Jury Finds for Polanski in Libel Case; Fashion Editor Fired for Blogging
A.J. HAMMER, CO-HOST: I`m A.J. Hammer.</s>BROOKE ANDERSON, CO-HOST: I`m Brooke Anderson. TV`s only live entertainment news show starts right now.</s>ANDERSON (voice-over): On SHOWBIZ TONIGHT, a stunning decision. It`s got sex, an Oscar-winning director accused of rape, Mia Farrow and a major magazine. Tonight, the verdict and the fiery reaction.</s>HAMMER (voice-over): Also, SHOWBIZ TONIGHT goes in-depth. Should you get fired for what you write online? It`s something we`ve all done, talk about our boss behind his or her back. Live tonight, the fashion magazine editor who may have blogged her way out of a glamorous career.</s>ANDERSON: Plus, Courteney Cox Arquette. She comes to SHOWBIZ TONIGHT to set the record straight about those reports she suffered from postpartum depression. And going from playing obsessively-neat Monica on "Friends" to a woman haunted with obsession.</s>HAYDEN CHRISTIANSEN, ACTOR: I`m Hayden Christiansen. If it happened today, it`s on SHOWBIZ TONIGHT.</s>HAMMER: Hello, I`m A.J. Hammer.</s>ANDERSON: And I`m Brooke Anderson. Karyn Bryant has the night off. One of Hollywood`s most controversial and powerful directors today won a stunning victory in court against one of the world`s best known magazines.</s>HAMMER: "Vanity Fair" had claimed Roman Polanski tried to pick up woman right after the murder of his very famous and very pregnant wife.</s>ANDERSON: Today, a London court ended the libel showdown with a decision that has rocked Hollywood and the media world.</s>HAMMER: SHOWBIZ TONIGHT`s David Haffenreffer joins us now live the case of Roman Polanski v. "Vanity Fair" -- David.</s>DAVID HAFFENREFFER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: A.J. and Brooke, the court case brought together all of the ingredients of an international media story: a Hollywood actress, a grizzly murder and a fugitive on the run. The victory for Roman Polanski surprised those who watched the case, but for the 71-year-old film director, he was simply trying to right a wrong that appeared in a widely read magazine.</s>HAFFENREFFER (voice-over): It was a case that involved Hollywood scandal, sex and murder. Polanski is the Oscar-winning director of "The Pianist." He took "Vanity Fair" to court over an article that ran three years ago. The article alleges Polanski, on his way to his wife`s funeral in 1969, went to Elaine`s bar in New York. That`s where, the article alleged, he tried to seduce a sexy a sexy Swedish woman. His wife, actress Sharon Tate, was brutally murdered by followers of Charles Manson in their Hollywood home. SHOWBIZ TONIGHT was there in London earlier this week when, in his defense, Polanski`s lawyers called actress Mia Farrow to the stand. Farrow, acting as a character witness, said she`d swear on stack of bibles that Polanski was too distraught to have tried to seduce anyone. "Vanity Fair," though, stood by its story. It just took the London jury just 4 1/2 hours to decide that "Vanity Fair" and its publisher, Conde Nast, were guilty of libel. The judge ordered the magazine giant to pay Polanski about $87,000 in damages, plus court costs. It`s a rare judgment against a publication which has a staff of attorneys review every article before it`s published. "Newsweek`s" Nicki Gostin tells SHOWBIZ TONIGHT that this could have repercussions for the industry.</s>NICKI GOSTIN, "NEWSWEEK": It`s not a huge amount. It`s not like millions of dollars. This is not -- Conde Nast is a huge corporation. This is not a big deal for them, 50,000 pounds. But you know, it`s certainly one that sent shivers down the spines of various editors.</s>HAFFENREFFER: Polanski testified in a court filled with 18th Century tradition, using high definition television and the latest in satellite hook-ups from Paris. That`s because he`s lived in France since fleeing the United States in 1978 to avoid child sex charges. Had he come to London, he could have been arrested and sent to America. Hours ago, the 71-year-old Polanski said in a statement that, quote, "It goes without saying that, whilst the whole episode is a sad one, I am obviously pleased with the jury`s verdict." But "Vanity Fair" editor Graydon Carter was clear in his anger.</s>GRAYDON CARTER, EDITOR, "VANITY FAIR": As the father of four children, one of them a 12-year-old daughter, I find it equally outrageous that this judgment was considered defamatory, given the fact that Mr. Polanski can`t be here because he slept with a 13-year-old girl a quarter of a century ago.</s>HAFFENREFFER: The circumstances of the case left many bewildered.</s>GOSTON: He even admitted that he went on a -- that he slept with a lot of women after Sharon Tate`s murder. So I think people were surprised that his reputation had been harmed by this, because you could make the argument, how can you damage someone`s reputation who has been convicted -- who had been convicted of sleeping with a 13-year-old. That`s sort of not a great reputation to have in the beginning.</s>HAFFENREFFER: With Conde Nast based in New York City and Polanski living in France, many wondered why the case was tried in London. Observers say libel cases against international media cases are often tried there, because British courts are considered friendlier to those filing the lawsuits than in the United States -- Brooke.</s>ANDERSON: Thank you, David. SHOWBIZ TONIGHT`s David Haffenreffer. Tonight, the Michael Jackson child molestation trial may be over, but the bills are still pouring in. It`s reported that the unsuccessful prosecution of the pope star cost California taxpayers $2.7 million dollars, and that`s just for crowd control and posting sheriff`s deputies at the Santa Maria County Courthouse. It doesn`t include prosecution and investigative expenses. Also today, Jermaine Jackson, Michael`s brother, says the trial, quote, "Tore Michael apart mentally" and left him too tired to attend his father`s 76th birthday party in Berlin.</s>HAMMER: Tonight, busted for blogging. Anyone who keeps a blog on the Net or has had something bad to say about their boss behind his or her back, you`ll want to listen up. Nadine Haobsh, a fashion editor for "Ladies Home Journal" magazine, was fired after it was learned that she was the person who was writing the blog that had the whole fashion industry buzzing. And Nadine Haobsh -- I`m sorry about that -- joining us live here in New York City. This thing took off like wildfire.</s>NADINE HAOBSH, FIRED FOR BLOGGING ABOUT WORK: Yes.</s>HAMMER: Fifty thousand people visited -- visited the site over a six- week period. Talk to me about some of the things that you were blogging about on your site.</s>HAOBSH: Well, to be honest, it was 80 percent celebrity gossip and only 20 percent beauty, but obviously, because I work in the beauty industry and such, it was the beauty blogs that got the most attention, the beauty posts. And so I was talking about, you know, the freebies that we get, because beauty companies have a lot more money than fashion companies do. And so, you know, the Christmas gifts you get and the things that you -- the swag, basically, that you get sent with the products. And I guess I sort of outed a few of the secrets of the beauty industry, even though they`re really not secrets.</s>HAMMER: Well, speaking of those freebies, let me read an example of one of the things that you wrote on your site. You said, quote, "My boss regularly gets Marc Jacobs wallets and coats, plane ticket vouchers, iPods, yearlong gym memberships, and of course, all the free highlights and haircuts your poor dyed, straightened and styled hair can stand." Now, you attempted to keep your identity secret. Was that partially because you thought maybe some of these things were crossing the line?</s>HAOBSH: To be honest, I don`t know why. That`s my biggest regret, that I kept my identity secret, because I think that this could have all been prevented if I had just come clean from the beginning and told my bosses that I was doing this. But I mean, probably in the back of my head I knew it was bad idea, which was why I didn`t tell them until I was contacted by a writer from the "New York Post" a couple days ago, and they told me they`d be doing a story on me.</s>HAMMER: So talk to me about what happened to your jobs.</s>HAOBSH: Basically, I told my boss a few days ago when the "Post" writer contacted me that they wanted to a story on me. My boss was understandably upset. And then the very next day, I received a job offer from "17" magazine. I went to my existing bosses, gave the two weeks` notice, which they declined. And then the story broke the next day in the "Post," and "17" rescinded the offer that day.</s>HAMMER: OK. So do you feel that it was within their right to fire you?</s>HAOBSH: To be honest, yes, I do. I mean, it`s my fault. I should have come clean from the beginning. You know, it was a conflict of interest, because I was a beauty writer, and I was writing about beauty. And being an employee at the time of "Ladies Home Journal," I basically was a spokesperson for them. And so I understand, you know, it was unprofessional. I didn`t realize it at the time, and that`s sort of my -- that was my error. But it was all -- it was done with the best of intentions. You know, I was naive enough to think what I was writing was all in good fun and that it wouldn`t get back to my bosses, and that`s my mistake.</s>HAMMER: OK. Well, Nadine stick around, because we want to talk to you some more about this. This is a question that I`m sure many people are wondering about. Should you be fired for what you write about your job in a blog? That is the topic of our "SHOWBIZ In-Depth" tonight. So joining us live from San Francisco to chat about it, Kurt Opsahl. He`s the staff attorney for Electronic Frontier Foundation, which handles Internet right issues. And live from Hollywood, Xeni Jardin, our friend from BoingBoing.net. It`s a technology Web site. Good to see you all. Kurt, I want to start with you. Certainly, companies are entitled to protect proprietary information. That`s not what was getting out here. It was basically, you know, for lack of a better term, gossip. Was it within the company`s rights to fire Nadine?</s>KURT OPSAHL, ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION: As a general matter, people are employed at will. A company can fire them for no reason, for any reason, so long as it`s not a protected reason. You can`t be fired for your race or your gender or for organizing a labor union in the workplace. And from what I`ve seen of Jolie in NYC, it doesn`t seem that it falls under any of those protected categories.</s>HAMMER: What do you think about that, Nadine, you know, seeing as how it didn`t fall within that sort of set of parameters?</s>HAOBSH: No, I think he`s right. I mean, basically, it came down to the fact that my boss has felt that it displayed a lack of professionalism and a lack of respect for the industry. And as a writer for "Ladies Home Journal," I was the representative within the industry. And so it`s disappointing, but I understand their position.</s>HAMMER: Xeni, weigh in on it.</s>XENI JARDIN, BOINGBOING.NET: Yes, well, I`m not a lawyer, but I am a blogger. And one of the things that a lot of people forget when they sort of experience the power of blogs for the first time, is that you then become subject to the same kind of legal issues that any other publication or any sort of broadcasting entity might. You`re now publishing information, so issues about defamation, publishing trade secrets, intellectual property, all that stuff then becomes your concern. And I know that this blog, this is dealing with lip gloss not yellow cake uranium. But still, there`s some important legal issues to consider here. The EFF actually published a really good legal guide for bloggers that everybody behind a blog should be reading.</s>HAMMER: And you guys have that on your web site, Kurt. So this must be happening an awful lot lately, because blogs are easy to start. I mean, basically, you just go online and anybody can start writing these? Is this just a problem that will continue to grow? And where`s it heading?</s>OPSAHL: Well, the blogs represent the democratization of media, giving any ordinary individual the power of the press, so they can publish their thoughts and opinions to the world. This enables people to express themselves more. But at the same time they might not have the resources to see the rules of the road, have legal departments like a corporate media entity might have. That`s one of the reasons we came out with a legal guide for bloggers so people can understand their rights, and if necessary, defend them.</s>HAMMER: So Nadine, you really didn`t know what you were getting yourself into, basically? You were just writing away?</s>HAOBSH: Exactly. I mean, I really didn`t. And I started the blog because a lot of my friends have blogs. You know, I read a lot of blogs regularly, like Gawker and Defamer and Paris Hilton, things like that. And so it just, you know, it was one of those cases where it seemed like something fun. It seemed pretty harmless. And my advice to would-be bloggers would be, you know, don`t write about your industry and think before you write, because it is going to get back to people.</s>HAMMER: And Xeni, this is not the first time we`ve seen this happen, is it?</s>JARDIN: No. There have been plenty of incidents. And I imagine we`ll see more. There was a blogger named Mark Genn (ph) who worked at Google, who was fired, somewhere alleging that this because of stuff he wrote in his blog. There was this Delta Airline stewardess, as well. There have been a number of cases like this, and it`s not going to go away, because blogs aren`t going away.</s>HAMMER: Kurt, your best piece...</s>JARDIN: Never think that you have anonymity.</s>HAMMER: Kurt, your best piece of advice for a would-be blogger?</s>OPSAHL: Blog anonymously. I`d rather have people blogging and keeping their anonymity than stopping blogging about workplace issues. This might not have been yellow cake uranium, but it is an important insight into the beauty world. And I think that it was a valuable blog that people enjoyed reading. If you blog anonymously and you can protect your identity, you can keep speaking out on these issues and protect yourself from getting terminated.</s>HAMMER: Stay anonymous. Kurt, Nadine and Xeni, thank you very much for chiming in and going in-depth with us here us on</s>SHOWBIZ TONIGHT. HAOBSH: Thank you.</s>OPSAHL: Thank you.</s>JARDIN: Thank you.</s>HAMMER: Well, now we`d like to hear from you on all of this. Our SHOWBIZ TONIGHT question of the day is blogging: do you have the right to trash your boss? You can vote by going to CNN.com/ShowbizTonight or e-mail us at ShowbizTonight@CNN.com. Some of your thoughts later on in the show.</s>ANDERSON: Well, another celebrity speaks out about her struggles with postpartum depression. Who is it? We`ll tell you, coming up next.</s>HAMMER: And Courteney Cox Arquette opens up to tell us about her baby blues, her relationship with Brooke Shields, thoughts on Tom Cruise and her totally un-Monica-like new role. A revealing "SHOWBIZ Sitdown" with the former "Friends" star is coming up.</s>ANDERSON: And, we`ve got a bonus feature for you on bonus features. How movie studios are turning big screen flops into small screen fortunes on DVD. SHOWBIZ TONIGHT`s "Silver Screen Secrets" series continues.</s>HAMMER: Time now for tonight`s "Entertainment Weekly Great American Pop Culture Quiz." What was the name of the Scottish freedom fighter portrayed by Mel Gibson in the movie "Braveheart?" Was it William Wallace, Montgomery Scott, Robert the Bruce or William O`Connell? Hang out. We`re coming right back with the answer.