A Letter to Our Readers:Red Herring named in baseless defamation suit.
by Blaise Zerega
September 13, 2002
Red Herring Communications yesterday was sued for libel by Imagis Technologies (OTC: IGSTF) in the Supreme Court of British Columbia. Also named in the suit is our contributing editor, Christopher Byron, author of the monthly column, "The Contrarian." The Imagis lawsuit alleges that "Feds, Face Recognition, and a Fishy Fund," which was published in our September issue (online it was titled "The Perils of Penny Stocks"), is defamatory. The action is without merit. We stand behind Mr. Byron's column fully.
As a journalistic enterprise, we strive to deliver accurate, fair, and balanced reporting. Our ethics policy demands that "we must be accountable: we promise to investigate all complaints and correct all mistakes of fact, context, and fairness." Accordingly, we investigated Imagis's allegations and determined that the facts reported in Mr. Byron's column are accurate and that they support the opinions he expressed. Imagis has neither proven any factual errors nor has it responded to repeated requests to submit a letter to the editor for publication. Our online partner, MSNBC Interactive, which republished the column on its website and received a complaint from Imagis also made a similar request which went unheeded. Instead, Imagis issued a press release in which it incorrectly stated that their complaint resulted in the column being pulled from the MSNBC site.
We invite you, our readers, to follow this matter closely. The Imagis lawsuit is an attack on Red Herring's editorial mission because it seeks to curtail the bold and original style of business journalism that is our signature. We have informed Imagis that Red Herring will not retract published writings simply because the subject of a column does not like what has been written and files a lawsuit.
Sincerely,
Blaise Zerega
Editor
This letter was last updated on September 13, 2002.
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