Slashdot Mirror
Anonymous Speech Litigation
Shadowhawk writes "According to this story on ZDNN, AOL filed a friend-of-the-court brief arguing that defamation lawsuits against anonymous posters to the Internet are 'an illegitimate use of the courts to silence and retaliate against speakers whose statements, while unpleasant from the standpoint of the [plaintiff], were not unlawful.'" AOL's web page about the case has the brief they filed. AOL is making an important argument about abuses of the legal system to identify ISP subscribers.
1. That's kinda knee-jerk, isn't it?
2. It's in their interest, part 1: the article mentioned how corps like AOL and Yahoo have to respond to "hundreds" of subpoenas for their records every year.
3. It's in their interest, part 2: we'd be perfectly accepting of the New York Times stepping into a lawsuit like this, because we've got noble ideas (say) about their interest in Free Speech, The Greater Good, Rights of Man/Woman, etc. But really, AOL is, substantially, in the same business; cynical/true observations about the use of content to provide eyes for ads aside, both are publishers, and both have a certain interest -- ideal and practical -- in free speech.
In fact, in light of these points, I wonder why it hasn't happened before. I mean, I'm sure some ISP somewhere has done something similar -- but I don't recall hearing about an ISP on the scale of AOL doing this before. Or am I on crack?
Anyone?
Bueller...Bueller...
Carousel is a lie!
Oh, and don't bother pointing out the irony of my pointing out that people won't use their real names when I post under "vinnythenose" (no, that's not my birthname ;) and don't give you any contact information :)
Anywho, good for AOL on protecting the rights of the anonymous. But I guess the question lies, is anonymity enoforcable? If I try to be anonymous, does that mean I should legally be anonymous, even if they can find out who I was (via IP addresses, logs, etc)?
Who is in the wrong in a posting situation. If I break my contract and try to dissuade people from purchasing from my company (assuming my contract has a clause like that). I am still wrong for doing that, even if I am anonymous. But if they can find out who I am, I'm no longer anonymous. Are they breaking my rights as an individual by finding out who I am? But I did break my contract...
AHHH!!!! I'm confusing myself! Anyhow, it's an interesting topic/thought.
--- I used to moderate, then I read the -1 articles and decided having to filter through them was not worth it.
Slashdot got a subpoena from Microsoft when certain users posted how to open a package without reading their restrictive licensing. blue underpants was one of the users.
The Slashdot lawyers told them to ignore it, so they did. Case closed.
So, at least a long time ago, Slashdot protected all their user's rights, not just anonymous cowards. I'm not so sure about today.
I think we all need to give AOL praise for this recent action. Granted, we like to cry and moan when corporations trample our rights and give us the shaft, but we also need to make it known when we approve of what they do, in the hopes that they will keep doing those things that make us happy :)
Sure, there may be some self-serving interest at the heart of this matter, but such is the way of capitalism. If their greed and annoyance at having to constantly deal with these cases results in their requesting that the courts block some of these ridiculous suits, I'm all for it.
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The IHA Forums
Natural != (nontoxic || beneficial)
I really wish we could see what was posted about this guy.
..."
Nothing too exciting... From an article published last November, here's what happened.
Melvin sued the anonymous Web gossip after he posted a comment online declaring: "Judge Joan Orie Melvin has been lobbying the Ridge administration on behalf of a local attorney seeking the appointment by Gov. Ridge to fill the vacancy on the Allegheny County Court of Common Pleas created by the mandatory retirement earlier this month of Judge Robert Dauer.
Kinda boring, really...
Huh??
AOL guys are the good guys this time?
I... I can't believe it! A Slashdot story taking AOL's side! michael must have gone temporarily out of his mind. Expect a retraction soon:
"Update: We're sorry, we just realized that we took the side of a major corporation. We hereby retract this article and all statements made within it. May God forgive us."
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main(c,r){for(r=32;r;) printf(++c>31?c=!r--,"\n":c<r?" ":~c&r?" `":" #");}
"(a state judge) is seeking discovery of the identity of a Doe defendant who allegedly posted defamatory material about the judge"
/.'ers have posted about him...
It would be funny if his corrupted highness, MPAA Judge Kaplan were to try this over stuff I and other
On second thought, he might be afraid to... Filing such a suit would give the defendant the power of discovery to PROVE all the links between him and the MPAA that made him unqualified to preside over the DeCSS case...
=== The price of freedom is eternal vigilance
But I guess the question lies, is anonymity enoforcable? If I try to be anonymous, does that mean I should legally be anonymous, even if they can find out who I was (via IP addresses, logs, etc)?
;)
Sure. Why not?
People keep making a big deal about the DMCA saying that "Effectively" controls access (and the jokes about how in-effective CCA's CCS has been, as well as the scheme itself being poor encryption). But its been pointed out repeatedly that the word "Effective" means that a serious attempt has been made (or some such leagal nonsense. IANAL... and I don't play one on TV). If thats true though, then shouldn't an "Effective" attempt at maintaining ones anonymity be allowed to leagaly protect ones identity from further intrusion?
This space for rent. All reasonable inquiries will be entertained at proprietors discretion.
See http://aolcom.cnet.com/news/0-1006-200-921517.html
Here is an extract :
This is not the first time AOL has come under fire by gay and lesbian rights groups. The most notable instance came when AOL admitted it had disclosed the member account of Timothy McVeigh, a naval officer, to a naval investigator. Because of the disclosure, the Navy discharged the sailor for "Homosexual Conduct Admittance" because he typed the word "gay" on his member profile under "Marital Status." He has since been reinstated.
Disclaimer : I work for AOL Time Warner and opinions are my own, not those of AOL Time Warner
-- Julien Pierre http://www.madbrain.com/blog
"Congress shall make no law... abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press..."
Unfortunately, Congress with the help of Federal Courts and the Supreme Court have made laws which do abridge the freedom of speech.
Many justices have declared that some forms of speech are not protected by the First Amendment, even though the Amendment's language is very clear. It protects profanity, it protects lies, it protects hate, it protects rumor, it protects anything you or I might say.
It protects them for one reason, because it was the hope of the Drafters that bad speech would be pushed aside by the noble and intelligent people. Remember, these Drafters originally did not give the masses the power to elect a President.
In a system where there is no longer protected speech, anonymous speech is the next best thing. Until the First Amendment is restored to it's original strength (if it ever is), we only have anonymous speech to protect us when we know an ugly truth.
The reason you may not think anonymous speech is important to you, is because you may not have an ugly truth to tell. You may never have a reason to use anonymous speech. That would be fine. But don't deny yourself the right to use anonymous speech because you do not have the need for it now.
The United States of America was founded as a great experiment to see if wealthy, educated people were responsible enough to rule themselves. Unfortunately, year by year, we give up responsibility to a mythical being known as "The Government". The problem is, as we shed our responsibility, we also shed our rights.
The right of anonymous speech requires the listeners to be responsible enough to research the claims presented. I will accept that responsibility, in the event that I ever need to tell the world of an awful truth, or in the event that someone else needs to tell me an awful truth; a truth that would cost them their job, their standing in society, or even their life.
So I beg you all to think upon this before you claim that "Anonymous Cowards" should be forever done away with. Won't you take the responsibility too, to look into the claims of someone who must hide his identity? Or does that require too much effort?
You are conflating apples and oranges. Spam is not a freedom-of-speech issue, it is a theft-of-bandwidth issue. Hate speech and trolls, on the other hand, are fundamentally matters of opinion, best addressed either by rebuttal or ostracism.
The responsibilities that go with freedom of speech are 1a)Recognizing that others have the same right, 1b)Recognizing that other rights (such as property rights) may not be violated to facilitate your speech, and 2)Recognizing that you'll need to apply some skull sweat in evaluating what you read -- freedom to speak necessarily includes the freedom to speak nonsense.
We also get the results of handing that responsibility to other people - censorware, draconian laws to deal with the unrestricted, unrestrained irresponsible speech of others (the Australian 'net censorship laws spring to mind as an example), and a general perception that curbing freedom of speech may not be such a bad thing after all...
Blaming censorship on people who speak provocatively is like blaming rape on women who dress provocatively. Both "arguments" excuse the inexcusable by transferring blame to the victim -- the very antithesis of "responsibility".
/.
/. If the government wants us to respect the law, it should set a better example.