Slashdot Mirror
MySpace Not Guilty in Child Assault Case
An anonymous reader writes "The Washington Post reports that a Texas judge dismissed a $30 million case against MySpace for their role in a child assault case. 19-year old Peter Solis lied about his age on MySpace to gain the confidence of a 13-year old girl. The judge ruled, 'To impose a duty under these circumstances for MySpace to confirm or determine the age of each applicant, with liability resulting from negligence in performing or not performing duty, would of course stop MySpace's business in its tracks and close this avenue of communication.'" What do you think? Good call?
Good for MySpace, I'm just surprised he didn't get the death penalty!
So, now that we have seen "common sense" used in a court case, can we use this as precedent for all future rulings?
There is no mod option "-1: Disagree" for a reason. "Overrated" is not an acceptable substitute. Post something instead.
What do you think? Good call?
Is the phone company responsible for verifying the age of people talking so a 19 year old can't lie to a 13 year old and then commit a crime? How about newspaper personal ads, are the newspaper's responsible? What ISPs who provide e-mail accounts? You know those companies that create voice boxes for people with throat cancer? Are they responsible for verifying the age of the person using them so they cannot be misused for this same purpose?
Blaming the medium or the tools is just plain stupid. This was, of course, a correct decision
This is like suing blockbuster because my membership card says "Gulliver" (which isn't my name - but they didn't check!), and somebody were to accept my (written in ink) blockbuster card as some form of ID. Say the bank were to loan a hundered thousand dollars to "Gulliver McMadeUpName", and then sue Blockbuster when I defaulted.
This was a ridiculous and frivolous suit. MySpace has no obligation to verify the truth of any information any random person posts. They aren't bondsmen.
The ramifications if this were taken seriously would be huge. Every web forum, including slashdot, would have to perform thorough background checks with 3 forms of government ID, before accepting members.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
Although the judge's conclusion was correct, the reasoning he applied was flawed: it's not that MySpace shouldn't be liable because its business model depends on it, it's that MySpace shouldn't be liable because it's the parents' responsibility to care for their kids, and MySpace isn't anybody's parent.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
I really want to know more about the psychology of this and how it comes about. I mean... who wants to be with a 13 yo anyway? Though, 19 meh... I have known 19 year olds who have dated 13 year olds, its usually a case of an overly marture 13 year old and an immature 19 year old. Hell, one of my best friends today was 19 and dated my sister when she was 14 and going on 15.
:)
I can attest that at 19, he wasn't quite at her level then. At 28, he still isn't now, but thats another story
But I digress... and far. This is an issue of assault more than age. Who cares how old he was? What he did was wrong at any age where the person can tell right from wrong. I really don't see how age verification will help. 13 year olds arn't that hard to talk into doing things that their authority figures don't approve of, hell he might have had an easier time with his real age... 13 year olds think 19 year olds are cool and mature.
The reason I say I want to know more about it, was I saw those dateline shows where they caught and outed a bunch of guys who did this stuff and interviewed them. It was sobering. Sobering that it was happening, and sobering to see these guys interviewd.
They seemed.... mostly normal. The only thing really different about them seemed to be that they seemed rather socially undeveloped. I really got the feeling they were going after young easily influenced girls because, they seemed to lack the social skills to get a girl their own age. As a slashdot geek, I am pretty familiar with some of the behavious.
I guess what bugs me, is I saw myself at different points in my life in their stories and thought, that with a slightly different values, and influences in my life, could I have been one of these guys showing up at a 13 year olds house with a six pack of cheap malt beverages?
While its easy to deamonize people who try to do, or do bad things, and we have to deal with this from a criminal justice standpoint when it happens. However, shouldn't we be looking at our society and how we can help to not create people who are in the situation where a 13 year old starts to look like a viable option?
It seems to me like these guys needed something. It wasn't a 13 year old girl they really needed, but it wasn't anything that time in jail was going to fix either. Most of them had even seen the show in the past, so the threat of incarceration certainly wasn't stopping them.
I think it behooves us to understand these issues at a deeper level, and try to solve them from their source rather than their symptoms.
-Steve
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
Myspace is not liable for this any more than the phone company is liable for the prank and threatening phone calls. I don't know about the rest of the /. community, but I am dead tired of the continuous attempts to impose liability on the carrier for the content. This goes to the very core of undermining the openness and freedom of the internet, as a neutral medium for communication and sharing of information. Verdict for the plaintiff would have been a horrible precedent.
This is a sick thing that happened and I think the guy should be jailed for life or worse but, what were the parents doing?!? I have to teenagers and while I won't delude myself in thinking I know everything that goes on in their lives, I have a fair idea about most of it (I hope).
I am in my son's WOW guild so I know them, I play Halo on occasion (it sucks getting my ass kicked so much) with him and his other friends. They are welcome in my house as long as they follow the rules.
I know my daughter likes manga, anime, country music, who her friends are, know their names and individual interests etc. etc.etc. Quality time is total b#$$s%^&, you have to spend time with them and know what is going on in their lives.
Wonder if her parents ever looked at her MySpace to see what she thinks, likes or is worried about...
MySpace it not at fault here, something is/was going on in that girl's life that put her in a position to want to go off and meet someone without telling her parents or at least without escort. The ball was not in MySpace's court.
I'm glad a judge had common sense on MySpace's behalf. People want to shift blame to the medium used for the meeting, not the people in the real world who are at fault. The only people to blame in this case are the parents and the guy who committed the crime. It was the parent's job to know what their child was doing and to prevent her from meeting people like this. The world is full of bad people, but it's the parent's jobs to protect their children. Of course, this in no way removes responsibility for the crime from the guy. All I'm saying is that HE is responsible for committing the crime and the parents are responsible for not preventing their child from falling victim to him.
Actually, the guy didn't lie about his age - the *GIRL* did. She was 13, but claimed on MySpace - and presumably, in person - that she was 18. Kinda puts his actions in a different light, doesn't it?
-Hentai [in vita non pacem est]
It's odd to say it, but I don't think this ruling is "right". Particularly not the precedent that it sets. The judge expressed concern for MySpace's business future and for the other users of the service. Seriously, this is not "common sense", this is "big business rules".
I *do* think that the outcome is correct - but the wrong reasons were given. The correct reason would have been more directly related to the notion of personal responsibility. Not this "MySpace can't be responsible, because, oh gosh, they'd lose money if they were" crap.
Common sense my arse. The outcome matches common sense, but not the rationale. I just hope it's not used as a precedent.
A parent doesn't have to monitor a child's every move to protect them. All they have to do is be honest and open with them and give them the information they need to protect themselves.
I can't speak for any other kids, but I stopped listening to MY parents because they were hypocritical, and otherwise generally full of shit. My dad would tell me not to smoke, but he would smoke in the car when he was taking me places and not stop when I asked him to, and as a child I was actually allergic to cigarette smoke. My mom would make up answers to questions to which she did not know the answer, maybe she thought it was fun or her insecurity would not allow her to not know the answer. Regardless, I rapidly stopped giving a shit about my parents' opinions and formed my own decisions. I am lucky enough to have been a pretty bright kid and to have been very into reading, and to have read a lot of books with very positive messages, and this served me a whole lot better than it could have.
If a parent treats a child with respect, the child will respond with respect. Unfortunately, most parents (including mine) didn't really get that. They were only concerned with me respecting them. They didn't really put effort into going the other direction until I was already an adult. But then, I moved out of the house when I was fifteen and moved in with my (considerably older) girlfriend. So they kind of had to wake up and accept that I was not their little boy any more, and in fact had not been for many years.
That's funny, because your comment very much makes it seem like you ARE endorsing these things, because you see the denial of these things as denying parents tools that would help them do their job, and you began the sentence with "Yet" as if you were denying that standpoint.
Incidentally, tracking devices exist now and if you can get your kid to wear it and not pass it off to another kid, that's cool, but they will eventually figure out a way to get the thing off. It's a big ugly watch-thing that locks onto their wrist. Better hope it doesn't get caught in anything.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
if you dont have their number already?
Man, if only someone put together a list of phone numbers and published them... let's say in a big thick book. Then they could sell ad space and make millions!
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
I find it sick that parents will try to cash in on their own failure as parents and the misfortune of their child. Why seek 30 million? Why not seek criminal charges if they truly feel the operators of myspace were resp for what happened to their child? 30 million is a money grab. Seeking criminal chrages is seeking justice. Two very different things.
I agree absolutely. It's all about the culture. It has nothing to do with race, EXCEPT that people who see themselves as a certain race decide or are pressured to decide that they should be in a certain culture because of their race. Actually, I hesitate to even use the term race, because genetic studies are showing that every modern "race" is actually a composite of the earliest groups. Modern "races" have varying degrees of relation to each other, so for example a 'black person' who has ancestors who re-immigrated to Africa from the middle east might actually be ethnically closer to a 'white person' from Lebanon than to another 'black person'. Also that Lebanese 'white person' might have very little in common with a Swedish 'white person'. So as many people have known for a while, race is mostly an artificial social construct.
The very important super extra critical idea everyone needs to get somehow, is that you are free to join any culture you want.. Want to be an up-tight protestant disciplinarian but your skin is really dark? That's ok! Want to be cyberpunk?.. well that demographic is already open to anybody, though some ghetto people might not realize it because they are functionally illiterate. Etc..
Then, we can go one step further and criticize cultures for their failings, perhaps even combine the best aspects of different cultures. How about combining the work ethic, systematic approach of anglo-american culture with the care for your wife and family from mexican culture.. lose the isolation and lack of solidarity from anglo culture, lose machoism and the pressure for total conformity from mexican culture, compromise and just have 2 kids.. what do you get? A better outcome for all. I'd bet on it.
Multiculturalism is a dead-end street because it commits you to absurd ideas, for example you'd have to say that the ghetto gang culture of macho violence is as hunky-dory as anything else, because it's right for them, within their own culture, and follows the rules which the majority of their subgroup has effectively agreed to. Hey if you think that right and wrong are totally relative, and you think it's just fine and dandy if someone gets shot, or lives in fear of getting shot, then this view makes sense. To me, it's pretty nutty.
It also had an inherent contradiction. Everyone's culture is equally as good, so everyone is as likely to be successful. But, at the same time, multiculti advocates want to say that everyone's culture's way of life is just as healthy as anyone else's. So a culture that does not think it is important to read to or otherwise educate your kids (especially girls) is somehow as likely to produce a successful citizen and also can't be criticized for not reading to their kids? Am I missing something here? Or is the key that multiculti argues ultimately that a sub-literate person who lives on nothing but second-hand folk knowledge and knows little about anything outside their subgroup is just as good as anybody else? So in other words, an anti-social gangsta from the ghetto who looks after his peeps and is fairly likely to bust a cap in your ass for complaining about his nightclub-class radio playing 12 hours a day is someone you're just as happy living with as someone who has been training from day 1 to be quiet, thoughtful, and kind? Does that make any kind of sense?
No..... and it's the culture at fault. It's time to take culture off the holy dais where it sits, untouchable. Let's get religion down while we're at it and kick both balls around. We're not going good places otherwise.
-p