Slashdot Mirror
GoDaddy Caves To Irish Legal Threat
crush writes, "An Irish website RateYourSolicitor.com, which aims to let clients find and rate solicitors (a British Isles flavor of lawyer), has received an Irish High Court injunction to remove defamatory material about one such rated solicitor. The site is hosted by a US provider, gmax.net, which has reportedly been served notice by lawyers acting for the defamed solicitor. According to the article, GoDaddy, as the domain name registrar, has locked access to the site (registration or bugmenot required). (Amusingly, the records are all for a 'John Smith' in the Russian Federation at 'lawyercatcher@lawyer.com'!) An interesting twist to all of this is that according to the Communications Decency Act, an ISP, as a publisher, cannot be held responsible or legally liable for what their clients do. So how can GoDaddy justify this censorship? Or are registrars the weak link in a system that seems like it ought to be robust against censorship?"
>why should the legal sector be held to a higher standard?
= 17&did=442).
A car mechanic who does a bad job can waste money and cause inconvenience. Lawers abusing the system can shut down entire industries, for example light aircraft manufacturing.
An electrician who does a bad job can make someone's house burn down. A lawyer who does a bad job can let a client go to Death Row (http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?scid
A floor tile installer who does a bad job can shake someone's faith in floor tile installers. A lawyer who does a bad job can shake the trust in the court system that holds society together.