March 30, 2012

Unpaid bloggers lose their lawsuit against Huffington Post.

"The principles of equity and good conscience do not justify giving the plaintiffs a piece of the purchase price when they never expected to be paid, repeatedly agreed to the same bargain, and went into the arrangement with eyes wide open."
"This is the electronic equivalent of someone writing a letter to the editor," John Coffee, a professor at Columbia Law School, said in an interview. "You are rewarded by publication, not by payment."
You want to get paid for your writing? Bargain for it. And quit whining. No one wants to read things written by whiners, so you're only digging yourselves a deeper hole.

34 comments:

Tyrone Slothrop said...

That's it, Althouse. I'm done commenting for free. I want some of that Amazon moolah, or I'm going over to Little Green Footballs.

Chuck66 said...

So they made no investment into Huffington. Took no risks. But when the money came in, they wanted part of it.

If Huffington would have experienced large loses, they wouldn't have chipped in to cover the shortfalls.

Kind of explains that half of the political spectrum.

I'm Full of Soup said...

Tyrone- maybe we should form a union, demand we get paid a living wage and then settle for reimbursement of our monthly internet bill!

wef said...

Unpaid bloggers lose their lawsuit against Huffington Post.

Ha, Ha!




(Have to admit though, the fruit fly Stassinopoulos knows her grift)

edutcher said...

Spoken like a lawyer, "Get it in writing".

I'm reminded of the saying they had in the California Gold Rush regarding how basic rules of fair play, based on the kind of fairness and reason that built the English Common Law, was all that was needed originally, "We needed no law until the lawyers came".

Of course, it also speaks volumes about Arianna and how rich Lefties love their money, protestations to the contrary, notwithstanding.

Wince said...

It's always an eye opener for a liberal when he feels used by another liberal of higher station.

I sense a theme. Ask Olbermann.

Chip Ahoy said...

I blog for the sheer joy of it, the joy being sheer. I do not know what sheer means and yet that ignorance does not matter.

Along the way I've learned about a camera and about getting light to creep around and behave and I learned how to avoid the dotted red line that appears underneath these words, mostly by sticking to regular words and standard spelling, and also to not be such a potty mouth.

Monetizing gives me the uckingfay eepscray. Shit. Red dots.

Fen said...

Does this mean HuffPo is now part of the 1% ?

#Occupy Huffpo!

Anonymous said...

The principles of equity and good conscience do not justify giving the plaintiffs a piece of the purchase price when they never expected to be paid, repeatedly agreed to the same bargain, and went into the arrangement with eyes wide open

And yet courts and politicians routinely interfere into market transactions voluntarily agreed and repeatedly agreed to, with each actor assessing the arrangements with eyes wide open. This principle of eyes wide open and repeatedly agreed to arrangements is constantly violated (by the very same courts) in the name of equity and good conscience for gods sake.

It's pretty obvious, though, that to be a judge or lawyer or someone in any way connected to the legal system doesn't require any sort of logical consistency or principles, so that any court would say something that is obviously not believed by the writer is not so surprising.

traditionalguy said...

I heard they tried a quantum meruit claim, but found that there was no value. Except for Meade that has been true here too.

Rose said...

You want to get paid for your writing? Bargain for it. And quit whining. No one wants to read things written by whiners, so you're only digging yourselves a deeper hole.

LOL. Yep.

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
clint said...

Isn't it funny how supporters of minimum wage laws (for everybody else) so often have unpaid interns, "volunteers", and unpaid contributors?

Toad Trend said...

"And yet courts and politicians routinely interfere into market transactions voluntarily agreed and repeatedly agreed to, with each actor assessing the arrangements with eyes wide open. This principle of eyes wide open and repeatedly agreed to arrangements is constantly violated (by the very same courts) in the name of equity and good conscience for gods sake."

Liberal shorthand: some are more equal than others.

purplepenquin said...

I thought it was only violent union thugs who wanted to be able to bargain with their employers? And even then, you're only supposed to negotiate over a small increase in wages...every other factor should be banned from be allowed in an employer-employee contract.

Or is this another one of those rules that are only applied to others and a different rule comes into play when you're talking about yourself? It is really hard to keep up sometimes...

DADvocate said...

Nobody likes Whiners.

BTW - I consider the opportunity to insult garage and Alpha payment enough for commenting on this blog.

SGT Ted said...

The whining? That a natural expression of leftists when they have to put their money where their ideology lives. Doing shit for free is what they make rich people do. They are exempt due to their superior moral stances.

Funny how they want to get free shit from people but they don't want to give free shit to people when it impacts their wallet.

Funny how they want to force someone to pay them with no contract. I come over to your house and pick up the trash there everyday for fre. After 1 year of doing this, I sue you for backpay for yard maintenance.

Why do people think leftists and liberals are so smart?

Anonymous said...

I think you are wrong, Althouse. The Huffington Post's entire existence is premised on the fact that there is a market for things written by whiners.

Ann Althouse said...

"I thought it was only violent union thugs who wanted to be able to bargain with their employers? And even then, you're only supposed to negotiate over a small increase in wages...every other factor should be banned from be allowed in an employer-employee contract. Or is this another one of those rules that are only applied to others and a different rule comes into play when you're talking about yourself? It is really hard to keep up sometimes..."

Are you mistaking HuffPo bloggers for unionized public workers?

I think you're missing 2 elements.

But, sure, these writers could attempt to unionize and then threaten to strike and so on in order to pressure HuffPo to agreeing to their terms. That kind of pressure is helpful to bargaining. I doubt very much that bloggers could overcome their individual competitiveness and form a union in this context. So, obviously, the idea of bargaining for pay was at the individual writer level. But the right to form a union in the private context is a matter of law, and I have no objection.

Now the dynamic and the law is completely different when it comes to public employees, who are not bargaining with a given private employer but with the people of the state, who are represented by the government that sets the terms of employment for the employees it hires to do the people's business. Of course, these employees are also part of the electorate that voted for the government. And the govt employee unions feed money into the campaigns of politicians who do what they want. This is a very strange business, a political dysfunction that some view as corrupt and others see as just really worrisome.

All right, now. Are you keeping up? That was a little hard, but I have confidence in your brain power... if you want to understand.

purplepenquin said...

if you want to understand.

What I'm trying to understand is why if it is a good thing for it to be illegal for some workers to negotiate a contract then why are you scolding other workers for not negotiating a work contract. Seems kinda flip-flopish and not an opinion that is built on a solid foundation.

The "public sector" thing is just a red herring - that whole some workers are more equal than others nonsense diverts attention from the actual issue: It is currently illegal for a large number of workers to negotiate with their employer on anything except for very limited wage increase/decrease.

IF that is really such a good idea for those workers, then why not also support that for all other workers?

SGT Ted said...

The "public sector" thing is just a red herring

No it isn't. Because the Public sector unions have become tax dollar money laundering operations for the Democrat Party election campaigns. The unions get a cut of every members paycheck, so they support politicians who will spend more tax dollars to hire more government workers, regardless of the publics actual needs or desires. They get more money that way and the Democrat gets the union votes in trade.

So, the politicians who benefit, Democrats all, no longer are working for their constituants, regardless of party, but are actually working for the unions, in trade for campaign donations all funded with tax dollars that originate from the citizens and the votes that come with union endorsements. Citizens be damned.

Tax money that is supposed to be for services is used as a honey pot to be spread around by and for the Democrats and unions to trade favors and purchase votes from each other.

That isn't "seems" like corruption: it IS corruption.

We can see that dynamic being played out in WI and CA right now. Democrats are sailing the Titanic straight into the financial iceberg of debt, holding the helm firm with the help of the Unions. Every "solution" that Jerry Brown has offered up to solve CAs insolvent budget has been tax increases at the behest of the SEIU and the public employees unions. He only cuts spending when he is forced to do to trade for support from even fellow Democrats.

Unknown said...

Oh, that Arianna! How delicious.

The liberal mantra: Capitalism for me but not for thee.

purplepenquin said...

No it isn't. Because the Public sector unions have become tax dollar money laundering operations for the Democrat Party election campaigns.

Ya know, I hear the same nonsense from some of my pals on the left...'cept it is about the military and how people in the Armed Forces always vote Republican 'cause Republicans always increase military spending and that is why people in the Armed Services shouldn't be allowed to donate to political campaigns or maybe even vote.

*shrug*

Guess this is just another one of those things I'm gonna have to disagree with ya'll about...

Q said...

I thought it was only violent union thugs who wanted to be able to bargain with their employers?


The HuffPo writers do not want to
"bargain with their employer".

(Nor, for that matter, do the union thugs, but that's a different story)

Q said...

Ya know, I hear the same nonsense from some of my pals on the left...'cept it is about the military and how people in the Armed Forces always vote Republican 'cause Republicans always increase military spending and that is why people in the Armed Services shouldn't be allowed to donate to political campaigns or maybe even vote.


This would be a wonderful analogy - if the US military took a cut of the wages of all military personal and then used the resulting war chest to lobby Republican politicians.

But since they don't, it isn't.

The problem with the unions is not, as you seem to think, pr pretend to think, the way they vote. People should be free to vote any damn way they wish. The problem is that they siphon off a portion of all union members wages and use that money for political lobbying, regardless of the wishes of union members.

Fen said...

Nice work explaining the PSU <-> Democrat funding con, gents.

But its not that purplepenquin doesn't get it, its that he doesn't want to.

Fortunately, he's just a foil and not your target audience.

Michael said...

"that is why people in the Armed Services shouldn't be allowed to donate to political campaigns or maybe even vote. "

Right, because what trouble could highly trained people with weapons cause to a government that oppressed them?

Thanks again for the genius insight, liberals.

Kevin Creighton said...

"No one wants to read things written by whiners, so you're only digging yourselves a deeper hole."

I respectfully disagree. The entire left-wing blogosphere depends on that very fact.

In hindsight, though, no one wants to read them either, so yes, your statement is correct.

Jose_K said...

If they stop writting what will the HP publish?

Jay said...

As a matter of law the bloggers don't have a case, but as a matter of ethics and manners, they do. It is crassly hypocritical for any multi-millionaire promoter of leftist causes to use other people's voluntary labor to make another $300 million and then fight in court to avoid paying anybody anything. She could have given everyone a nice check and still have quadrupled her already-huge net worth. Heck, throw in plane tickets and hotel rooms and throw a big party for everyone. The woman has no class at all.

Penny said...

Jay has chutzpah!

No money, but chutzpah!

Do "chutzpah" long enough and good enough and you can give away your own money... honey.

Penny said...

And if you need help with that distribution?

Call a lawyer.

They know all the whiners.

Penny said...

Bet they can even force-rank the whiners.

Course that'll cost you.

Penny said...

Least you'll know you gave your hard earned chutzpah money to the neediest lawyer and his client du jour.