DCS Sending Legal Notice To Reviewer (Golden Sound) Over an Old Review of Their Bartok DAC


I saw this You Tube video which was posted by Headphones.com which at the beginning talked about the site taking the side of Golden Sound (GS) & then GS himself going through the details of what happened (his side of the story).

https://youtu.be/R7NxRFT6FiI

While I am not taking any sides until DCS comes out with their story publicly. While we all are aware that many times companies force reviewers to remove the criticism of their products by employing different ways. But what should be the way forward about the reviews for reviewers and companies?

Can we as the end consumers and as a community come-up with the framework around reviews?

 

Regards,

Audio_phool

128x128audio_phool

Audiogon can remove any post it wants ... YouTube can remove anything it wants for any reason.

Of course.

The First Amendment has no bearing here as this issue is between two private parties.

The First Amendment offers multiple protections for actions taken against you by a private party.

@cleeds if you are referring to libel or slander then yes you have first amendment protections against private party suits assuming what you wrote or said is demonstrably true.  
I finally see the disconnect we were having, I was speaking within the context of, for example, a forum removing any content it wants.  Within the context of dcs and goldenear and claims of libel or slander, goldenear certainly has protections as long as what was posted/written is true (or at least not libel or slander, I don’t think it is)

 

And here is a response to the DCS response

https://forum.headphones.com/t/dcs-response-and-story/23779

 

Yeah

Watched the video. Not that I was ever going to buy Dcs gear anyway, but certainly would never consider it now. 
 

Reviews are opinion pieces. Unless, as Dcs claims, there were factual misrepresentations of the product, they did not disclose what those misrepresentations were. 
 

Looks to be some pretty petty actions by Dcs if this indeed is the case. 

As an attorney in practice for over 38 years, I offer the following:

1. The First Amendment applies only to government prohibition or regulation of speech. It is inapplicable to disputes between private parties.

2. Defamation claims typically have short statutes of limitation depending on the State (i.e., 1 to 2 years from the date of the defamation). So, depending on when the alleged defamatory statement was made, dCS might be time-barred from asserting such a claim.

3. If dCS is determined to be a corporate "public figure," then the alleged defamatory statement must have been made with "actual malice" for there to be a recovery (monetary or otherwise), which is a fairly high bar to overcome.