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Steffi Graf Wins Case Vs. Microsoft

Posted by timothy on from the refusal-to-promise-a-perfect-tomorrow dept.

scaramush writes: "The AP is reporting that Steffi Graf has won her lawsuit against Microsoft for hosting nude doctored photos of her. Although Microsoft had removed the images when they appeared in June, MS declined to sign a formal agreement that they would not appear again. This is the second loss for MS in this case. Scary precedent."

3 of 449 comments (clear)

  1. This is misleading... by Raetsel · · Score: 5, Informative

    This is a case in Germany, under German law, against the German division of Microsoft. From the article:
    • "...Steffi Graf won a court case against Microsoft Germany..." (my emphasis)
    Frightening though it may be, this isn't about any of the draconian US laws.
    --

    "...America's great minds of today, teaching America's great minds of tomorrow. Poor bastards." -- A Beautiful Min
  2. Re:"Scary Precedent"? Um, what? by Darby · · Score: 5, Informative
    "The photos... appeared last year on the site operated by Microsoft Germany where users could post pictures and texts to share with others".

    Microsoft was merely acting as ISP in this case.

    This has been said many times in this article, so I'm not picking on you specifically. I just picked this post to respond to.

    MS was *not* acting as an ISP in this situation. Do you see where you said "on the site operated by Microsoft". In this situation they were a hosting provider. The picture was posted on some MSN community or similar. No one said that whoever posted the picture used them to dial up to the internet.
    Further MS claims in their terms that they own all of the content on the site. So they are the host of the material and further they claim to own it as well. This makes them the publisher. In this case MS's draconian license scheme backfired and they *are* liable. If they had some disclaimer like at the top of this page:
    The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.

    then they would *not* have been liable. Since they provide the web space *and* they feel that this entitles them to ownership of anything anyone else makes and posts there, they got screwed in this case.

  3. read the court's explanation by __aawsxp7741 · · Score: 5, Informative

    This ruling does not actually apply to all forums. For instance, Slashdot would not be affected. The court's explanation (google translation) clearly states that the decision was based on the fact that Microsoft has "acquired" the posted information by closely integrating it into their site and, more importantly, by claiming rights to it.