Sunday, July 20, 2014



French blogger fined £1,200 after negative review of restaurant

A French blogger has been fined £1,200 after a judge ruled a negative restaurant review appeared too high on Google searches.

Caroline Doudet was also ordered to amend the title of her review, written in August 2013, which described the restaurant as 'the place to avoid in Cap-Ferret.'

Owners of the Il Giardino restaurant, in the Aquitaine region of southwestern France, sued Ms Doudet claiming the review, which appeared fourth in Google searches, was hurting their business.

Ms Doudet told the BBC: 'This decision creates a new crime of "being too highly ranked [on a search engine]", or of having too great an influence.

Ms Doudet's blog, Cultur'elle, has about 3,000 followers, which the judge said had exacerbated the damage caused to the restaurant.

SOURCE


5 comments:

Anonymous said...

If it's anybody's fault, isn't it Google's for causing it to be displayed in such a way - ?

Anonymous said...

Maybe the restaurant should be fined for being The Place to Avoid.

Anonymous said...

Well, I mean one would think about making the food taste better and the service more friendly/

Anonymous said...

French laws are weird.

Anonymous said...

I'm certain the attention the restaurant has drawn to the negative review is now guaranteed to sink the restaurant.