CNN Sues iReporter For Insisting He Works at CNN
CNN built its iReport platform as a kind of YouTube for news: Readers report on their own news stories, which they can upload onto CNN.com. Now CNN is suing one of those iReporters for claiming he works for CNN.
Robert Paisola is getting slapped with a lawsuit from CNN, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Paisola is a Salt Lake City, Utah man who frequently identifies himself as a "senior iReporter for CNN." We left phone and email messages for Paisola and will update as soon as we hear back from him.
The network is alleging that Paisola's Twitter page includes a CNN-stylized logo and that his LinkedIn page falsely states that "Robert is credentialed by CNN iReport."
We did some more digging and don't see the CNN logo on Paisola's Twitter page anymore. But his Twitter bio states that he is a "Debt Collector Abuse Advocate, Timeshare Scam Protector, Providing YOU with News YOU CAN USE from Robert Paisola CNN."
But on his LinkedIn page Paisola lists himself as "credentialed" by CNN:
Paisola has other strange misinformation posted on his LinkedIn page. He claims that he is the CEO of Western Capital Multimedia, and that the company acquired Condé Nast's Portfolio Magazine and Allure magazine. Condé Nast's Portfolio print publication was shuttered in August 2009 and its website was acquired by American City Business Journals. Allure is still owned and printed by Condé Nast.
He also claims that he is a "regular contributor" to BusinessWeek, CNN, Sirius XM, The Wall Street Journal and NPR. But we can't find his byline at any of those publications.
Here is the excerpt from Paisola's LinkedIn:
We requested a comment from CNN, but they have not gotten back to us yet. Here's a video of Paisola, in which he promotes his services to help fight off debt collectors. He claims he is "very direct."
