Here’s why you need to think before you tweet & retweet

This morning’s news that actor and comedian Alan Davies is among 10,000 Twitter users facing legal action over the false Lord McAlpine allegations is the latest, but biggest, example of why you have to think before you tweet…and retweet.
One of the problems of Twitter is that users very quickly forget that they’re not only sharing their comments, and, crucially, those of anyone they retweet, with their pals but also everyone else on Twitter. So you’re pretty much publishing it to millions of people. Just like the conventional mainstream media.
The difference is they have long understood the consequences of getting their facts wrong. Apart from specialist lawyers, no-one knows the laws of libel better than journalists. It’s a key part of their training because the power to publish to millions (or even just thousands) of readers is something that has to be treated carefully.
So they understand that saying you simply repeated something someone else said isn’t a defence in law — you’re responsible for publishing it again. Aside from the Reynolds defence, you have to be able to prove anything you publish, or face the consequences.
So the old advice that you shouldn’t tweet anything that you wouldn’t say to the person’s face is reinforced by this latest example of what happens if it turns out to be untrue.
Think not naming the person will protect you? Not so. Look at Newsnight. They didn’t name Lord McAlpine, but they said enough for him to be identified by enough people for his name to start circulating.
Again, the concept of what’s known as ‘jigsaw identification’ is already well-understood by the conventional media. They already have to watch for it with cases with child victims or accused under 18 as well as rape victims — ensuring that individually and collectively they don’t give out enough details for the person to be identified by someone who might know them.
Similarly, if you keep it too obscure you could be sued by several people who could argue people might mistakenly think it was them — 10 policemen successfully sued a paper in England because it ran a story about ‘a policeman’ from a particular station.
Once upon a time to be a publisher you needed a printing press and all sorts of other expensive gubbins and so realised that you had a lot on the line if you got your facts wrong in print.
Twitter may be free and easy, but the consequences of saying or repeating something you personally have no proof for are just the same. So think before you tweet or retweet.