On Thu, 08 Dec 2005 20:42:56 +0000, Marc Brett
wrote:

On Thu, 8 Dec 2005 10:14:26 -0000, "Paul Stevenson"
wrote:


"John Rowland" wrote in message
...

After more than six years of supporting Tramlink, Stephen Parascandolo has
been forced by legal threats to remove the Latest News section from the
Unofficial Croydon Tramlink website.

http://www.tramlink.co.uk/news/index.shtml

From whom?
Why?

Received this from Stephen:

You are welcome to forward the attached text, which I think answers your
questions, to the newsgroup - it has already been on various Yahoo!Groups
and similar material will be in the Croydon press this week.

Thanks to everyone for their messages of support - my inbox has been filling
all day.

As it is no big secret, the parties that **threatened** to take legal action
we -

Tramtrack Croydon Ltd over "inaccurate" speculation regarding the cause of
several recent incidents.

Bombardier Transportation over "libellous rubbish" that was published on my
site, with fears that some reports (many dating back some time) contained
inaccurate information on tram defects, which may influence other cities
decisions on future tram orders. Any further "inaccurate" comments would
result in letters from their lawyers without warning.

Neither company identified specific reports which they objected to.
Everything that was published was done so in good faith, based on the
information sent to me. However the site was only as accurate as the
information it received.

The offers of assistance are very welcome, but at the end of the day, I
publish the website and I write the website. If future reports could lead to
legal action without warning, I can't afford to take the personal risk. I
don't have a legal team, or a huge publishing group to fight the claim. And,
I do not want to expose my sources to clear my name.

If people want to write letters of support to magazines or Newspapers,
please do, but nothing short of legal indemnities on past material (edited
if required), and legally binding guidelines on future articles (i.e. If I
follow the guidelines, I won't get sued), will allow a return of the News in
the previous format. I made some changes on Saturday and suggested this
approach to TCL - I had hoped it would have been possible to have reached
some agreement with them. The situation with Bombardier has unfortunately
overtaken that process.

I believe the Croydon Advertiser, and Guardian will be running a story in
their next editions.

I am sorry it has come to this, but I have to protect myself first at the
end of the day.

I find this situation utterly appalling. Whatever happened to free
speech, public disclosure and the right to express an opinion? The only
reason why those parties could possibly wish to close down this source
of information is because what is said is true. If it wasn't true then
they'd only need to provide the correct information and I'm sure Stephen
would publish the information by way of correction and balance. I have
seen no hint of malice in anything Stephen has published - he simply
tried to provide a true record of events whether those events are
positive or negative. Tramtrack and Bombardier seem to be saying that
they are not prepared to learn from their mistakes or events and
therefore a source of such information needs to be "shut up". I think
the potential for negative publicity from their actions will say much
about their companies and what potential purchasers of their products or
investors in their constituent companies should be considering.

--
Paul C


Admits to working for London Underground!