A few not-so-brief thoughts (EC v DA)

So DA and EC settled. Well. Huh. #notchilled

— Courtney Milan (@courtneymilan) October 22, 2015

So.

That happened.

And #notchilled basically exploded.

For any of my readers who are not aware, erotic romance/erotica publisher Ellora’s Cave filed a defamation suit against the blog Dear Author, and the blog’s founder and owner, Jane Litte aka Jen Frederick.

The basis for the lawsuit is the publication, back in September of 2014, of The Curious Case of Ellora’s Cave. If you have a few days to spare, there are a number of interesting posts written about the case in the intervening thirteen (ye gads!) months. You can find links to quite a few of those at the bottom of this post. (Please note that I have continued to add new links at the end, particularly to Courtney Milan’s and Deirdre Saoirse Moen’s posts explaining some of the legal stuff in layman terms.)

A couple of things on the EC v DA suit (the Ann Jacobs update)

After a few months of quiet, shit is getting real (h/t to Courtney Milan).

Ellora’s Cave author Ann Jacobs has filed a motion to intervene as a third party in the defamation lawsuit against Dear Author. Ms Jacobs also filed a counterclaim to the suit.

Courtney Milan is hosting both documents (motion to intervene, counterclaim), and she also explains what this means, here. Deirdre Saoirse Moen discusses her own perspective here.

I call your attention to the discussion, in Ms Milan’s blog, of what this motion by Ms Jacobs can mean for all the many–oh so many!–Ellora’s Cave authors, and other subcontractors, who can make the argument that the publisher breached its contracts with them. The fact that a class action against Ellora’s Cave, that would benefit people who have been mistreated–late payments, incorrect royalty statements and checks, derogatory statements by Tina Engler/Jaid Black about the very people who made EC succeed, and more–is legally possible…

On donating to Dear Author’s legal defense fund.

In the light of Jane Litte’s revelation that she is also Jen Frederick, apparently a successful NA author, one of the sentiments that popped up pretty much on the spot was, “how dare she ask for money when she’s filthy, filthy rich!”

First, a few things:

• I am not a lawyer.
• I don’t pretend to be a lawyer.
• I don’t play a lawyer anywhere.
• What follows is not legal advice.

All clear? Okay, then.

I believe The Curious Case of Ellora’s Cave post is not defamatory in any way. The facts it presents are public, and the opinions of the author are, precisely because they are opinions, protected in the US by the First Amendment.

Let me repeat that last bit for you: even if the piece hadn’t been as well researched and backed up by information available to any person curious enough to hunt it up, as it was; even then, it would still be the author’s opinion, and therefore, protected speech.

Unfortunately, the US also has a culture of abusing the legal system to try to silence critics. Or, as someone else told me when the suit was filed, anyone can sue anyone for any damn thing.

The grandmother of all plot twists!

Second update: I’m eating some of my words.

Update: I’m closing comments and mulling a few things before I post something else–probably tomorrow morning. To find out why, read this as the Passive Voice.

*

If you read Dear Author regularly, this is not news for you.

If you don’t…well, prepare to go down the rabbit hole. (This is freaking long, even for me.)

Jane Litte, reader, reviewer and ‘mean girl’ extraordinaire, also happens to be a self published and traditionally published author of a number of books (all written in about two and a half years, apparently, some with another fairly well known author, Jessica Clare), who has enough success to put the whole “(something or other) best seller” under her author name–Jen Frederick.

Here’s my comment on that post (minus the editing error (i.e., “to all those people” *headdesk*)