Good Idea / Bad Idea

PSXDupe

Guys

I was half thinking of creating a website listing details of all activie firearms dealers in Ireland. I was also thinking that users of the site could rate each dealer based on their experience with them.

I know here we're able to discuss issues we have but unfortunately we cannot discuss who we are having the issues with, which I total repect.

However I think that if people are willing to hand over their hard earned cash to someone and wait god knows how long for their firearm(s) to be licenced that they should be able to pass comment on their experience.

I have had great experiences with most dealers that I have dealt with, and a complete nightmare with one or two.

I'm not turning to stir the **** here, just improve the experience people have with an already time consuming process.

Website - Good Idea / Bad Idea.

juice1304

Although it is a good idea i can see them bringing legal action against you fairly quickly if someone writes a terrible review

Gravelly

juice1304 wrote: »

Although it is a good idea i can see them bringing legal action against you fairly quickly if someone writes a terrible review

I doubt it as long as no actionable accusations were made, otherwise Facebook, Tripadvisor, Amazon, Google, Trustpilot, Which? etc. would be getting sued all the time.

PSXDupe

For what, if the comment is truthful, then what legal action can they bring.
This is where I am at a loss.

It would be similar to hotels.com etc etc

juice1304 wrote: »

Although it is a good idea i can see them bringing legal action against you fairly quickly if someone writes a terrible review

Grizzly 45

www.rate my gun dealer.ie Would probably go the same way as ratemyteacher.ie or rate my solicitor.ie. Make barristers and lawyers very rich.We are the 2nd most litigious society in the Western world and the most libel conscious as well and all it would take is one bad review and you are financial brown bread prey to someone.Unless you registered it in its entirety in the US and worked it from there somehow.

PSXDupe

The way I look at it, if a comment id posted and a dealer finds offence with it, then they simple request for it to be removed.
The site would also serve to advertise good dealers and promote those who put the customer first.

Grizzly 45

Gravelly wrote: »

I doubt it as long as no actionable accusations were made, otherwise Facebook, Tripadvisor, Amazon, Google, Trustpilot, Which? etc. would be getting sued all the time.

They are based and registered outside the ROI and ASFIK the accusation must be dealt with under the laws of initial registration country.So in most cases the USA, and have fun trying to bring a slander or libel suit in US courts.It's why you can post pretty freely on FB stuff you wouldn't dare say face to face in public.

PSXDupe

I really don't see what they can sue for if what is begin said is the truth.

Also would the site which provided the facility to comment be held liable for the person making the comment. Surely not, they only offer a service

Grizzly 45

PSXDupe wrote: »

The way I look at it, if a comment id posted and a dealer finds offense with it, then they simple request for it to be removed.
The site would also serve to advertise good dealers and promote those who put the customer first.

This is IRELAND mate! If there is a whiff of"free money" by legal means the unscrupulous will try and take advantage of it:(.It's just one of these nasty facts and characteristics we have as a race. A good libel lawyer will spin a "Jim bloggs left me .50 short in change on a box of shells !" into a story of such hardship and deprivation and public shunning of his business and loss of revenue that you would think he was living out on the streets in rags.
It's a great idea, but two things stick in my mind about it apart from the legal issues, is there isnt that many gun dealers here in the first place.So how does the site develop revenue and web traffic, once we all know who is good or who is a sinner?

Gravelly

Grizzly 45 wrote: »

They are based and registered outside the ROI and ASFIK the accusation must be dealt with under the laws of initial registration country.So in most cases the USA, and have fun trying to bring a slander or libel suit in US courts.It's why you can post pretty freely on FB stuff you wouldn't dare say face to face in public.

As far as I'm aware, you're wrong. Would be interested to hear a legal experts view on this, but since FB has several entities registered in Ireland, and have data centres in Ireland, I'm not sure they could necessarily get away with that. It would also render libel law defunct if it was possible to do that I'd imagine.

PSXDupe

The site is not to generate revenue, or traffic.

I already pay for a large hosting plan in the USA and a domain name cost $10. So site setup is 2-3 hours work and $10.
Search engine submittion is nothing either and a bit of fluting around SEO setting and awareness will generate over time.

$10 per year to keep the site up, no need for revenue generation.

Grizzly 45

Where is FB HQ originally registerd? Menlo Park CA.That's the parent company and that is where you send all legal writs in any action.FB Hq Dublin is a hub for Europe.It still has to go back to the US.It's why those complaining about neo nazi groups and other "hate speech" groups in Europe won't get very far, as the FB service provider in the US is covered under the 1st amendment and US laws.

And 10,000 times YES you do need legal advice on doing something like this, especially on Irish libel and slander in the digital age.In fact, maybe talk to the owners of Boards.ie themselves as they will have done this rodeo a few times before in all sorts of ways and aspects.:)

Gravelly

Grizzly 45 wrote: »

Where is FB HQ originally registerd? Menlo Park CA.That's the parent company and that is where you send all legal writs in any action.FB Hq Dublin is a hub for Europe.It still has to go back to the US.It's why those complaining about neo nazi groups and other "hate speech" groups in Europe won't get very far, as the FB service provider in the US is covered under the 1st amendment and US laws.

And 10,000 times YES you do need legal advice on doing something like this, especially on Irish libel and slander in the digital age.In fact, maybe talk to the owners of Boards.ie themselves as they will have done this rodeo a few times before in all sorts of ways and aspects.:)

This is the case where a student wrongly identified as a passenger who ran off without paying a taxi sued Facebook (and Youtube and Google!) from Ireland.

http://trinitycollegelawreview.org/the-new-face-of-defamation/

From memory, Facebook and Twitter have both been sued in European courts, with their Irish HQ's being named in the suit. I can't see how a company being sued could just say "well it's not us, it's yer man over there" and avoid legal action. If that were the case, every company in the world would have an office in Somalia or somewhere to fend off legal action.

Sparks

PSXDupe wrote: »

I was also thinking that users of the site could rate each dealer based on their experience with them.

That right there is the problem with the idea and the cause of a large portion of the mod's workload on here.

If Joe Q Public (anonymous) can put up information on Fred (identified firearms dealer), then PSXDupe (legally the publisher of said information) can wind up hooped. And even if you maintain the user's data and hand it over to a section 8 court order, you're still talking about a lot of fun in the process. It does not matter if you make money off the site or not; that has nothing to do with the basis of these lawsuits, which is that the person suing has lost livelihood or his good name as a result (and those two are not the same chunk of law either; you give a business a non-defamatory bad rating, even just numerically, and you are still open for a suit on the livelihood basis - and while you might win, you have to pay to win in court - and winning does not see you get all your money back).

See: http://www.rate-your-solicitor.com/

Also, Grizzly, you're a bit out of date; Google and Facebook have both been sued in Dublin courts in fairly well-known recent cases. The entire right-to-be-forgotten for example, is purely an EU thing. If they operate in the EU, they must adhere to EU regulations, it does not matter where the HQ building is located.

And as for:

Grizzly45 wrote:

you can post pretty freely on FB stuff you wouldn't dare say face to face in public.

Come on man, it's only been months since someone said something in a one-line throwaway facebook comment in either the NARGC or the SC facebook page (I forget which it was) and they wound up losing a defamation case and facing damages of seventy-five thousand euros.


And just to forestall one of the more popular wrong ideas on this topic, "just use an ISP from outside the EU and you're grand" is also not the fastest way to ruin I can think of, but it's a pretty solid candidate.

Sparks

Gravelly wrote: »

From memory, Facebook and Twitter have both been sued in European courts, with their Irish HQ's being named in the suit. I can't see how a company being sued could just say "well it's not us, it's yer man over there" and avoid legal action. If that were the case, every company in the world would have an office in Somalia or somewhere to fend off legal action.

In cases where they are acting just as a conduit with no knowledge of the content, they have some legal protection and full liability lands on the person who wrote the content in the first place; but if they know about it and don't act on that knowledge, they can be named in the lawsuit as a defendant as well (boards.ie ltd has done this dance a few times now). But it's *some* protection, not full protection, and from what I recall they wouldn't be protected if they had no mechanism at all to act on dodgy content; the defence is based on doing due diligence but it not being humanly possible to find every single case of dodgy content because of the sheer volume of stuff coming in on a daily basis.

Sparks

Also, standard disclaimer, I'm a software engineer not a barrister and this is not professional advice - go hire a solicitor!

Chiparus

You would want to be very careful.

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/solicitor-takes-legal-action-over-comments-on-website-1.607477

Luckysasha

You could use a platform that is already set up for this purpose. Personally I use Yelp quite a bit when going to new cities abroad especially the US. Irish people are slow to use services like Yelp that's why the Irish businesses such as gun ranges listed may have only one or two reviews whilst a gun range say in Texas will have hundreds of reviews. I personally post reviews on the places I visit to provide information to other people who are considering using the business or service

PSXDupe

So the guts of this is, it could be more pain that anyone wants.

For me personally I know the dealer in question for myself will not be getting another penny from me.
I think it will just have to be word of month to inform people.

Thanks everyone for your input.

Luckysasha

With the greatest of respect this is what I'm talking about when it comes to Irish people reviews businesses and services. Personally speaking being relatively new to the shooting world I have only dealt with 2 or 3 RFDs. One bad experience sticks out in my mind but I can't come on here and voice my opinions because I would be told I can't name the RFD in question. So where do I go ? I try the word of mouth route but that won't reach the general masses of shooters who might benefit from hearing about a certain shooting ground trying to defraud me out of nearly €600. Where as if we where using a service like yelp or even TripAdvisor then I could share my experience safe in the knowledge I could post anonymously if desired and if people wanted to PM to find out more details then that's their choice. I think PSXDupe is on to something here and I for one will be following this with great interest

Sparks

Where as if we where using a service like yelp or even TripAdvisor then I could share my experience safe in the knowledge I could post anonymously if desired

No, you couldn't.

I mean, you'd think you could, but you can't really. Either you're known to the site but your identity is not disclosed, as on here; or you're going via Tor and a few other tricks so the site doesn't know your identity. But in the first case, you're not really anonymous and a court order will reveal your identity to the plaintiff (see our forum charter's note on that); and in the second case your comment will be deleted out of hand if anyone even blinks at it - if, in fact, you're allowed to sign up that way at all (not all sites allow it).

BattleCorp

Good Idea / Bad Idea

I'm going to go with Bad Idea.

Even if everything published is true, I'd bet my right testicle that someone will eventually take you to court.

And believe me, winning in court aint cheap. It might only cost $10 to set up but it could easily wind up costing you thousands, tens of thousands or possibly even more.

Luckysasha

Sparks wrote: »

No, you couldn't.

I mean, you'd think you could, but you can't really. Either you're known to the site but your identity is not disclosed, as on here; or you're going via Tor and a few other tricks so the site doesn't know your identity. But in the first case, you're not really anonymous and a court order will reveal your identity to the plaintiff (see our forum charter's note on that); and in the second case your comment will be deleted out of hand if anyone even blinks at it - if, in fact, you're allowed to sign up that way at all (not all sites allow it).

Can a business take you to court for giving an honest and true account of your experience. For example if I posted "such and such where rude to me when I visited their shop and charged me more for 50 clays than my buddy who visited later in the day." Maybe I'm just being naive to the whole thing

123shooter

Grizzly 45 wrote: »

www.rate my gun dealer.ie Would probably go the same way as ratemyteacher.ie or rate my solicitor.ie. Make barristers and lawyers very rich.We are the 2nd most litigious society in the Western world and the most libel conscious as well and all it would take is one bad review and you are financial brown bread prey to someone.Unless you registered it in its entirety in the US and worked it from there somehow.

Grizzly what if you had no money or assets..........could you have a field day?:)

Sparks

Luckysasha wrote: »

Can a business take you to court for giving an honest and true account of your experience. For example if I posted "such and such where rude to me when I visited their shop and charged me more for 50 clays than my buddy who visited later in the day." Maybe I'm just being naive to the whole thing

Yes, readily.

Truth is a defence against a charge of defamation. Which means you give it in court, not that people are banned from taking you there. And to get in the door is going to cost you, and even if you win, some of what you paid (it's set out by your solicitor ahead of time in a section 68 letter) is just what it cost, you never get that back even if you win and costs are awarded against the plaintiff. So even if it was a nonsense case, it could still cost you quite a lot of money. And that's if you win, there is literally no such thing as a sure thing in Irish Courts.

(Interesting side note: in the US, or at least parts of it, there are rules against that - they're known as SLAPP cases and you're barred from taking them, though the level of protection varies from state to state. The best protection being in California, for those keeping score :P )

Sparks

123shooter wrote: »

Grizzly what if you had no money or assets..........could you have a field day?:)

The thing to remember about rock bottom is that you can always dig deeper.

Grizzly 45

Sparks wrote: »

T,
Also, Grizzly, you're a bit out of date; Google and Facebook have both been sued in Dublin courts in fairly well-known recent cases. The entire right-to-be-forgotten for example, is purely an EU thing. If they operate in the EU, they must adhere to EU regulations, it does not matter where the HQ building is located.

And as for:

Come on man, it's only been months since someone said something in a one-line throwaway facebook comment in either the NARGC or the SC facebook page (I forget which it was) and they wound up losing a defamation case and facing damages of seventy-five thousand euros.

I meant more in the sense of slander of the keyboard warrior type.Calling each other everything under the Sun, where in real life if someone said it to you in person, their facial surgery repair bills would be astronomical while your legal bills for GBH wouldn't be too far behind either. But the above does prove my point on how litigant happy the Irish are..Most everyone else would just say in the world "Yeah,yaeh fuk you too and your dog!" And carry on with life, or have little choice on it.But here it's a chance at the high court lottery game with the 2nd prize of a "settlement out of court" And then we are surprised if insurance costs are ridiculous here and our papers consist of safe editor and paper lawyer picked over to the nines, bland rubbish?

EDIT.Also in the case of our mutual friends in the link.Was there also some and also quite important in these cases , malicious intent to libel?There is also a thing called innocent libel.Where you write something and even misplace a comma.Thus giving an entire different meaning to a sentence that you had no intention of doing.Soit could also be that there was more than just a throwaway comment involved in this case?

Luckysasha

It makes you wonder why we don't see more court cases from businesses who take exception to say a bad TripAdvisor review. Do businesses just accept it's part and parcel of offering a service to the general public that if someone isn't happy then they proceed to take to the internet and voice their opinions rather than just confront the business face to face. In fairness from reading the likes of TripAdvisor and Yelp the owners / managers will generally try to communicate with the bad reviewers to try and rectify the issues.

Sparks

Grizzly 45 wrote: »

I meant more in the sense of slander of the keyboard warrior type.Calling each other everything under the Sun, where in real life if someone said it to you in person, their facial surgery repair bills would be astronomical while your legal bills for GBH wouldn't be too far behind either.

Yeah, but that's not actionable under Irish defamation law (or the older libel and slander laws). It was specifically referred to as "salty language" and wasn't libellous. It's in all the textbooks. You can call someone a **** ****er all you like and it's just salty language, but if you were to suggest they actually engage in bestiality then that's libellous.

I admit, it's a fine line, but barristers appear to love those...

Cass

PSXDupe wrote: »

I know here we're able to discuss issues we have but unfortunately we cannot discuss who we are having the issues with, which I total repect.

Most of its covered but this bit i wanted to comment on.

We used to have reviews here all the time. Some positive, some negative and it gave both sides to a lot of businesses and lads could make their own mind up after reading them.

However with the law the way it is in this country unless you're calling them a saint, and however true and clinical (facts, no name calling) your assessment is as soon as they see a negative review they threaten legal action, the site owners/admins remove the content for review, and the usual outcome is to leave it gone to avoid trouble.

IOW there is no such thing as the ability to honestly review a business anymore and said businesses are more interested in making threats to avoid people talking about them, than acknowledging the perceived problems and trying to fix them.