekily states:

So if there’s something you’d like to ask Sarah, Nadine, Cheryl, Kimberly or Nicole just go to www.thesun.co.uk/bizarre and give us your questions.

In a statement issued today Cole’s lawyers said: “There is no truth whatever in these allegations. Ashley Cole will not tolerate this kind of cowardly journalism or let it go unchallenged.”

“It is disgraceful that he should be faced with this kind of unpleasant insinuation and innuendo at a time when he is trying to focus on this summer’s World Cup and his forthcoming wedding.

Ashley Cole roundup

Posted by Martin Stabe on 3 March 2006 at 11:25
Tags: Ethics, Journalism, Libel, News of the World, Online, Privacy, Sport, Star, Sun

Our exclusive report yesterday that Arsenal and England footballer Ashley Cole is suing the News of the World and the Sun (for harassment, libel and “false privacy” over stories about gay footballers in which he was not even named) has been widely picked up by other papers.

The Star tastefully splashes with the story (but strangely not on its web site). It’s also in the Daily Mail, Evening Standard, and Daily Telegraph.
The Times and Independent analyse the potential consequences for media law and what the Guardian calls the “implications for the tabloid press and their Faustian pact with the celebrity world”:

Legal experts view the case as an important step in taking the temperature of libel and privacy law in cases where the aggrieved parties are not named but the public is able to build up a “jigsaw” identification via tabloid hints that spark gossip via email, blogs and chatrooms.

They said the privacy part of the claim was “unique” because it relied on an untested concept known as “false privacy” - even though Cole says he is not gay, he will argue his privacy has been invaded.

Best of all is the Sun’s own front page report. In the intro, we learn that:

SOCCER star Ashley Cole has instructed lawyers to sue two newspapers — claiming he has been wrongly linked to gay sex allegations.

Fast forward to paragraph six:

He instructed lawyers to sue the News of the World — who originally reported that two Premiership stars had been caught romping on camera with a music industry pal.

Oh! That newspaper. Onward to paragraph 10, the last of the story:

Cole’s lawyers have filed writs against the News of the World and The Sun. He is suing for libel, harassment and breach of privacy.

Nice of them to mention that little detail.

2 comments

Footballer Ashley Cole sues tabloids

Posted by Martin Stabe on 2 March 2006 at 19:00
Tags: Evening Standard, Journalism, Libel, News of the World, Privacy, Sport, Sun

“Ashley Cole sues over gay orgy claim”, as reported in Press Gazette.

Update: The Times reports that the DJ shown in the pictures with Cole will also be suing.

CBS and News Corp launch US mobile services

Posted by Jeffrey Blyth on 28 February 2006 at 11:06
Tags: Journalism, Mobile Phones, Sun, Television, United States

As if websites and bloggers were not enough to contend with these days, American newspapers and magazines face some new competition: news and features on cell phones.

The American television network CBS has launched a new service that will broadcast features and news clips directly to subscribers’ cell phones.

For a fee of one dollar (just over 60p) a week, subscribers will get at least five news clips a day, plus the latest gossip on top celebrities and even clips from the CBS show Entertainment Tonight. Still in the works: a sports news channel.

This comes on top of a similar news and entertainment service launched by News Corp. Called Mobizzo, it even includes gossip items from such Murdoch papers as the London Sun.

There is a prediction that within five years the number of mobile phones around the world will double to at least 4 billion. CBS and News Corp. are both bent, it’s said, on getting in on this new development on the ground floor. Within a year or two it’s predicted providing news and features on mobile phones will be a crowded field. In fact one of the other predictions is that cell-phone users on their mini-screens will be able to virtually watch news as it happens – for example a bomb going off in Baghdad within minutes of the actual explosion.

News International profits ’sluggish’

Posted by Martin Stabe on 9 February 2006 at 12:25
Tags: News of the World, Sun, Sunday Times, Times

Releasing earnings figures yesterday, News Corporation said that while its profits were up, it’s no thanks to its newspaper division, which saw profits decline by 63 per cent.
As the Independent reported, the 650 redundancies that will result from it Wapping printworks will cost £57m. The company is moving its printing operations to sites in Enfield, Glasgow and Liverpool.

The Indy also mentions that News Corp had announced advertising revenues from its UK newspapers are ’sluggish’ - a fact curiously omitted from the Times’ report.

In addition to the Times, News Corp is the parent company of the Sunday Times, Sun and News of the World.