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Right to Post Anonymously Protected
JudTaylor writes " ZDNet has an article decribing a decision by a Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge allowing Yahoo to protect the privacy of posters to message boards.
Lee Tien, an white hat attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, stated "This is a great victory for anonymous speech. I believe Judge Cabrinha's ruling will signal to other companies that judges will not permit corporate executives to abuse the courts in ferreting out their critics." Critics of Pre-Paid Legal Services had posted messages disparaging the company on Yahoo boards. Representatives of the company had no immediate comment." I'm glad to see a decision for freedome can still happen in this country.
Can I now post goatse.cx links and not get yelled at?
I'm glad to see a decision for freedome can still happen in this country.
Amen to that, brother! For far too long we noble citizens have been paying way to much for our domes. It's high time we made them free! Dome lovers of the world, Unite(d Center)!
Have fun: Join D.N.A. (National Dyslexics Association)
m00.
As a respectable communist child-molesting telemarketer, I take GREAT offense at being called a scientologist! My law firm, Cheatem, Screwem and Lye, will be contacting you shortly.
I bid you good day.
Just don't do it in the UK where they can throw you in jail for forgetting the decode key!
The courts have also ruled dictionaries and spell-checkers are completely legal, Taco. :)
Last night I shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got in my pajamas I'll never know.
"Note: This is not a message board."
...I propose that all subsequent replies on this article should be made as "Anonymous Coward".
"a decision by a Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge allowing Yahoo to protect the privacy of posters to message boards."
I live to post another day!
-AC
A trial court's ruling has negligible precedential value (at least in the state court system-federal is different). It does not get published. It doesn't bind anyone. Trial court judges in the state courts here in a busy county like Santa Clara frequently have a dozen or more rulings such as this one to make a week. In addition, they might have 30 or more other less significant motions to rule on. So they don't have time to pay as much attention to the legal issues as an appellate court judge does. As a result, reversal on appeal is a definite possibility. Furthermore, this ruling is going to be very fact specific, as it most likely relies on what was posted and the company's motivation for going after the poster. That is, if someone posts something like "Company X sucks. Their products are horrible," Company X has a hard time arguing that its lawsuit is anything other than a screen to subpoena the identity of the poster. But if the post is "Company X CEO John Doe has been convicted of bestiality," the court is much more likely to let John Doe subpoena the identity of the poster.
It violates the "Information Wants To Be Free" concept. As does the decision of the court. After all, if you support "Information wants to be free!" then you have to oppose anonymity. If the poster is anonymous, then the information about his identity is being withheld, and is not free.
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