The Wednesday, July 2, 2008 Publisher's Lunch published a summary and links to the case, virtually guaranteeing that any publishing industry professional who had not heard of the matter now has:
A lawsuit filed some time ago by literary agent Barbara Bauer in New Jersey's Monmouth County Superior Court charging defamation and intentional interference with prospective economic advantage against 22 plaintiffs, including such online posters as Patrick and Teresa Nielsen-Hayden, Victoria Strauss and Ann Crispin, along with the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America website and Wikipedia parent Wikimedia, was scheduled for a court hearing yesterday. Lawyers for the Electronic Frontier Foundation joined Wikimedia in moving to dismiss the case, citing both the First Amendment and New Jersey law.The suit alleges that Bauer "has been impaired in her ability to earn a living as a literary agent and has sustained and will continue to sustain loss of income in amounts that will be established at trial," As the Newark Star-Ledger notes, she claims the defendants "have repeatedly belittled her on blogs and websites and contributed to a now-deleted page about her on Wikipedia." In particular, Bauer was cited on a number of web sites for her inclusion in a Writer Beware's listing that asserted the "20 Worst Literary Agents."
As noted here, Wikimedia is no longer a defendant. Bauer's lawyer has said he would have to confer with his client about whether or not to proceed against it on grounds other than those in the original filing.