LIBEL.COM — Rod Dreher offers some legal advice for bloggers.

From the facts stated in Dreher’s article, the suit in question doesn’t sound very strong, but I’m sure that there’s more to it than I’m aware of. Anyway, it’s the general subject that interests me, not the particulars of one case.

There’s been some discussion of this in the blogosphere, and the article and the items it links to are must-reads. Some webloggers are a bit quick on the draw with accusations of plagiarism, etc. — which particularly when aimed at a professional journalist are serious in the extreme, and likely to fetch a strong response — and need to remember that publishing on a weblog is no different from publishing elsewhere: you shouldn’t make accusations unless you’re reasonably sure they’re true, and could back it up if challenged. You’re not required to be right about everything, but some degree of responsibility and care is required, just as with Big Media. (And webloggers who publish things that turn out to be false should publish a correction swiftly once they learn of the error — whether or not anyone threatens a libel action).

And Big Media organizations have lawyers already on salary or retainer to deal with such things. Most bloggers don’t, and defending a libel suit, even if you win, is expensive and stressful. You can get insurance to cover the expense, but the stress will be there regardless.

More importantly, it’s not that hard to avoid libeling people. Just try to get things right — and be quick to correct errors that are pointed out. On the latter point, webloggers have Big Media beat hollow.

UPDATE: Eugene Volokh has some related observations.