“Investigative reporter” Teri Buhl is running around the internet threatening to sue people for publishing her public tweets. That’s ridiculous in and of itself. But then your head just about explodes when you realise that a few years ago she published a teenager’s private sex diary online without permission.
Today, the internet is lightly aflutter with a the story of a journalist who doesn’t understand the rules of journalism or privacy. A TechDirt reporter wrote a post a few days ago investigating an odd statement on Buhl’s Twitter account claiming “tweets are not publishable”. (She’s just made her account private, which she should have done long ago. Head to Favstar to see the awesomely mundane stuff she’s hiding amongst nearly 40,000 tweets.)
TechDirt consulted some lawyers and came to the sane conclusion that — as you would expect — Buhl’s tweets are in fact publishable. Buhl then turned around and threatened to sue TechDirt and others that picked up the story for publishing her tweets.
But the charade is especially rich since back in 2010 Buhl posted explicit sexual content from a teenager’s private journal on Facebook in the name of exposing some nonsensical notion about ‘What really goes on with those naughty kids these days’. That teenager also happened to be the daughter of her boyfriend at the time. She betrayed that trust — for a story. She was arrested over allegations about this theft and a trial date is currently set for March 22.
Teri Buhl needs a lesson on the law and common decency and the internet.