Your Twitter Outrage May Require Libel Insurance
In the age of Trump, social media slugfests are driving coverage for defamation, along with home and auto policies.
Courtney Love spent almost six years in litigation, accused of libeling her former attorney in a Twitter post that was visible for less than 10 minutes. She paid a reported $780,000 in settlements as a result of two other defamation suits, both stemming from Twitter missives Love wrote about designer Dawn Simorangkir. “Twitter should ban my mother,” her daughter, Frances Bean Cobain, once said.
Love, an actress, musician and the widow of late Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain, inherited the band’s publishing rights. She can afford to take on defamation lawsuits. You probably can’t. Given how much of our lives is spent venting on social media, especially in the age of Trump, the more vociferous might want to consider libel insurance.