Masked Email Activist Can Stay Anonymous

Mitchell writes "The NewStandard is reporting that a Texas judge ruled in favor of an anonymous political activist who used a Yahoo! email account to notify the press and to potential voters about the wasteful spending practices of Texas politician Jimmy Cokinos. Cokinos lost relection, and tried to nail "recall_carl01" with a defamation lawsuit, but a judge threw out the bid since the emailed critiques weren't defamatory."

Comments

Not Quite Open Season On Celebs

[cmholm]

It's not true that it's open season on public personalities, just that said personalities have a much higher burden of proof than - say - me.

Depending on the jurisdiction, it often appears that the BS threshold is so high as to make defemation of public figures outright legal. The reason is that courts feel that the right to openly discuss those in power outweighs the powerfuls' right to slap folks talking stink about them. Movie, tv, and recording stars are for the most part collateral victims.

Re:The lawsuit was pointless anyway

[ari_j]

I know many people who have, and it's hardly indicative of stupidity. In your 40 years of life, free e-mail accounts have existed for about 1/4 of the time, so your 40 years of life have absolutely no relevance to this discussion. The only evidence that supports your claim arises solely out of your own ignorance.

I agree that it's almost a given that the person in question did not give his real name and address when he applied for that Yahoo account, but that does not mean that everyone who has ever applied for one lied in their application.