Why is Blake Lively so overrated?

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I doubt Baldoni much cares whether he actually wins his lawsuits; he's just trying to get his version of events out in the open which it seems he is accomplishing. His career and livelihood is on the line in a way that Blake Lively's isn't. She'll be fine either way (even if she never gets another film role she's still married to a billionaire, besties with another billionaire, and has other ventures). He might never get work again if he didn't fight back.

I wonder if Blake’s marriage will be fine. I think it possible that much of what apppears to be ginned up in her complaint was likely present by her to Ryan as fact.

I don't see those two splitting up even if they hate each other (not saying they do, but IF). Being a Hollywood power couple is much of their appeal. On the other hand I wouldn't be surprised if Taylor Swift drops her like a hot potato. Taylor is ruthless in maintaining her image and if I were her I wouldn't want my name anywhere near this mess. See also Karlie Kloss as mentioned by a PP.

Maybe, if my spouse lied to me and I acted in ways that later destroyed my reputation based on those lies, it would destroy my marriage. But they have four kids so there’s that. And perhaps he knew she was lying and encouraged it.

It’s a matter of perception not lies. There is a difference. I know you want to see her utterly destroyed but it’s just not going to happen.

Definitely different perspectives. Jus t like some on here can sense her discomfort and others insist they k ow for sure that she never felt uncomfortable and was loving every minute.

I always find it interesting how people think they know for sure how someone else feels or what someone was was thinking. (About anyone else, not specific to this case or Blake). Especially from a distance, about strangers or people on tv.

Plus Ryan was in some meetings. Hosted Baldoni at his home. He’s pretty aware of whatever was going on and has way more information than posters here who think they know all.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Any chance a judge approves the gag order? Can anyone here with legal insight provide some clarity?

The are asking for both a protective order (that's what people are referring to as the "gag order") and a hearing to discuss appropriate conduct of counsel moving forward. I can't find a copy of their motion online though so I'm not sure exactly what the are asking the protective order to cover.

They'll get the hearing, that's an easy one and could be rolled into other preliminary hearings the judge might schedule as well. I would expect the judge at the hearing to lecture attorneys on both sides regarding communications to the press, not just Baldoni's lawyers.

I do think there are some things that Baldoni's lawyer has either released or is proposing releasing that the court would consider issuing a PO against. For instance I think it's highly likely the judge could issue a PO preventing Baldoni from releasing footage from the birth scene, where even if you go by Baldoni's complaint, the most Lively was wearing was a pair of underwear briefs on the bottom, and her legs were up in stirrups. That would be an easy one. I am less sure about how the judge would treat other requests for nondisclosure, of stuff like texts/emails between the parties. A lot of it is already in the complaints, I don't know how much else there even is. The judge will have to weight the potentially prejudicial or damaging impact of any potential disclosure against Baldoni's right to defend himself in the court of public opinion. And I don't know if Lively is asking for a blanket PO (unlikely to get) or something more targeted, which is more likely to be successful.

I know the press has a lot of protections, but do you think his case against the New York Times has legitimacy? They left out some key texts. e.g. Two people on his team said there was so much ammo against Justin when it came to the sexual harassment claims, but they left out a part where they both said that those accusations weren't true.

I would be pretty surprised if his NYT suit makes it past summary judgment. The only reservation I have is that recent big settlement by ABC news with Trump, which also surprised me but in retrospect I think they did it to avoid litigation that could go to the Supreme Court and potentially overturn important precedent (Sullivan). So that gives me pause and makes me wonder if we are just in a different era. However, that was Trump as plaintiff and the odds of it going to the SC are high and he appointed half the justices. I don't think Baldoni v. NYT is going that route.

In order to prove defamation, he has to prove "actual malice." He has to prove that they published something that was intentionally misleading with the specific goal of hurting Baldoni. I think this will be virtually impossible for a bunch of reasons -- the piece actually has multiple bylines and it would be hard to prove they collaborated to take Baldoni down, the NYT's fact checking process is pretty rigorous and they will have documentation of everything, and his argument is basically that they failed to provide full context to the allegation but they will simply argue that they reported on Lively's complaint and the allegations they had at the time, and then later reported on Baldoni's complaint and his counter-allegations. News orgs are not required to hold stories until every bit of information is available before reporting.

The NYT has also said they plan to vigorously defend in the case, so that weighs against a potential settlement. I don't think Baldoni has much of a case on the law here. I do wonder what a decisive loss in the NYT case does with regards to his battle against Lively and Reynolds. It won't help, but I don't know how much it will hurt.

Am I understanding correctly that you’re saying if the texts provided to them were edited/incomplete, then they could be shielded from liability by relying on those texts? In other words, they didn’t need to investigate whether those texts were complete or edited before reporting their story? If so, that’s kind of unfortunate because they essentially amplified edited/incomplete texts to present a completely different story than the unedited/complete texts would show! I feel like the due diligence standards should be higher for New York Times journalists…

If they verified the texts were real, no, I don't think they are legally required to ensure they have every single text in a text chain.

Also, even though some of the meaning of specific texts was changed when taken out of context, the broad outlines of what they reported was true -- Baldoni hired a PR firm to plant stories about Lively online in order to undermine her reputation in case she came forward with details about the alleged harassment on set. The context that has since been provided doesn't challenge any of that. It just puts some of the comments in the texts into gentler framing.

I think it's going to be near impossible for Baldoni to prove the NYT intentionally mislead the public with this story because he did actually do what he is accused of doing in terms of the PR story -- he hired the firm specifically to turn public sentiment against Lively. Sure, he'll argue he did that because the harassment allegations are false and he was getting ahead of that story. That's fine and the NYT has reported on his argument as well. But those texts were not made up and the story itself is still accurate even if additional context has come to light.

He basically has no case here.

Failing to provide context isn't libel against anyone.

Failing to provide context against a public figure will be laughed out of court as libel.

PP here and this is a much more succinct version, yes. I don't think he'd have a case even if he were a public person, though, because they didn't print anything untrue.

I think that is not enitekh correct, they altered one of the texts to take out emojis that indicated it was satire.

Meant to say they altered at least one of the texts in a way that changed its meaning, that is different than just failing to print entire text chain.

I have never thought of the upside down smiley face as meaning I didn't mean anything I just said or satire. I googled online for descriptions of it (from a time pre this saga) and it seems that there are about 100 different intended meanings of the emoji. Many say they use it to indicate resignation or whatever or dry humour etc. I am not sure one can assume the intention at the time the emoji was sent was that it means the text that was sent was satire.

If the reporter was unsure what it meant, perhaps she should have asked the person who texted it. You know, practice journalism.

I'm a journalist, and I absolutely think the NY times is in trouble. For one thing, if you are making claims about someone, you need to tell them and give them enough time to make a response before publishing. They failed to do that.

They did though-- Baldoni had a heads up and request for comment, it was on the short side. However as my reporter husband told me, that's not unusual if you are asking a public person with lawyers and professional PR for comment (whereas if it was a private person you might give them more time to respond, depending on the nature of the allegations). None of the allegations were news to Baldoni-- he was already aware of the on-set harassment allegations and they were also aware of the complaint. So a few hours for comment in that scenario is apparently not unusual (per my DH).

I personally think the reporting was a little sloppy, especially given that they attached Twohey's name to it and took the me too angle. But not wrong. And they had confirmation of the texts veracity from the PR firm.

It would be different if it was shown the texts were falsified. They weren't. They were cherry picked. But Baldoni did in fact hire the firm to smear Lively -- in addition to the texts, there are documents that show the firm's goals and plans of attack. It's not like they went to press with nothing or lies. The coverage was just slanted toward Lively, which is not illegal or legally actionable.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I doubt Baldoni much cares whether he actually wins his lawsuits; he's just trying to get his version of events out in the open which it seems he is accomplishing. His career and livelihood is on the line in a way that Blake Lively's isn't. She'll be fine either way (even if she never gets another film role she's still married to a billionaire, besties with another billionaire, and has other ventures). He might never get work again if he didn't fight back.

I wonder if Blake’s marriage will be fine. I think it possible that much of what apppears to be ginned up in her complaint was likely present by her to Ryan as fact.

I don't see those two splitting up even if they hate each other (not saying they do, but IF). Being a Hollywood power couple is much of their appeal. On the other hand I wouldn't be surprised if Taylor Swift drops her like a hot potato. Taylor is ruthless in maintaining her image and if I were her I wouldn't want my name anywhere near this mess. See also Karlie Kloss as mentioned by a PP.

Maybe, if my spouse lied to me and I acted in ways that later destroyed my reputation based on those lies, it would destroy my marriage. But they have four kids so there’s that. And perhaps he knew she was lying and encouraged it.

It’s a matter of perception not lies. There is a difference. I know you want to see her utterly destroyed but it’s just not going to happen.

Definitely different perspectives. Jus t like some on here can sense her discomfort and others insist they k ow for sure that she never felt uncomfortable and was loving every minute.

I always find it interesting how people think they know for sure how someone else feels or what someone was was thinking. (About anyone else, not specific to this case or Blake). Especially from a distance, about strangers or people on tv.

Lawsuits are not about perceptions.

This is about the marriage not the lawsuit. A good husband backs his wife win or lose.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Maybe this has already been said, but Blake has been badly advised by her attorney. Both sides are going to lose badly, and nothing good will come of this. There is never ever an upside for her, even if you believe her (and they don't need the money). And unfortunately, in this climate, if I were forced to choose a winner, I would chose him (not that I dont believe her).

Litigaton is never the answer, and I was a litigator for 30 years.

Just wow. What a mess (that she created).

I agree. Even though she may have been justified in some of her initial demands (because there does seem to have been some chaos or unconventional management on the set) it’s really inexplicable why she went for the jugular in icing Baldoni out at the premiere, unfollowing, etc.

Another litigator here and agree as well.

As a lawyer (though not a litigator), I am baffled by the legal opinion that unfollowing someone on social media is "going for the jugular." That's, uh, not actionable. Not my are of expertise or anything, but I feel pretty confident about it. It might feel bad, but it's not grounds for a lawsuit.

The point is that her actions spurred a ton of public and media scrutiny on him, leading him to hire the PR firm, and then it all escalated from there.

This has "look what you made me do" vibes. Can't she just say that the reason she unfollowed him on social media (again, this is such a stupid thing to complain about -- no one is entitled to someone else's follow) and requested to walk the red carpet separately from him is because she was unhappy with how he behaved on set and how Wayfarer handled it?

I'm not saying she didn't contribute to the escalation of this thing -- she obviously did. But so did he. I find it very weird to take her to task for some of the stuff she did to ramp up the conflict but then when it comes to Baldoni's choices, it's like "well he didn't have any choice." Of course he had a choice! You are never required to hire a PR firm to smear your costars name online. Come on.

Well, I agree that anyone has the right to Unfollow someone, it’s silly to think that people aren’t going to immediately pick up Justin Bieber just unfollowed his wife and it’s all over my feet and I don’t even care about either of them. It’s typically done to make a statement. She could have blocked him until after the release of the movie and then I guarantee no one would’ve noticed.

What would be interesting would be to see if told the cast to do the same because that’s what generated a lot of headlines.

I don’t think just unfollowing him would have been grounds for anything, I think he was trying to do what she is doing, and paint a picture of patterns of behavior. She and her husband unfollowed him, the cast unfollowed him, she shunned him from the premier, refused to do interviews with him, and so on.

This prompted intense media scrutiny.

Ironically, it seemed to cause more problems for her, because it felt like fans were respecting the way he was promoting the movie, and there were obviously lots of issues with the way she was promoting it. She was asking them to take sides and they seemed to take his side. That just led to more and more anti-Blake sentiment because she has a history of not getting along with castmates and doing really dumb interviews. I just saw another one posted today, now granted she was very young, probably 16, but she said she used to wear so much bronzer when she started wearing make up that she looked black. Again, I realize she was young, but she just has a history of truly terrible interviews.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I doubt Baldoni much cares whether he actually wins his lawsuits; he's just trying to get his version of events out in the open which it seems he is accomplishing. His career and livelihood is on the line in a way that Blake Lively's isn't. She'll be fine either way (even if she never gets another film role she's still married to a billionaire, besties with another billionaire, and has other ventures). He might never get work again if he didn't fight back.

I wonder if Blake’s marriage will be fine. I think it possible that much of what apppears to be ginned up in her complaint was likely present by her to Ryan as fact.

I don't see those two splitting up even if they hate each other (not saying they do, but IF). Being a Hollywood power couple is much of their appeal. On the other hand I wouldn't be surprised if Taylor Swift drops her like a hot potato. Taylor is ruthless in maintaining her image and if I were her I wouldn't want my name anywhere near this mess. See also Karlie Kloss as mentioned by a PP.

Maybe, if my spouse lied to me and I acted in ways that later destroyed my reputation based on those lies, it would destroy my marriage. But they have four kids so there’s that. And perhaps he knew she was lying and encouraged it.

It’s a matter of perception not lies. There is a difference. I know you want to see her utterly destroyed but it’s just not going to happen.

Definitely different perspectives. Jus t like some on here can sense her discomfort and others insist they k ow for sure that she never felt uncomfortable and was loving every minute.

I always find it interesting how people think they know for sure how someone else feels or what someone was was thinking. (About anyone else, not specific to this case or Blake). Especially from a distance, about strangers or people on tv.

Lawsuits are not about perceptions.

Very often they are. The burden of proof in a negligence case, for instance, is often very much about perception. Witness credibility is a judgment call. In this case in particular, there will be a lot of perception involved.

The law is not like doing math. It's messy.

[Anonymous]

I just pulled up the NY Times article and it does have quotes from Freedman saying it's all lies, but I'm not sure if those were in the original article. I absolutely hate that online articles allow them to get away with "updating" and not showing the original. This is obviously even worse in political contexts where we see things edited and erased but presented with the original date they were published.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I doubt Baldoni much cares whether he actually wins his lawsuits; he's just trying to get his version of events out in the open which it seems he is accomplishing. His career and livelihood is on the line in a way that Blake Lively's isn't. She'll be fine either way (even if she never gets another film role she's still married to a billionaire, besties with another billionaire, and has other ventures). He might never get work again if he didn't fight back.

I wonder if Blake’s marriage will be fine. I think it possible that much of what apppears to be ginned up in her complaint was likely present by her to Ryan as fact.

I don't see those two splitting up even if they hate each other (not saying they do, but IF). Being a Hollywood power couple is much of their appeal. On the other hand I wouldn't be surprised if Taylor Swift drops her like a hot potato. Taylor is ruthless in maintaining her image and if I were her I wouldn't want my name anywhere near this mess. See also Karlie Kloss as mentioned by a PP.

Maybe, if my spouse lied to me and I acted in ways that later destroyed my reputation based on those lies, it would destroy my marriage. But they have four kids so there’s that. And perhaps he knew she was lying and encouraged it.

It’s a matter of perception not lies. There is a difference. I know you want to see her utterly destroyed but it’s just not going to happen.

Definitely different perspectives. Jus t like some on here can sense her discomfort and others insist they k ow for sure that she never felt uncomfortable and was loving every minute.

I always find it interesting how people think they know for sure how someone else feels or what someone was was thinking. (About anyone else, not specific to this case or Blake). Especially from a distance, about strangers or people on tv.

Lawsuits are not about perceptions.

That’s what lawyers do. Present things from their clients perceptions and from a perspective that supports their clients z perceptions differ hence why they defence and prosecutor present different cases and why Blake and Justin’s complaints are different. Different perceptions = different points of view and different versions of events…exhibit A and B…the two complaints in this case

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I doubt Baldoni much cares whether he actually wins his lawsuits; he's just trying to get his version of events out in the open which it seems he is accomplishing. His career and livelihood is on the line in a way that Blake Lively's isn't. She'll be fine either way (even if she never gets another film role she's still married to a billionaire, besties with another billionaire, and has other ventures). He might never get work again if he didn't fight back.

I wonder if Blake’s marriage will be fine. I think it possible that much of what apppears to be ginned up in her complaint was likely present by her to Ryan as fact.

I don't see those two splitting up even if they hate each other (not saying they do, but IF). Being a Hollywood power couple is much of their appeal. On the other hand I wouldn't be surprised if Taylor Swift drops her like a hot potato. Taylor is ruthless in maintaining her image and if I were her I wouldn't want my name anywhere near this mess. See also Karlie Kloss as mentioned by a PP.

Maybe, if my spouse lied to me and I acted in ways that later destroyed my reputation based on those lies, it would destroy my marriage. But they have four kids so there’s that. And perhaps he knew she was lying and encouraged it.

It’s a matter of perception not lies. There is a difference. I know you want to see her utterly destroyed but it’s just not going to happen.

+1

I think if we assume the character Nicepool is based on Baldoni (and it seems obvious it is), that kind of sums up how Ryan views the situation. I sincerely doubt he's looking at this footage and thinking his wife lied.

Also, he edited the final cut of the movie. So strong odds he's already seen this footage and others that depict interactions between Lively and Baldoni.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Any chance a judge approves the gag order? Can anyone here with legal insight provide some clarity?

The are asking for both a protective order (that's what people are referring to as the "gag order") and a hearing to discuss appropriate conduct of counsel moving forward. I can't find a copy of their motion online though so I'm not sure exactly what the are asking the protective order to cover.

They'll get the hearing, that's an easy one and could be rolled into other preliminary hearings the judge might schedule as well. I would expect the judge at the hearing to lecture attorneys on both sides regarding communications to the press, not just Baldoni's lawyers.

I do think there are some things that Baldoni's lawyer has either released or is proposing releasing that the court would consider issuing a PO against. For instance I think it's highly likely the judge could issue a PO preventing Baldoni from releasing footage from the birth scene, where even if you go by Baldoni's complaint, the most Lively was wearing was a pair of underwear briefs on the bottom, and her legs were up in stirrups. That would be an easy one. I am less sure about how the judge would treat other requests for nondisclosure, of stuff like texts/emails between the parties. A lot of it is already in the complaints, I don't know how much else there even is. The judge will have to weight the potentially prejudicial or damaging impact of any potential disclosure against Baldoni's right to defend himself in the court of public opinion. And I don't know if Lively is asking for a blanket PO (unlikely to get) or something more targeted, which is more likely to be successful.

I know the press has a lot of protections, but do you think his case against the New York Times has legitimacy? They left out some key texts. e.g. Two people on his team said there was so much ammo against Justin when it came to the sexual harassment claims, but they left out a part where they both said that those accusations weren't true.

I would be pretty surprised if his NYT suit makes it past summary judgment. The only reservation I have is that recent big settlement by ABC news with Trump, which also surprised me but in retrospect I think they did it to avoid litigation that could go to the Supreme Court and potentially overturn important precedent (Sullivan). So that gives me pause and makes me wonder if we are just in a different era. However, that was Trump as plaintiff and the odds of it going to the SC are high and he appointed half the justices. I don't think Baldoni v. NYT is going that route.

In order to prove defamation, he has to prove "actual malice." He has to prove that they published something that was intentionally misleading with the specific goal of hurting Baldoni. I think this will be virtually impossible for a bunch of reasons -- the piece actually has multiple bylines and it would be hard to prove they collaborated to take Baldoni down, the NYT's fact checking process is pretty rigorous and they will have documentation of everything, and his argument is basically that they failed to provide full context to the allegation but they will simply argue that they reported on Lively's complaint and the allegations they had at the time, and then later reported on Baldoni's complaint and his counter-allegations. News orgs are not required to hold stories until every bit of information is available before reporting.

The NYT has also said they plan to vigorously defend in the case, so that weighs against a potential settlement. I don't think Baldoni has much of a case on the law here. I do wonder what a decisive loss in the NYT case does with regards to his battle against Lively and Reynolds. It won't help, but I don't know how much it will hurt.

Am I understanding correctly that you’re saying if the texts provided to them were edited/incomplete, then they could be shielded from liability by relying on those texts? In other words, they didn’t need to investigate whether those texts were complete or edited before reporting their story? If so, that’s kind of unfortunate because they essentially amplified edited/incomplete texts to present a completely different story than the unedited/complete texts would show! I feel like the due diligence standards should be higher for New York Times journalists…

If they verified the texts were real, no, I don't think they are legally required to ensure they have every single text in a text chain.

Also, even though some of the meaning of specific texts was changed when taken out of context, the broad outlines of what they reported was true -- Baldoni hired a PR firm to plant stories about Lively online in order to undermine her reputation in case she came forward with details about the alleged harassment on set. The context that has since been provided doesn't challenge any of that. It just puts some of the comments in the texts into gentler framing.

I think it's going to be near impossible for Baldoni to prove the NYT intentionally mislead the public with this story because he did actually do what he is accused of doing in terms of the PR story -- he hired the firm specifically to turn public sentiment against Lively. Sure, he'll argue he did that because the harassment allegations are false and he was getting ahead of that story. That's fine and the NYT has reported on his argument as well. But those texts were not made up and the story itself is still accurate even if additional context has come to light.

He basically has no case here.

Failing to provide context isn't libel against anyone.

Failing to provide context against a public figure will be laughed out of court as libel.

PP here and this is a much more succinct version, yes. I don't think he'd have a case even if he were a public person, though, because they didn't print anything untrue.

I think that is not enitekh correct, they altered one of the texts to take out emojis that indicated it was satire.

Meant to say they altered at least one of the texts in a way that changed its meaning, that is different than just failing to print entire text chain.

I have never thought of the upside down smiley face as meaning I didn't mean anything I just said or satire. I googled online for descriptions of it (from a time pre this saga) and it seems that there are about 100 different intended meanings of the emoji. Many say they use it to indicate resignation or whatever or dry humour etc. I am not sure one can assume the intention at the time the emoji was sent was that it means the text that was sent was satire.

If the reporter was unsure what it meant, perhaps she should have asked the person who texted it. You know, practice journalism.

I'm a journalist, and I absolutely think the NY times is in trouble. For one thing, if you are making claims about someone, you need to tell them and give them enough time to make a response before publishing. They failed to do that.

They did though-- Baldoni had a heads up and request for comment, it was on the short side. However as my reporter husband told me, that's not unusual if you are asking a public person with lawyers and professional PR for comment (whereas if it was a private person you might give them more time to respond, depending on the nature of the allegations). None of the allegations were news to Baldoni-- he was already aware of the on-set harassment allegations and they were also aware of the complaint. So a few hours for comment in that scenario is apparently not unusual (per my DH).

I personally think the reporting was a little sloppy, especially given that they attached Twohey's name to it and took the me too angle. But not wrong. And they had confirmation of the texts veracity from the PR firm.

It would be different if it was shown the texts were falsified. They weren't. They were cherry picked. But Baldoni did in fact hire the firm to smear Lively -- in addition to the texts, there are documents that show the firm's goals and plans of attack. It's not like they went to press with nothing or lies. The coverage was just slanted toward Lively, which is not illegal or legally actionable.

They did go to press with lies, lies that would have been uncovered had they talked to him, or to the pr ladies.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I just pulled up the NY Times article and it does have quotes from Freedman saying it's all lies, but I'm not sure if those were in the original article. I absolutely hate that online articles allow them to get away with "updating" and not showing the original. This is obviously even worse in political contexts where we see things edited and erased but presented with the original date they were published.

If it was updated, it will usually say so at the bottom of the article. It can be fine print but it will usually indicate if it was updated after publication time/date.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Any chance a judge approves the gag order? Can anyone here with legal insight provide some clarity?

The are asking for both a protective order (that's what people are referring to as the "gag order") and a hearing to discuss appropriate conduct of counsel moving forward. I can't find a copy of their motion online though so I'm not sure exactly what the are asking the protective order to cover.

They'll get the hearing, that's an easy one and could be rolled into other preliminary hearings the judge might schedule as well. I would expect the judge at the hearing to lecture attorneys on both sides regarding communications to the press, not just Baldoni's lawyers.

I do think there are some things that Baldoni's lawyer has either released or is proposing releasing that the court would consider issuing a PO against. For instance I think it's highly likely the judge could issue a PO preventing Baldoni from releasing footage from the birth scene, where even if you go by Baldoni's complaint, the most Lively was wearing was a pair of underwear briefs on the bottom, and her legs were up in stirrups. That would be an easy one. I am less sure about how the judge would treat other requests for nondisclosure, of stuff like texts/emails between the parties. A lot of it is already in the complaints, I don't know how much else there even is. The judge will have to weight the potentially prejudicial or damaging impact of any potential disclosure against Baldoni's right to defend himself in the court of public opinion. And I don't know if Lively is asking for a blanket PO (unlikely to get) or something more targeted, which is more likely to be successful.

I know the press has a lot of protections, but do you think his case against the New York Times has legitimacy? They left out some key texts. e.g. Two people on his team said there was so much ammo against Justin when it came to the sexual harassment claims, but they left out a part where they both said that those accusations weren't true.

I would be pretty surprised if his NYT suit makes it past summary judgment. The only reservation I have is that recent big settlement by ABC news with Trump, which also surprised me but in retrospect I think they did it to avoid litigation that could go to the Supreme Court and potentially overturn important precedent (Sullivan). So that gives me pause and makes me wonder if we are just in a different era. However, that was Trump as plaintiff and the odds of it going to the SC are high and he appointed half the justices. I don't think Baldoni v. NYT is going that route.

In order to prove defamation, he has to prove "actual malice." He has to prove that they published something that was intentionally misleading with the specific goal of hurting Baldoni. I think this will be virtually impossible for a bunch of reasons -- the piece actually has multiple bylines and it would be hard to prove they collaborated to take Baldoni down, the NYT's fact checking process is pretty rigorous and they will have documentation of everything, and his argument is basically that they failed to provide full context to the allegation but they will simply argue that they reported on Lively's complaint and the allegations they had at the time, and then later reported on Baldoni's complaint and his counter-allegations. News orgs are not required to hold stories until every bit of information is available before reporting.

The NYT has also said they plan to vigorously defend in the case, so that weighs against a potential settlement. I don't think Baldoni has much of a case on the law here. I do wonder what a decisive loss in the NYT case does with regards to his battle against Lively and Reynolds. It won't help, but I don't know how much it will hurt.

Am I understanding correctly that you’re saying if the texts provided to them were edited/incomplete, then they could be shielded from liability by relying on those texts? In other words, they didn’t need to investigate whether those texts were complete or edited before reporting their story? If so, that’s kind of unfortunate because they essentially amplified edited/incomplete texts to present a completely different story than the unedited/complete texts would show! I feel like the due diligence standards should be higher for New York Times journalists…

If they verified the texts were real, no, I don't think they are legally required to ensure they have every single text in a text chain.

Also, even though some of the meaning of specific texts was changed when taken out of context, the broad outlines of what they reported was true -- Baldoni hired a PR firm to plant stories about Lively online in order to undermine her reputation in case she came forward with details about the alleged harassment on set. The context that has since been provided doesn't challenge any of that. It just puts some of the comments in the texts into gentler framing.

I think it's going to be near impossible for Baldoni to prove the NYT intentionally mislead the public with this story because he did actually do what he is accused of doing in terms of the PR story -- he hired the firm specifically to turn public sentiment against Lively. Sure, he'll argue he did that because the harassment allegations are false and he was getting ahead of that story. That's fine and the NYT has reported on his argument as well. But those texts were not made up and the story itself is still accurate even if additional context has come to light.

He basically has no case here.

Failing to provide context isn't libel against anyone.

Failing to provide context against a public figure will be laughed out of court as libel.

PP here and this is a much more succinct version, yes. I don't think he'd have a case even if he were a public person, though, because they didn't print anything untrue.

I think that is not enitekh correct, they altered one of the texts to take out emojis that indicated it was satire.

Meant to say they altered at least one of the texts in a way that changed its meaning, that is different than just failing to print entire text chain.

I have never thought of the upside down smiley face as meaning I didn't mean anything I just said or satire. I googled online for descriptions of it (from a time pre this saga) and it seems that there are about 100 different intended meanings of the emoji. Many say they use it to indicate resignation or whatever or dry humour etc. I am not sure one can assume the intention at the time the emoji was sent was that it means the text that was sent was satire.

If the reporter was unsure what it meant, perhaps she should have asked the person who texted it. You know, practice journalism.

I'm a journalist, and I absolutely think the NY times is in trouble. For one thing, if you are making claims about someone, you need to tell them and give them enough time to make a response before publishing. They failed to do that.

They did though-- Baldoni had a heads up and request for comment, it was on the short side. However as my reporter husband told me, that's not unusual if you are asking a public person with lawyers and professional PR for comment (whereas if it was a private person you might give them more time to respond, depending on the nature of the allegations). None of the allegations were news to Baldoni-- he was already aware of the on-set harassment allegations and they were also aware of the complaint. So a few hours for comment in that scenario is apparently not unusual (per my DH).

I personally think the reporting was a little sloppy, especially given that they attached Twohey's name to it and took the me too angle. But not wrong. And they had confirmation of the texts veracity from the PR firm.

It would be different if it was shown the texts were falsified. They weren't. They were cherry picked. But Baldoni did in fact hire the firm to smear Lively -- in addition to the texts, there are documents that show the firm's goals and plans of attack. It's not like they went to press with nothing or lies. The coverage was just slanted toward Lively, which is not illegal or legally actionable.

They did go to press with lies, lies that would have been uncovered had they talked to him, or to the pr ladies.

Please point to the lies they published. And no, "Lively alleges XYZ" is not a lie of it is what she is alleging.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I doubt Baldoni much cares whether he actually wins his lawsuits; he's just trying to get his version of events out in the open which it seems he is accomplishing. His career and livelihood is on the line in a way that Blake Lively's isn't. She'll be fine either way (even if she never gets another film role she's still married to a billionaire, besties with another billionaire, and has other ventures). He might never get work again if he didn't fight back.

I wonder if Blake’s marriage will be fine. I think it possible that much of what apppears to be ginned up in her complaint was likely present by her to Ryan as fact.

I don't see those two splitting up even if they hate each other (not saying they do, but IF). Being a Hollywood power couple is much of their appeal. On the other hand I wouldn't be surprised if Taylor Swift drops her like a hot potato. Taylor is ruthless in maintaining her image and if I were her I wouldn't want my name anywhere near this mess. See also Karlie Kloss as mentioned by a PP.

Maybe, if my spouse lied to me and I acted in ways that later destroyed my reputation based on those lies, it would destroy my marriage. But they have four kids so there’s that. And perhaps he knew she was lying and encouraged it.

It’s a matter of perception not lies. There is a difference. I know you want to see her utterly destroyed but it’s just not going to happen.

+1

I think if we assume the character Nicepool is based on Baldoni (and it seems obvious it is), that kind of sums up how Ryan views the situation. I sincerely doubt he's looking at this footage and thinking his wife lied.

Also, he edited the final cut of the movie. So strong odds he's already seen this footage and others that depict interactions between Lively and Baldoni.

She did in fact misrepresent how the scene occurred, otherwise known as lie. The texts in his complaint show she misrepresented other aspects of her complaint as well. It’s certainly possible Ryan was always aware that the harassment claims were crap, it’s also possible that she misrepresented what happened to Ryan and he is only learning over the past two weeks what actually occurred.

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Anonymous wrote:Any chance a judge approves the gag order? Can anyone here with legal insight provide some clarity?

The are asking for both a protective order (that's what people are referring to as the "gag order") and a hearing to discuss appropriate conduct of counsel moving forward. I can't find a copy of their motion online though so I'm not sure exactly what the are asking the protective order to cover.

They'll get the hearing, that's an easy one and could be rolled into other preliminary hearings the judge might schedule as well. I would expect the judge at the hearing to lecture attorneys on both sides regarding communications to the press, not just Baldoni's lawyers.

I do think there are some things that Baldoni's lawyer has either released or is proposing releasing that the court would consider issuing a PO against. For instance I think it's highly likely the judge could issue a PO preventing Baldoni from releasing footage from the birth scene, where even if you go by Baldoni's complaint, the most Lively was wearing was a pair of underwear briefs on the bottom, and her legs were up in stirrups. That would be an easy one. I am less sure about how the judge would treat other requests for nondisclosure, of stuff like texts/emails between the parties. A lot of it is already in the complaints, I don't know how much else there even is. The judge will have to weight the potentially prejudicial or damaging impact of any potential disclosure against Baldoni's right to defend himself in the court of public opinion. And I don't know if Lively is asking for a blanket PO (unlikely to get) or something more targeted, which is more likely to be successful.

I know the press has a lot of protections, but do you think his case against the New York Times has legitimacy? They left out some key texts. e.g. Two people on his team said there was so much ammo against Justin when it came to the sexual harassment claims, but they left out a part where they both said that those accusations weren't true.

I would be pretty surprised if his NYT suit makes it past summary judgment. The only reservation I have is that recent big settlement by ABC news with Trump, which also surprised me but in retrospect I think they did it to avoid litigation that could go to the Supreme Court and potentially overturn important precedent (Sullivan). So that gives me pause and makes me wonder if we are just in a different era. However, that was Trump as plaintiff and the odds of it going to the SC are high and he appointed half the justices. I don't think Baldoni v. NYT is going that route.

In order to prove defamation, he has to prove "actual malice." He has to prove that they published something that was intentionally misleading with the specific goal of hurting Baldoni. I think this will be virtually impossible for a bunch of reasons -- the piece actually has multiple bylines and it would be hard to prove they collaborated to take Baldoni down, the NYT's fact checking process is pretty rigorous and they will have documentation of everything, and his argument is basically that they failed to provide full context to the allegation but they will simply argue that they reported on Lively's complaint and the allegations they had at the time, and then later reported on Baldoni's complaint and his counter-allegations. News orgs are not required to hold stories until every bit of information is available before reporting.

The NYT has also said they plan to vigorously defend in the case, so that weighs against a potential settlement. I don't think Baldoni has much of a case on the law here. I do wonder what a decisive loss in the NYT case does with regards to his battle against Lively and Reynolds. It won't help, but I don't know how much it will hurt.

Am I understanding correctly that you’re saying if the texts provided to them were edited/incomplete, then they could be shielded from liability by relying on those texts? In other words, they didn’t need to investigate whether those texts were complete or edited before reporting their story? If so, that’s kind of unfortunate because they essentially amplified edited/incomplete texts to present a completely different story than the unedited/complete texts would show! I feel like the due diligence standards should be higher for New York Times journalists…

If they verified the texts were real, no, I don't think they are legally required to ensure they have every single text in a text chain.

Also, even though some of the meaning of specific texts was changed when taken out of context, the broad outlines of what they reported was true -- Baldoni hired a PR firm to plant stories about Lively online in order to undermine her reputation in case she came forward with details about the alleged harassment on set. The context that has since been provided doesn't challenge any of that. It just puts some of the comments in the texts into gentler framing.

I think it's going to be near impossible for Baldoni to prove the NYT intentionally mislead the public with this story because he did actually do what he is accused of doing in terms of the PR story -- he hired the firm specifically to turn public sentiment against Lively. Sure, he'll argue he did that because the harassment allegations are false and he was getting ahead of that story. That's fine and the NYT has reported on his argument as well. But those texts were not made up and the story itself is still accurate even if additional context has come to light.

He basically has no case here.

Failing to provide context isn't libel against anyone.

Failing to provide context against a public figure will be laughed out of court as libel.

PP here and this is a much more succinct version, yes. I don't think he'd have a case even if he were a public person, though, because they didn't print anything untrue.

I think that is not enitekh correct, they altered one of the texts to take out emojis that indicated it was satire.

Meant to say they altered at least one of the texts in a way that changed its meaning, that is different than just failing to print entire text chain.

I have never thought of the upside down smiley face as meaning I didn't mean anything I just said or satire. I googled online for descriptions of it (from a time pre this saga) and it seems that there are about 100 different intended meanings of the emoji. Many say they use it to indicate resignation or whatever or dry humour etc. I am not sure one can assume the intention at the time the emoji was sent was that it means the text that was sent was satire.

If the reporter was unsure what it meant, perhaps she should have asked the person who texted it. You know, practice journalism.

I'm a journalist, and I absolutely think the NY times is in trouble. For one thing, if you are making claims about someone, you need to tell them and give them enough time to make a response before publishing. They failed to do that.

They did though-- Baldoni had a heads up and request for comment, it was on the short side. However as my reporter husband told me, that's not unusual if you are asking a public person with lawyers and professional PR for comment (whereas if it was a private person you might give them more time to respond, depending on the nature of the allegations). None of the allegations were news to Baldoni-- he was already aware of the on-set harassment allegations and they were also aware of the complaint. So a few hours for comment in that scenario is apparently not unusual (per my DH).

I personally think the reporting was a little sloppy, especially given that they attached Twohey's name to it and took the me too angle. But not wrong. And they had confirmation of the texts veracity from the PR firm.

It would be different if it was shown the texts were falsified. They weren't. They were cherry picked. But Baldoni did in fact hire the firm to smear Lively -- in addition to the texts, there are documents that show the firm's goals and plans of attack. It's not like they went to press with nothing or lies. The coverage was just slanted toward Lively, which is not illegal or legally actionable.

They did go to press with lies, lies that would have been uncovered had they talked to him, or to the pr ladies.

Please point to the lies they published. And no, "Lively alleges XYZ" is not a lie of it is what she is alleging.

I’m not going through every line of the article with you, it’s lengthy. Her entire case is built on straws and even the tiniest but of investigation would have revealed that.

[Anonymous]

What are the factual lies?

Did she or did she not feel uncomfortable with him nuzzling her neck and going in for kisses is opinion, not truth or lie

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Anonymous wrote:I doubt Baldoni much cares whether he actually wins his lawsuits; he's just trying to get his version of events out in the open which it seems he is accomplishing. His career and livelihood is on the line in a way that Blake Lively's isn't. She'll be fine either way (even if she never gets another film role she's still married to a billionaire, besties with another billionaire, and has other ventures). He might never get work again if he didn't fight back.

I wonder if Blake’s marriage will be fine. I think it possible that much of what apppears to be ginned up in her complaint was likely present by her to Ryan as fact.

I don't see those two splitting up even if they hate each other (not saying they do, but IF). Being a Hollywood power couple is much of their appeal. On the other hand I wouldn't be surprised if Taylor Swift drops her like a hot potato. Taylor is ruthless in maintaining her image and if I were her I wouldn't want my name anywhere near this mess. See also Karlie Kloss as mentioned by a PP.

Maybe, if my spouse lied to me and I acted in ways that later destroyed my reputation based on those lies, it would destroy my marriage. But they have four kids so there’s that. And perhaps he knew she was lying and encouraged it.

It’s a matter of perception not lies. There is a difference. I know you want to see her utterly destroyed but it’s just not going to happen.

Definitely different perspectives. Jus t like some on here can sense her discomfort and others insist they k ow for sure that she never felt uncomfortable and was loving every minute.

I always find it interesting how people think they know for sure how someone else feels or what someone was was thinking. (About anyone else, not specific to this case or Blake). Especially from a distance, about strangers or people on tv.

Lawsuits are not about perceptions.

That’s what lawyers do. Present things from their clients perceptions and from a perspective that supports their clients z perceptions differ hence why they defence and prosecutor present different cases and why Blake and Justin’s complaints are different. Different perceptions = different points of view and different versions of events…exhibit A and B…the two complaints in this case

This is all nonsense. We have seen and heard what actually occurred in that scene. It matches the description in his complaint and does not match what is described in hers. Whether she was in a good mood, attracted to him, or repelled by him is irrelevant.