Slashdot Mirror
Europe To Force Right of Reply On Internet Communication
David Buck writes "Today, the Council of Europe (an influential quasi-governmental body that drafts conventions and treaties) is to
finalize a proposal that would force all Internet news organizations, moderated mailing lists and even web logs (blogs) to allow a right of response to any person or organization they criticize. This would mean that you would be required to post the responses as well as authenticate their origin and make the responses available for some period of time. This will likely have a chilling effect on Internet communication (at least in Europe)."
At the time, Dalzell was serving on a three-judge panel that rejected the absurd Communications Decency Act as a violation of the First Amendment's guarantee of free expression.
Dalzell recognized that the U.S. government's true fear of the Internet was not indecency or obscenity, but hypothetical worries about how "too much speech occurs in that medium." Dalzell and eventually the Supreme Court realized that the best way to foster the soon-to-be spectacular growth of the Internet was to reduce government regulation--not to increase it.
document.write(' ');
Unfortunately, Europeans still haven't quite figured that out. The Council of Europe--an influential quasi-governmental body that drafts conventions and treaties--is meeting on Monday to finalize a proposal that veers in exactly the opposite direction. (It boasts 45 member states in Europe, with the United States, Canada, Japan and Mexico participating as non-voting members. Its budget is about $200 million a year, paid for by member governments.)
The all-but-final proposal draft says that Internet news organizations, individual Web sites, moderated mailing lists and even Web logs (or "blogs"), must offer a "right of reply" to those who have been criticized by a person or organization.
With clinical precision, the council's bureaucracy had decided exactly what would be required. Some excerpts from its proposal:
"The reply should be made publicly available in a prominent place for a period of time (that) is at least equal to the period of time during which the contested information was publicly available, but, in any case, no less than for 24 hours."
Hyperlinking to a reply is acceptable. "It may be considered sufficient to publish (the reply) or make available a link to it" from the spot of the original mention.
"So long as the contested information is available online, the reply should be attached to it, for example through a clearly visible link."
Long replies are fine. "There should be flexibility regarding the length of the reply, since there are (fewer) capacity limits for content than (there are) in off-line media."
While the Council of Europe is very influential and its proposals have a tendency to become law, that outcome is not guaranteed.
It's pretty zany to imagine that just about every form of online publishing, from full-time news organizations to occasional bloggers to moderated chat rooms, would be covered. But it's no accident. A January 2003 draft envisioned regulating only "professional on-line media." Two months later, a March 2003 draft dropped the word "professional" and intentionally covered all "online media" of any type.
Pall
According to the draft:
"Aware at the same time that it may not be necessary to extend the right of reply to non-professional on-line media whose influence on public opinion is limited; "
I don't think that many weblog scould be considered professional or influencing of public opinion.
Yes, it indeed is like that. If you feel that you have been misrepresented in e.g. a newspaper article
they have to print your counterstatement. Usually it is headed by a more or less boilerplate intro of: "The press laws require us to print this, this does not mean it is true, correct etc."
you just have to allow the entity you are talking about a chance to reply
This sounds a lot like the old "Fairness Doctrine" that was applied to US radio broadcasts prior to 1988. That rule said that if you broadcasted X hours of programming with a certain point of view, you also had to broadcast X hours of programming with an opposing point of view. The main problem with this was that in many situations, one of the sets of programs was a ratings loser and hence a major money loser, so the radio stations would not broadcast either. Some people have even argued that this practice stiffled peoples' expression of controversial opinions on the radio.
In case of fire, do not use elevator. Use water!
At least not in the US. Such "right of reply" laws were ruled categorically unconstitutionl in the US a long tome ago. _Miami Herald Pub. Co. v. Tornillo_, 418 U.S. 241 (1974). link
If I criticise SCO my Slashdot journal, and me being based in Europe, SCO demanded that I give them the right of reply, what does it entail?
When they respond you would have to do a new journal entry. It would start with a disclaimer along the lines of 'according to blabla I have to present the following. The views following express the opinions of SCO and are not mine.' Then you would print whatever they sent you. To actually force you to post their rebuttal they almost certainly need some kind of ruling by a judge. You can clearly mark what is from them and still write your opinions before and after.
Hank! White!
Basically, it states that you are always entitled to a response at no cost in the publication that has criticized you, to give the readers both sides of the story.
If some paper/magazine writes a critical article on your person or organization, this gives you the right to post your rebuttal to the same audience that read the initial article - which seems OK for me.
Okay... I'll do the stupid things first, then you shy people follow.
[Zappa]
Council of Europe is NOT a "quasi-governmental" entity. Indeed, it is an intergovernmental one and is the closest thing there is to a central, federal, European government. Calling it "quasi-governmental" is a gross inaccuracy. More info here
Mother is the best bet and don't let Satan draw you too fast.
Is this a requirement for newspapers in Europe?
;-)):
From the article (RTFA
"A 1974 Council of Europe resolution says "a newspaper, a periodical, a radio or television broadcast" must offer a right of reply. Most European countries have enacted that right, with a German law--compiled by the U.K. nonprofit group Presswiseâ"that offers a typical example: A publisher is "obliged to publish a counter-version or reply by the person or party affected."
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
Or let's say that you kindly RTFA and, in particular, this part: "It may be considered sufficient to publish (the reply) or make available a link to it" (emphasis mine).
You tell me how "whilst" differs from "while," and I'll stop calling you a pretentious jackass.
Publishers of periodical publications have to print/broadcast counterstatements in the issue following the receipt of the counterstatement, with the same prominence as the original article. The counterstatement is limited to factual information. The publisher does not have to publish (subjective) opinion. The publisher can comment on the counterstatement, but is likewise limited to factual information.
First up, I don't agree with this proposal at all, but it seems apparent that there are some exaggerations here.
First, this proposal seems to be aimed at protecting the individual from slander by business, not vice-versa.
Second, I don't see how this relates to blogs.. the draft specifically says "professional on-line media":
The right of reply, and in particular the principles of Resolution (74) 26, should apply not only to the press, radio and television, but also to professional on-line media.
and in the "definitions":
the term "professional on-line media" means any natural or legal person or other entity whose main professional activity is to engage in the collection, dissemination and/or editing of information to the public on a regular basis via the Internet
The Slashdot headline is misleading, this is far from set in stone. The Council of Europ has only influence, it has no legislative authoriity. There already is Right-of-Reply for most print publicaitons in Europe, but some countries, such as Great Britian, have not enacted those laws.
This is just a suggestion of an influential body. The proposal may be accepted in part or in whole by all, some or none of the European member countries.
Personally, I hope it dies a painful death, and maybe the Europeans can eliminate right of reply all around. Print and the internet aren't TV-- there's no scarcity involved. This just sounds like a bureacratic (sp!) nightmare, a feel-good proposal that has the government meddle where there is no need.
Thank goodness for the 1st amendment, which keeps silly laws like this (we have other kinds of silly laws) out of the USA.
Bollocks. Every european newspaper has standard terms of reply which already specify the requirements for authentication. There is no problem to require the replying side to offer a valid identity document (or a true copy of) and pay for all postage and handling (and in some countries an identity check). So once again. Bollocks.
Baker's Law: Misery no longer loves company. Nowadays it insists on it
http://www.sigsegv.cx/
Yes, the BBC, one of the least biased, most respected, independant(short of Sir Humphry Appleby's schemes) news sources on the planet.
The fact that it doesn't rely on Comercial funding is not the same as being a Government Broadcaster. Every person in the UK pays some money(except of course the Young Ones who spend their time hiding from the BBC despite being on it) to get a TV license, all this money goes to the BBC, other funds are aquired by merchandise from TV shows and publishing efforts as well as selling Content to other networks around the world.
The ABC in Australia is the same and its also respected to a high degree in South East Asia for being unbiased and informative, something your post will hopefully never achieve.
The idea that they are under the control of the British government is almost as insane as saying the United States media refuse to attack George Bush...wait a second.
Have there been any precedents around this sort of thing? And what country combination were those precedents?
Australia (Victoria) + US.
An Australian was defamed (according to Aussie laws) by an American corporation. The American laws didn't agree. So he went to a Victorian court and won the right to be able to sue, even though it was an American company and the servers were in America.
This is an article about it, but there was another one this year. Or at least, 2001 seems much too long ago to have been it.
Look out!
You'll find the latest draft here:
Note what the trollish C/Net editor skips in its article:
Reaffirming that the minimum rules in the appendix to Resolution (74) 26 do not go beyond granting a right of reply with respect of factual statements claimed to be inaccurate and that, as a consequence, the on-line dissemination of opinions and ideas falls outside the scope of this Recommendation;
"Reaffirming" refers to the Resolution (74) 26 where it is well specified that only false statements are affected by this "right to reply".
So the rest of the article is just C/Net trolling.
There are already limits to your freedom of speech. If you libel/slander someone, you will have to do something that you don't want to do, without compensation. That may be going to court or, with this law, placing a counterstatement (or a link to it) on your page.
Why should you, or I, or anyone else have the "right" to post slanderous or just plain false comments about companies/people without their ability to respond?
You don't have that right - and if you do libel another party, they don't just have the "right to reply." They have the right to sue the pants off your arse.
!#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
Depends. The right of reply is limited to periodically updated journalistic and editorial publications. See here and here.
EU is build on the foundation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (the national states in the EU have to make sure that their national laws don't conflict with the Human Rights, and EU citizens can take their case to the European Court of Human Rights if they feel that their Human Right is violated by an European country (for instance, free speech). This document is of course also the foundation of the UN and has its philosophical basis in the philosophers of the enlightenment (the most important of them being French philosophers) which lead to the French revolution and the American Constitution. Paragraph 19 of the Human Rights Charter states:
So, it is very wrong to state that EU lacks a "First Amendment".
The other claims are equally absurd.
--- guns don't kill people, people with guns kill people ---
The power to publish your thoughts is still there. You can post whatever you want. But like all good debates, the other side gets a voice too...
Why not allow them to counter? If you have a good argument in the fist place there isn't much to be scared of.
And the policy allows for a reply to be hyperlinked to, so you don't have to host their reply, just link to it (so bandwidth TOS isn't an issue).
Imagine it the other way -- when a powerful entity criticises you... they would be forced to let you reply too.
--- If I had a funny sig too, you might be laughing now.
the day the uk joins the eu is the day (hand on heart) i live my country
Well then, off you go! Shoo, shoo! You already joined it years ago when you signed the Maastricht Treaty!
Yes, recent polls have shown that Britons are the EU citizens most unaware of the union...
Ethics is what you say you do. Morals is what you actually do.
You are correct.
FAIRNESS DOCTRINE - U.S. Broadcasting Policy
Begging for modpoints since '03
"Why should you, or I, or anyone else have the "right" to post slanderous or just plain false comments about companies/people without their ability to respond?"
But they already do have the right to respond on their own web page!
If its libelous then you can be sued.
But if you say "I think Corporation X SUCKS!", then that's protected speech. Corporation X just has to "suck" it up and go on with life. They aren't "owed" a rebuttal.
Admit it... deep down, you don't like free speech because its, well, its just not fair!
The current law for offline media also mandates that the size of such a rebuttal should be 'reasonable' (ie: no free full-page ads) with regards to the media in which it is published.
Okay... I'll do the stupid things first, then you shy people follow.
[Zappa]
His documentry wasn't squashed. Stupid White Men almost was. It was supposed to have been on sale a few days after 9/11 but instead the publisher wouldn't ship the books until Moore made changes so as to look less Anti-Bush. Three months later his publisher was threatening to pulp the 50,000 copies already printed until a librarian started a grass roots campaign to get it published. Which goes to show, its not the right to free speach which is important, it is the right to have your free speach heard. If your press is so free, why did Michael more have to come to a British TV company (Channel 4) to get his TV series made? Why in his list of websites for "Real News" is it that the only two old news media sources he mentions are both British? (The Guardian and the BBC) One of which is a state run TV station! It seems that despite our lack of de jour freedom we might have more de facto freedom that Americans do. No really! Tell me one thing (other than own a machine gun) that an american can do that I cannot and I will tell you one thing I can do which an american cannot. can you say DeCSS? can you say DMCA, PATRIOT act, TIA? Freedom is the ability to choose, but choice is an illusion by those with power against those without, and no one in europe are as all powerful as your rulers^H^H^H^H^H^H leaders.
You can't win Darth. If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine
Besides, a corporation doesn't have the same rights to speach as an individual
No, not in Europe. In the US, though, corporations have standing in court. They are recognised as a person. Since roughly the 1890s. As such, they have the same right to free speech as the wannabe communist down the road. Difference is, the corporation has money.