The Ohio State woman, her nose and her side or main dude

If they showed it on SC and talked about it, she might.

 

It looked more like a scratch instead of a pick to me.

 

She totally farted.

 

That's why I said there's no action for the original broadcast. If ESPN talked about it in the same way that some websites have, then there may be a claim. But there's nothing for the original broadcast or even a rebroadcast that doesn't cast her in a light that could be libelous. She has no expectation of privacy at a public sporting event, and neither do any of the other thousands of people there. That means a showing of the video itself is 100 percent fair game. It only becomes actionable if there's a libelous falsehood attached, which an accusation of infidelity could potentially be.

 

First, she'd have to prove she is not banging the guy. How does one prove that? Also, she'd have to prove the harm it has caused her. Beyond being the butt of snarky jokes on the internet, is this girl suffering any real harm? Lastly, the websites in question would have to present the "sidepiece" description as fact instead of speculation.

As everyone knows, libel is damn hard to litigate (rightfully so, to protect a free press). She's better off either embracing the hilarity of the video and having some fun with it, or just laying low. It will be forgotten before the National Championship ends.

 

Some of these websites nowadays only exist for malice, so they don't have the "absence of malice" escape clause.

 

I agree. I am talking about the creation and promotion of the edited video.

You lose your right to privacy when you attend a sporting event, and some people might argue that you have limited privacy when you attend them, but you cannot edited people's images. ESPN cannot run a split screen of the game on one half and "girls with big tits at the game" of the other half of the split.

And for what Tony says about sites only being around for malicious intent, one good court case could make a lot of them go away or a lot of their content go away.

 

I agree that she's better off trying to embrace the situation than litigating. Streisand effect, and all. I was just trying to answer 93Devil's earlier questions about potential liability.

And back to the legal question: 1) It's not hard to prove that one is or is not in a relationship with a person. If both testify there's no relationship then the irresponsible websites would be the ones forced with trying to prove that both are lying. 2) Apparently the guy is her actual boyfriend, which means she doesn't have to prove that she isn't with him, rather it means that the falsity of an allegation that she's been caught cheating is easier to prove.

Assuming she doesn't want the sudden attention, harm would be fairly easy to prove. Depending on the state, harm is presumed if the libelous statement involves a woman being unchaste.

As a private figure, the fault standard for libel in her case would only be negligence, which makes libel much easier to prove. Lastly, speculating isn't going to save you from a libel claim. The line between a statement of fact and a statement of opinion (which speculation would fall under) can be very fine in libel law.

 

I don't think she has a legal leg to stand on if she is filmed with a guy she should not be with.

What I think is very interesting is how her images were altered to show her in an unflattering way and a national media outlet ran those altered images. That's where I think she has a good punitive case against ESPN and the creator of the Vine.