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Non-Tech : The New Iomega '2000' Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Herb Fuller who wrote (3313)	11/3/1999 5:45:00 PM
From: Gottfried	Respond to of 5023

Herb, the WSCity data looks a little different, but there is a 153,000 sh trade at 15:38:22 Gottfried Date Time High Low Close Volume 11/03/99 11/03/99 16:26:36 3.000 3.000 3.000 1,500 11/03/99 16:24:21 3.000 2.937 2.937 2,800 11/03/99 16:23:26 2.937 2.937 2.937 5,400 11/03/99 16:22:08 3.000 3.000 3.000 11,400 11/03/99 16:20:38 3.000 2.937 2.937 15,800 11/03/99 16:18:56 3.000 2.937 3.000 32,900 11/03/99 16:17:13 3.000 2.937 3.000 14,000 11/03/99 16:15:19 3.000 3.000 3.000 7,300 11/03/99 16:14:14 3.000 2.937 3.000 12,000 11/03/99 16:12:05 2.937 2.937 2.937 700 11/03/99 16:11:15 3.000 2.937 2.937 12,600 11/03/99 16:09:48 3.000 2.937 3.000 500 11/03/99 16:07:11 3.000 3.000 3.000 1,000 11/03/99 16:06:34 3.000 2.937 3.000 6,900 11/03/99 16:05:35 3.000 2.937 3.000 7,000 11/03/99 16:03:48 3.000 2.937 2.937 2,900 11/03/99 16:02:11 3.000 2.937 3.000 4,200 11/03/99 16:01:00 3.000 2.937 3.000 38,900 11/03/99 15:59:21 3.000 2.937 2.937 9,400 11/03/99 15:57:53 3.000 3.000 3.000 7,200 11/03/99 15:55:38 3.000 2.937 2.937 1,200 11/03/99 15:54:59 3.000 2.937 2.937 4,800 11/03/99 15:53:28 3.000 2.937 3.000 5,800 11/03/99 15:50:49 3.000 3.000 3.000 800 11/03/99 15:49:31 3.000 2.937 3.000 6,500 11/03/99 15:48:37 3.000 2.937 3.000 2,100 11/03/99 15:45:51 2.937 2.937 2.937 2,400 11/03/99 15:44:30 3.000 2.937 2.937 46,600 11/03/99 15:42:48 3.000 2.937 3.000 28,200 11/03/99 15:41:30 3.000 2.937 3.000 35,400 11/03/99 15:39:43 3.000 2.937 2.937 9,400 11/03/99 15:38:22 3.000 2.937 3.000 153,000 11/03/99 15:36:29 2.937 2.937 2.937 1,200 11/03/99 15:34:51 3.000 3.000 3.000 100 11/03/99 15:33:44 3.000 2.937 3.000 8,700 11/03/99 15:29:54 3.000 3.000 3.000 200 11/03/99 15:29:01 3.000 3.000 3.000 1,200

To: Herb Fuller who wrote (3313)	11/14/1999 1:36:00 PM
From: Herb Fuller	Respond to of 5023

The Salt Lake Tribune It's about time that Iomega takes an Internet stand against the the abusive posts against them. Herb =========================================================== sltrib.com Company Ire Is Turning Into Lawsuits Against Critics in Web Chat Rooms BY STEVEN OBERBECK THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE Picture this: An investor buys 1,000 shares of Acme Widgets Inc. only to see the stock plummet in value. Management's reassurances prove meaningless. The investor's frustration grows. Even that annual embodiment of corporate democracy, the stockholders' meeting, leaves the investor in dismay with more questions than answers. Desperate, he turns to an Internet chat board to try to get the lowdown on the company. "This company must be a scam. Management are either complete fools or a bunch of crooks," he types for all to see. The company sues him the next day. Though such lawsuits are rare, investors need to be wary. A rising number of publicly held companies are growing increasingly frustrated with chat boards, the information age's equivalent of the gossip hound's pickle barrel. A few corporations, including the Draper-based Fonix Corp., have filed lawsuits against the those who have posted messages disparaging to the company and its management. "The question of what companies should do about chat boards has been coming up a lot," said Brian Borders, president of the Washington, D.C.-based Association of Publicly Traded Companies. Chat board postings are of particular concern for smaller companies, he said, those whose shares can easily be moved for good or ill by a cleverly released rumor or statement raising doubt about the integrity of management. To date, most publicly held companies have been taking the grit-your-teeth-and-bear-it approach, choosing to ignore even the wildest rumors or the most vicious online attacks. What few lawsuits have been filed by corporations have mostly been directed at specific individuals, those believed to have loaded up chat boards with comments about a company while shorting or buying the stock. Shorting a stock involves selling borrowed shares with the intention of buying them back later when the price goes down. And that makes the Fonix lawsuit unusual, Borders said. The Utah developer of speech-recognition technology in early October filed a lawsuit in Utah's 3rd District Court against 10 individuals -- identified only by their online aliases -- for defaming the company and its officers on a Yahoo chat board. "The lawsuit is aimed at trying to find out who these people are," said Paul Clayson, Fonix's vice president of sales and marketing, shortly after the filing of the legal action. "We would like to find out whether their motives are financial or if they are acting out of frustration." Fonix's attempt to use the court to crack the identities of chat-room visitors whose true names are hidden behind monikers such as "The Lost Profit" and "Fedupwithfonix" will be watched closely by many publicly held companies, Borders said. "Fonix's lawsuit is one of the brave exceptions [among publicly held companies]," he said. "A lot of people will be watching to see how well it succeeds, what they accomplish and what fallout could occur." Although most companies choose to ignore "cybersmears," about 3 percent of publicly held companies are getting on chat boards and responding to the rumors, said Lou Thompson, spokesman for the National Investors Relations Institute. "It is something we try to discourage," Thompson said. Companies that make their own postings to try to correct false information may get locked into that position and feel they have to respond to all rumors. And once committed, if they fail to respond it could give investors the mistaken impression a posting is true, he said. Utah's Iomega Corp., which several years ago was a hot chat-room topic among investors, is taking a different tact. It is setting up its own chat board for investors although the company's position is it will not respond to rumors. You cannot do a lot about the rumors or innuendo out there," said Wade Olsen, Iomega's director of investor relations. "It is our policy to publicly disclose material events when they occur and people can call us about any information that is out there." " When it comes to chat-board visitors disparaging company management, Olsen said the company has taken a harder line but has stopped short of any litigation. "We have tracked down some of those people and chatted with them and tried to get them to understand we do not think it is a smart thing to do," Olsen said. "So far we have not had to go beyond that and I am not sure what would happen if we did." For many of those who post messages on chat boards, criticizing a company's management is tied up with the notions of freedom of speech and being able to disparage management of a company in which they hold stock. "It is still possible though to defame a company and libel individuals in management," said Jeffrey Hunt, a media attorney in Salt Lake City. And people do need to be careful, he said. Just how careful someone has to be though is open to interpretation. Along with freedom-of-speech questions, Borders said it may be argued that the management of publicly held corporations rise to the point of being public figures, which can make it more difficult for such corporate executives to get sanctions for libel. Such legal hair splitting, however, may be of little comfort to someone who suddenly finds themselves the subject of a lawsuit filed by a corporation with all the expense and agony that might entail, he said.