Top Gear Sued...

[Whickerman]

So Top Gear is apparently being sued for giving a bad review - according to Fox News. Could this mark the end of 'fair comment' on tv?

http://www.foxnews.co...s-bbc-car-bad-review/

[joggerjayne]

This sounds fishy.

It says the episode was in 2008.

Surely the Limitation Period for an action in Defamation or Malicious Falsehood is One Year.

[DTCwordfan]

aah, jayne, but if they have run a repeat(s)

[jackthehat]

Indeed, it appears to be the fact that this programme and its negative comments keeps being repeated that has caused this action.

[Milvus]

The point was they said the Tesla ran out of battery after 55 miles. It in fact ran out of battery after 211 miles. They then said the second Tesla broke down. It didn't. This happened two or three years ago and Tesla at the time asked them to remove the Tesla review. Top Gear did not remove it and have nor stopped from retransmission since. Tesla have now taken legal action. It doesn't seem like fair comment in that light

[Zeuhl]

Milvus

what evidence is there that the car ran for 211 miles and TG lied.

211 is the distance the car's spec says it would do but I think it came up short in the TG test. I seem to recall the TG team liked the car's performance but found it to be hopelessly impractical and unreliable.

I would expect TG and their lawyers are very careful about the veracity of their reviews or they could be sued regularly by very powerful corporations.

[Milvus]

Zuehl you are right. The 211 was from memory of the news article. The actual quote from the court case was that neither car went below 20% charge. Neither ran out of battery or broke down, contrary to the Top Gear programme

[jackthehat]

I think that Tesla have sorted out the 'wrinkles' apparent in the original test-drive and are now confident of marketing an excellent product.........unfortunately, the repeats of the show now reinforce the original problems in consumers' minds at the expense of the progress made in EVs.

[Zeuhl]

Gotcha

Even if the review was 'true' I can see why having it repeated over and over would be annoying especially if they have addressed any issues with their later products.

[rojash]

"Could this mark the end of 'fair comment' on tv? "

No. If the court determines that it was fair comment then Tesla will lose the case. Tesla's argument is that it wasn't fair comment, but malicious falsehood.

[AlBags]

Battery powered cars hardly ever .. if never .. live up to their claim .. or expectation.
Switch on windscreen wiper or air con for 10 mins .. and you're screwed on range!

[Gromit]

Clarkson is an unashamed petrolhead, but the review was actually quite good considering the car broke down. I would not think Tesla will be successful in their legal action, as it does come under 'fair comment'.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8DfHyGD7_pM&feature=youtube_gdata_player

[rojash]

"review was actually quite good considering the car broke down"

As I understand, part of Tesla's case is that the car didn't actually break down. If they are correct, then it's not fair comment. (I'm not taking sides here - just pointing out that whether or not the car broke down, and whether or not Top Gear's review was fair comment, is a case for the court do decide).

[Coobeastie]

http://transmission.b...current-legal-action/

The Executive Producers take on the case.

[lumination]

as long as they arnt being taken off the air...

[alleath]

I thought Tesla had come into possession of scripts for that episode that included camera directions for pushing the car back into the hanger and for Clarkson to deliver the line - "unfortunately it just doesn't work in the real world" - written BEFORE they had taken the cars out onto the track?

[trapped]

With a budget of over £3.5 billion pounds the BBC does not lose many cases.

[alleath]

http://www.dailymail....lectric-car-test.html

[Red_John]

the theoretical range was the 211 but that won't be achieved hooning round the track. I can't see what TG did wrong all they did was demonstrate that it takes more energy to go fast, no sh1t Sherlock! I can't see that Tesla have a leg to stand on.

[Red_John]

It's like the M3 using less fuel than a prius test. It's not so much what you drive but how you drive it.

[TonyV]

BBC will not lose - Tesla - good car / good idea but running out of money me thinks