A French judge ruled that a scathing restaurant review was "too prominent" in search results, and fined its author for hurting the restaurant's business.
Kevin Rawlinson at the BBC reports:
Ms Doudet was sued by the owner of Il Giardino restaurant in the Aquitaine region of southwestern France after she wrote a blogpost entitled "the place to avoid in Cap-Ferret: Il Giardino". According to court documents, the review appeared fourth in the results of a Google search for the restaurant. The judge decided that the blog's title should be changed, so that the phrase: "the place to avoid" was less prominent in the results. …
A French lawyer and blogger who writes under the pseudonym Maître Eolas, said: "It seems to me that the judge did not understand the technical issues." He added that, in French law, this type of decision would not create legal precedence.
Good luck,