There’s no way this ends well

So a Chicago real estate company decides to sue a woman for a tweet she wrote, seen primarily by her by 20 followers, for $50,000.

The $50,000 line? “Who said sleeping in a moldy apartment was bad for you? Horizon realty thinks it’s okay.”

Kudos for them for using social media monitoring tools to look for brand mentions. Though the off-the-cuff remark from Jeffrey Michael of Horizon:

We’re a sue first, ask questions later kind of an organization.

Hardly a line likely to get you any sympathy.

It takes a special kind of genius however for someone to be so upset about this negative brand mention that they decide to start legal proceedings.

Never mind that the woman they’re suing was clearly a little abrasive generally – most of her tweets are complaints and insults – click to enlarge the screengrab of her twitter page below.

click to enlarge

How’s this going to play out?

Well – they’re going to get publicity for being reactionary and litigious. Is anyone more likely to use the company because of it? Highly unlikely.

Now here’s an idea – you’re monitoring for brand mentions, someone says they’re unhappy, how about you actually respond to the complaint? Maybe try to ‘turn that frown upside down’?

It’ll be fun to watch #horizonfail – another example of how not to behave when everyone might be watching.

Update: Mashable have this formal response from Horizon, apologising for the tongue in cheek quote and trying to state their case. I still think they’d be better off just shutting the hell up at this point.

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