Las Vegas golf course owner Billy Walters is suing Travel Golf Media and two of its bloggers, amid allegations of extortion.
Walters claims that Travel Golf Media, a golfing portal that includes a number of blogs, has “intentionally interfered with Walters Golf’s prospective economic advantage by persuading patrons, based on false statements, not to patronize” Walters’ golf courses.
He also claims that Travel Golf Media threatened to author and post negative reviews of Walters Golf courses unless Walters Golf agreed to a new contract at an increased advertising rate in February 2005.
The blogs on TravelGolf.com started attacking Walters’ courses the same month.
In a sign of poor form, Robert Lewis of Travel Golf Media told Las Vegas City Life that they had been censoring negative reviews of Walters courses on their blogs for the period of the previous advertising contract, but the practice ceased when the advertising did and that this explained the sudden appearance of negative stories.
