[Omah]

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-sto...5875-23121827/

FOREIGN papers are now naming the celebrities who have taken out gagging orders in Britain – making a further mockery of the law.

Several published the name of the married Premier League *footballer who cheated on his wife in a six-month fling with Big Brother beauty Imogen Thomas.

A Spanish newspaper published a piece saying: “People in the UK bet on almost anything and this time they have bet on the name of the football player and dad unfaithful to his wife with the *ex-girlfriend of Jermain Defoe. (Player named) is the bookies’ favourite. They say there’s no smoke without fire.”

A Peruvian paper also had an article saying: “In the UK they’re casting doubt over the faithfulness of (player named).” Italian media also revealed his identity.

Several innocent people, including TV presenter Gabby Logan and celebrity *political activist Jemima Khan, have already being caught up in the fallout of the controversial orders after being wrongly identified on Twitter as having affairs.

Superinjuctions shot down in flames ..... private lives of "protected" celebrities exposed worldwide ......

Americans are bemused that famous people in the UK are able to stop the publication of details of their private lives, because it goes against one of their country's founding principles, free speech.

The US has a booming industry in entertainment, gossip and celebrity publications, mainly based in New York and Los Angeles.

None of them need to worry much about injunctions.

The equivalent in the US would be something called prior restraint, but there are very few successful examples.

"The First Amendment of the US Constitution protects freedom of speech and courts are very, very reluctant to prohibit somebody from saying something," says Steven Wagner, a litigation lawyer at Wagner Davis in New York.

[bananarama]

Celebrities including footballers make their living by being presented to the public. Anyone with a career involving the public I believe have no right to privacy laws. They make their bed and should rest in it.

People accused of a crime however is far more difficult. Some have said for example paedo'es should have no right to privacy. I agree with the sentiment but in practice some accused of a crime are actually inoccent and yet they would suffer not only false accusation but also public persecution.

Also if for example a paedo was attcked the attacker would be commiting a crime by taking the law into their own hands A wrongly accused person may be seriously hurt or worse. So a privacy law involving criminal is a way of protecting hot heads who want revenge that the law does not give.......

Even convicted criminals are sometimes not guilty. For that reason and that reason only serious criminal accusations should be subject to a privacy law....

Actors, actressess, sports folk and presenters should accept the consequences of their carreer if they beahave in a dishonourable manner......

The internet blows a hole in the concept of privacy so enforcing any law should there be one is probably impossible anyhow......

[Omah]

Originally Posted by bananarama

Celebrities including footballers make their living by being presented to the public. Anyone with a career involving the public I believe have no right to privacy laws. They make their bed and should rest in it.

People accused of a crime however is far more difficult. Some have said for example paedo'es should have no right to privacy. I agree with the sentiment but in practice some accused of a crime are actually inoccent and yet they would suffer not only false accusation but also public persecution.

Also if for example a paedo was attcked the attacker would be commiting a crime by taking the law into their own hands A wrongly accused person may be seriously hurt or worse. So a privacy law involving criminal is in a way of protecting hot heads who want revenge that the law does not give.......

Even convicted criminals are sometimes not guilty. For that reason and that reason only serious criminal accusations should be subject to a privacy law....

Actors, actressess, sports folk and presenters should accept the consequences of their carreer if they beahave in a dishonourable manner......

The internet blows a hole in the concept of privacy so enforcing any law should their be one is probably impossible anyhow......

I agree with most of that ..... the "criminal" aspect is, of course, very tricky .....

[Crimson Dynamo]

've been in India of late, and spent most of my time not looking at the internet, not reading newspapers, and not watching television, on account of there being more interesting things to look at, ie India itself.

Two days into my trip, a major story broke when Osama bin Laden got an essential bit of his head shot off and decided to give up his career of international terrorising in favour of a nice lie down and a rot. It's odd when a massive news event occurs while you're abroad – because you don't learn about it through familiar channels, it somehow feels as though the event hasn't "properly" happened – a bit like you're reading the capsule synopsis of a movie rather than watching the movie itself. It's not real till Huw Edwards says its real. In fact, I bet even Edwards himself doesn't believe the news until he hears himself saying it, which possibly explains the perpetually surprised look on his face.

Anyway, a story that garnered rather less attention in India was the ongoing superinjunctions kerfuffle back home, which reached a head when an anonymous tweeter splurged some of the pertinent names and details, annoying Jemima Khan in the process by including a gruesome fictional claim about her featuring in a series of "intimate photos" with Jeremy Clarkson, a set of images that categorically have never existed in the real world, yet are now being published, enhanced and reprinted inside our own rich imaginations. I see a new one each time I blink. Often they move. Many are in 3D. All are unforgivably graphic. In the vast majority of them, Clarkson's wearing a look of tense concentration mixed with bewildered amazement. Occasionally he's weeping.

But I digress. The glaring problem with getting a superinjunction in 2011 is that they no longer guarantee superanonymity. In fact, they increasingly guarantee the opposite. As soon as the faintest whiff of the superinjunction's existence slips out, the gossip is magnified tenfold, and before long half of Twitter jokingly adopts your name as a mantra.

So. Getting a superinjunction isn't just draconian, but counterproductive. I can imagine a few instances where they might be justified (cases of blackmail, say) but on the whole: bad idea. I'm broadly against them, so it's fun seeing them circumnavigated. But what fun there is is also countered by sadness.

Because the majority of the cases we're illicitly learning about aren't shocking corporate coverups but dreary shag-and-tells where the "public interest" defence is virtually nonexistent. It's stuff I don't want to know about people I admire. Maybe I'm squeamish. The press defence for wanting to print this sort of thing consists of three main prongs:

Prong one: Anything a public figure does is, by default, a matter of public interest. That's not true. Take actors. I don't want to know what they get up to off-camera. I don't want that knowledge in my head, getting in the way of their performance. I rather enjoy the suspension of disbelief. They're public figures whose private lives I'd prefer not to hear about.

Prong two: Having "courted the limelight", celebrities shouldn't complain if the attention they desired turns negative. While there are certainly cases where that's fair comment, it 1) assumes all celebs are in it for nothing but adulation and attention and 2) sounds eerily similar to the argument that scantily dressed women are asking for it. Been on TV, like, ever? Then you've waived your right to privacy for life. I once read a Daily Mail article consisting of long-lens paparazzi photographs of the actor Richard O'Sullivan, long since retired from our screens, accompanied by text sneering about how old and frail he was looking these days. Serves him right for courting the limelight back in 1975. And for ageing, like every human being on Earth.

And what, precisely, constitutes "courting the limelight" anyway? There are countless journalists using Twitter accounts to broadcast their personal musings to as many followers as they can muster. Is that "courting the limelight" too? If one of them attracts 500,000 followers, can we justifiably follow them to the beach and take photographs of their hilarious sagging arse? How about 50,000 followers? How about 5,000? Let's say 50. More than 50, and it's in the public interest. Only just, but hey, it counts.

The final prong is the dumbest: celebrities "trade off their image" and therefore "owe it to their fans" to live up to their reputations.

Horse****. If celebrities "owe" their fans anything at all, it's a bit of transitory entertainment. A few moments of distraction. Celebrities are buskers and their "fans" are passersby, and that's as far as the relationship goes.

If I've paid to see Keanu Reeves in a movie, he owes me 90 minutes of dialogue and wooden expressions, and that's that. He can spend the rest of his life masturbating to abattoir footage if he likes: it's none of my business. And if I approach him in the street for an autograph and he tells me to piss off, that's fair enough too. He probably wouldn't say it very convincingly, but that's Keanu Reeves for you.

So: superinjunctions bad. Prurience equally bad. In summary: everything is horrible.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisf...s-of-anonymity

[Omah]

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage...ated-wife.html

A LEADING actor who paid one of Wayne Rooney's hookers for sex has finally admitted his guilt to his devastated wife, The Sun can reveal.

He made the emotional confession despite winning a super-injunction gagging us from publishing any details of his romp with vice girl Helen Wood, 24.

Last night it was not clear if the star's decision to come clean would be enough to save his marriage.

But the revelation comes just days after the actor, who has appeared both on TV and in films, was named and shamed alongside other celebrities on micro-blogging website Twitter.

[Omah]

self-serving stance on privacy is excruciating

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisf...uperinjunction

To recap: Jemima Khan (Goldsmith as was) is the freedom of information champion – "Twitter's greatest advocate", as she described herself last year – who recently used an infinitesimal amount of her gazillion-pound inheritance to post bail for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. On Monday she awoke to what she called "a bloody nightmare" as a Twitter user falsely claimed that she had taken out a superinjunction to prevent intimate photos of her and Jeremy Clarkson becoming public.

Well. Were the union a matter of fact, it would surely represent history's greatest instance of a man punching above his weight (don't forget Quasimodo never actually pulled Esmeralda). But it is a fabrication, possibly chinese-whispered out of the fact that Jemima and Zac did take out a privacy injunction in 2008 when their emails were hacked.

So now our WikiLeaks devotee – Jemima is particularly passionate about "the free flow of information in this digital age" – is frightfully cross that someone has published sensational material with no regard for its consequences. She insists people distinguish between government and corporate transparency and an individual's privacy, to which the only response is: have you been on the internet lately? People do not care to distinguish between the importance of a North Korean nuclear test and whether Miley Cyrus is wearing knickers. Good luck regulating it.

Perhaps Jemima really is unable to see that in the brave new technological world it is impossible to have freedom of information without freedom of misinformation. But she will find it difficult to escape the irony that the existence of the Goldsmith siblings' superinjunction was first revealed by a certain website close to her heart. WikiLeaks: proudly bringing you details of secret US drone strikes and minor celebrity gagging orders since 2006.

[Jords]

Dont agree with them. Celebrities know what theyre getting theirself into when they decide to strike it for fame, and some become role models for people, its fake to let the public believe a particular celeb is oaky coaky because theyve got an injuction of something which would be shown negatively.

[Omah]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/foo...ing-order.html

Another married Premier League footballer has obtained a gagging order in an attempt to keep details of his private life secret.

The footballer, who plays for England and has children, has become the latest celebrity to use human rights legislation to hide details of his "indiscretions" with another woman from the public.

The orders have sparked accusations that privacy laws are being abused to protect the reputations of celebrities and high-profile sportsmen.

However, unlike previous injunctions, the footballer applied for the order jointly with the other woman.

Maybe "the other woman" is married to another "high-profile sportsman" ?

I hope they're "outed" soon .....

[Pyramid*]

In certain circumstances - yes I agree with them. There are basic rights to privacy for matters that are very private.

When celebs chose to use them to basically cover their backsides when they have been found to do something illegal, immoral etc - that they are used to avoid embarrassing them, or used to avoid any negative impact on their careers, or the parties concerned - absolutely not. If the play with fire, they should expect to get burnt and suffer the consequences. Simples.

Every day common folk who don't have wads of cash, who are caught - have to live with losing their jobs, careers ruined, relationships being damaged etc when they playing with fire: why should celebs who can buy silence be allowed to.

They say money talks. Money also silences.

[Omah]

http://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/view...ion-exclusive/

BRITAIN’S bonkers legal system has got so crazy that there is now a super-injunction hiding the blushes of someone who is dead.

The top-secret order was taken out in 2008 by an elderly man.

But under the crackpot system of gagging orders that has sprung up to allow stars to keep their secrets out of the newspapers, it remains in place despite his death.

And the Press is still prevented from revealing any information about the case, including who sought the injunction and what they were attempting to hush up.

The news came to light as the Daily Star Sunday trawled through thousands of pages of legal documents to reveal the true extent of the anonymous privacy injunctions.

Farcical .....

[Omah]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...=feeds-newsxml

A footballer used court gagging orders to hide an affair months before his wedding and another just after, it was claimed yesterday.

The Premier League player’s first injunction meant his bride may have been in the dark about his cheating when she married him.

Months later he was caught again and won a second legal ban on details of the affair being made public.

The revelation came a day after the Daily Mail told how a separate gagging order was granted to a married England footballer to hide an affair.

Such bans raise concerns about the extent to which wealthy celebrities can deceive their own families, and their fans, without fear of exposure.

Yeah, the old "living a lie" syndrome .....

[Grimnir]

everyone has the right to privacy until proven guilty of something
press are scum

[Omah]

Originally Posted by Grimnir

everyone has the right to privacy until proven guilty of something
press are scum

Well, in the Premiership footballer's case, he's admitted being guilty of cheating on his wife, lying to his sponsors and deceiving his fans .....

He may also be guilty, by association, of accusing someone of a serious criminal act .....

[patsylimerick]

Originally Posted by Grimnir

everyone has the right to privacy until proven guilty of something
press are scum

All of them? Really? What about foreign correspondents who work in war zones? Those who expose abuses of power, fiscal wrongdoing, child abuse? All of them? Scum? What about Crime Correspondents? Political correspondents? Sports journalists? Every TV news programme? Every newspaper journalist? All scum? Or just tabloid hacks? People write what sells. If 'scum' sells, what does that say about the consumers of the product? There are a very great many brilliant people who work in the media. The staff of Heat do not the entire profession make.

[DrunkerThanMoses]

Yes and No

In some cases I think their wrong.. e.g the Imogean deal right now, he be named for what he has done, i fell bad for his wife and family.

In others I do agree they are needed

[GiRTh]

Not needed what so ever. The press have themselves to blame by running too many tittle tattle stories so we now have injunctions for stories that are definitely in the public interest. A celebrity chef and businessman breaking employment law is definitely in the public interest. The Guardian running a storiy that Trafigular were dumping toxic waste of the Ivory coast is definitely in the public interest.

It sickens me to know that if Tiger Woods were British we would never have found out about his numerous affairs. This is not freedom of press in any way shape or form,

[Omah]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-13453626

An order granting anonymity to ex-Royal Bank of Scotland boss Sir Fred Goodwin has been lifted at the High Court.

The existence of Sir Fred's injunction had already been made public by an MP using parliamentary privilege.

The High Court ruling followed a further intervention by Lord Stoneham who used parliamentary privilege to reveal more details to peers.

Its lifting comes ahead of the publication of a report on super-injunctions from the Master of the Rolls.

Ministers have indicated unhappiness at courts' granting of injunctions, following controversy about celebrities using them to hide details of their personal lives.

But the coalition has decided against introducing a Privacy Act to address these concerns, the BBC has learned.

Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt and Justice Secretary Ken Clarke are understood to have ruled the option out at a meeting on Thursday.

Instead, ministers will consider producing more detailed guidance for judges on how to interpret the Human Rights Act, which guarantees a right to privacy.

Clive Coleman Legal correspondent, BBC News

This is a case of parliamentarians judging that there's a public interest in revealing private information, when the judge hearing the case has decided there isn't. A constitutional tension, if not a full-blown crisis.

Somewhat curiously, Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt has ruled out the possibility of Parliament passing a privacy law. This is in spite of a vigorous press campaign against our judge-made privacy law, and in particular, the powerful secret injunctions that enforce it.

If MPs continue to break privacy injunctions using parliamentary privilege, and people continue to reveal supposedly protected details online, the courts will start to look impotent.

Certain judges already look like self-interested lackeys of the rich .....

[Omah]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-13465286

Lord Neuberger, who is the most senior civil judge in England and Wales, has chaired a year-long inquiry by a committee of judges and lawyers.

The committee of judges said:

Super-injunctions and other injunctions "can only be granted when they are strictly necessary"
There was "no doubt" that super-injunctions were once granted "far too often"
Only two super-injunctions had been granted since January 2010
Super-injunctions were now only granted for very short periods where secrecy is essential
Whenever any "anonymised" order was made the court should provide a reasoned judgement for its decision

The report states "the procedure will enable the media to be informed about applications in advance as parliament envisaged".

Well, it's a start .....

Clive Coleman Legal correspondent, BBC News

The report reaffirms the critical importance of open justice.

It recommends guidance on informing the media about injunction hearings.

That will stress the importance of press freedom and the report makes clear it will be a very rare case where advance notice of a hearing is not given to a media organisation likely to be affected by an order.

The Master of the Rolls acknowledged that too many anonymous injunctions had been granted prior to the John Terry case in January 2010.

However, since then, only two super-injunctions had been granted and the media have been present at many other injunction hearings, which they have neither opposed or appealed.

Open justice is what we want .....

[Omah]

Thomas is now suing Twitter

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...#ixzz1Mv6vAhfX

Documents filed at London's High Court confirm the Premier League star, who won an anonymity order banning the media from publishing stories about his alleged affair with the reality-TV star Miss Thomas, launched the action on May 18.

The action claims 'persons unknown' are described as those 'responsible for the publication of information on the Twitter accounts'.

It refers to the widely-reported posting on May 8 of a series of Tweets purporting to name a number of celebrities who had obtained injunctions.

It comes as an inquiry admitted today that injunctions used to cover up the alleged affairs of the rich and famous are impossible to police on social networking sites such as Twitter.

Twitter is based in San Francisco, California, with servers and offices in San Antonio, Texas, and Boston, Massachusetts.

It is not known if the company has any assets in Britain. It is therefore outside the jurisdiction of British courts, making legal action more complicated.

There would also be difficulty in identifying who actually wrote the Tweets, many of which were 're-tweeted', or published again by other users.

'It was only a question of time before someone who has obtained a super-injunction, would try to bring proceedings for contempt of court against the Tweeters and those supplying them with the information at an injuncted newspaper,' Jennifer McDermott, head of media and public law at Withers LLP, told the Telegraph.

'To do this, a Court application will first be made to get Twitter to divulge the identities of the relevant ''wrongdoers'' and, if successful, contempt proceedings could then be brought against them, which could result in them being fined or even imprisoned.'

She said that legal proceedings against Twitter would be 'arduous' process because it is based in California where 'free speech rules'.

Hahahahahaha ..... I hope the Yanks tell &$*^ Ł*)%$ to FO .....

[Smithy]

Why does omah feel the need to repeatedly bump and post news articles in ever thread he has an opinion in

[Omah]

[http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-13477811

Legal proceedings are being taken by a professional footballer against Twitter for allegedly publishing information covered by a super-injunction.

The player, identified only by the initials CTB, is also known to be taking action against the Sun newspaper and ex-Big Brother star Imogen Thomas.

Papers lodged in the High Court are against Twitter and "persons unknown".

They request disclosure of Twitter users said to be behind the publication of confidential information.

The order requires Twitter to disclose the requested information within seven days - or within the appropriate time required by the law in California, where Twitter has its headquarters.

Twitter has refused to comment on the matter.

Media lawyer Nick Lockett said the legal action against Twitter may not have much effect.

All this legal action must be costing *$%^ &*Ł$^% a small fortune .....

[King Gizzard]

haha he's a ****whit. you can't simply sue twitter. theyre worth much more than little giggsy. If he sued them, then surely his identity would have to be revealed somehow?

[arista]

"Thomas is now suing Twitter"

Well her legal team is going to try.
But that is still under debate.


She can swear on Her Bible
in her bog.

[Pyramid*]

If ever there was a example for such injuctions not to be used to silence infidelities / law breaks etc: this has to be the the prime example.

I cannot stand Thomas, but it does seem that she's being totally fed to the lions here..... she's not helped, but if ever the law needs changed - this has to be the prime example of why.

A married celebrity can 'play around', do what they like to cover their infidelity, protect themselves from being known as a liar, cheat, cannot be trusted, cannot be used as a 'role model' to their fans, cannot be a true clean cut idol as portrayed by their sponsors: because they have money to buy silence.

there may be some good comes of this after all. (Doubt it though...too many 'in power' also use the very same loophole to cover their own misdemeanours!)

[Omah]

Football star's plan to sue Twitter leads to rise in users repeating his name online

Speculation over the identity of the professional footballer who is taking legal action against Twitter reached new heights today as hundreds of users of the micro-blogging site claimed to know his name.

The married star, who is referred to as CTB in court documents, is said to have had a ‘sexual relationship’ with Big Brother’s Imogen Thomas.

He obtained an order preventing The Sun newspaper from revealing his name last month and has now launched proceedings against Twitter and ‘persons unknown’ after users claimed to have identified a number of individuals said to have taken out gagging orders.

But the legal bid led to one player’s name being mentioned on Twitter at a rate of up to 16 times a minute.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...#ixzz1N0Xq0ptu