Love's Twitter Settlement Revealed

In late January, I posted that it appeared that fashion designer Dawn Simorangkir's libel lawsuit against singer Courtney Love, which was expected to be the first defamation trial stemming from posts on Twitter, was going to end in a settlement. Now The Hollywood Reporter has revealed the amount of the pre-trial settlement: $430,000, plus interest. 

Here's how the settlement amount compares to results from other cases: It is 43 percent higher than the $300,000 median of trial awards in defamation, privacy and related cases against media defendants from 1980 through 2009, but is only 15 percent of the average award in these cases, $2.85 million.  Of course, most of these initial awards are reversed or reduced on appeal.


While the Simorangkir-Love suit has been settled, it's just a matter of time before another, probably lower profile lawsuit will explore defamation in Twitter's 140 character-chunks.  (More on that in this post.)