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First Amendment Ruling Protects Internet Trolls
I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "A recent ruling by the Court of Appeal of the State of California (PDF) in Krinsky v. Doe H030767 overturned a lower court ruling and decided that the First Amendment right to anonymous speech protects internet trolls, too. Specifically, the ruling said that 'this juvenile name-calling cannot reasonably be read as stating actual facts.' And, even though some of the statements were crudely sexual and accused Ms. Krinsky of being among 'boobs, liars and crooks,' the statements were held to 'fall into the category of crude, satirical hyperbole which, while reflecting the immaturity of the speaker, constitute protected opinion under the First Amendment.'"
We now have a Slashdot article on trolling? Holy crap, this is gonna be bad, really bad. Does this mean all trolls are now on-topic?
512 MB RAM, 20 GB disk, 200 GB transfer, five datacenters. $19.95/month.
I was going to FP but i was afraid of getting moderated "Troll"
Who run Barter Town?
That is one of the down sides of democracy. The signal to noise ration is sometimes bad.
But what you consider BS one time might be the truth the next. It is up to you.
I for one welcome all things troll friendly. The only thing keeping me from rejoicing completely is that this may interfere with internet censorship... Can we protect trolling, but still censor profanity and anything that may offend religious groups? Then I'll be happy and America will be safer. Those who oppose trolls but allow offensive religious speech hate America's freedom.
He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
Let's welcome our new Beowulf Cluster of legal troll-overlords...
... the wave! The wave is coming, I can see it... heck, the earth is shaking!
I'm an infovore...
Don't Feed The Trolls
It only empowers them to wield attack lawyers.
512 MB RAM, 20 GB disk, 200 GB transfer, five datacenters. $19.95/month.
In Soviet Russia, YOU rule over trolls.
Slashdot's gone cold I'm wondering why I got out of bed at all / The morning rain clouds up my window and I can't see at all / And even if I could it'll all be gray but your picture on my wall / It reminds me, that it's not so bad -- it's not so bad
Dear Rob, I wrote but you still ain't callin / I left my email, my ICQ, and my yahoo chat at the bottom / I sent two emails back in autumn, you must not-a got 'em / There probably was a problem with your sendmail or somethin / Sometimes I scribble email addees too sloppy when I jot 'em / but anyways; fsck it, what's been up? Man how's your boxes? / My boxes is linux too, I'm bout to be a compiler / once I learn gcc, / I'ma go on and compile for hours / I read about your Palm Pilot too I'm sorry / I had a friend lose his Palm over at the airport in Maradonna / I know you probably hear this everyday, but I'm your biggest fan / I even read all your bullshit Linux news and Microsoft's man / I got a room full of your posters and your pictures man / I like the way you sold your ass out too, that shit was fat / Anyways, I hope you get this man, hit me back, / just to chat, truly yours, your biggest fan / This is Stan
Dear Rob, you still ain't called or wrote, I hope you have a chance / I ain't mad - I just think it's FSCKED UP you don't answer fans / If you didn't wanna talk to me outside your Linux World / you didn't have to, but you coulda signed an autograph for Matthew / That's my Senior sys admin he's only 26 years old / We waited on a 9600 baud for you, / four hours and you just said, "No." / That's pretty shitty man - you're like his fsckin idol / He wants to be just like you man, he likes you more than I do / I ain't that mad though, I just don't like bein lied to / Remember when we met in Boston - you said if I'd write you / you would write back - see I'm just like you in a way / I never had a clue about shit either / I gcc'd shit with my wife then beat her / I can relate to what you're saying in your page / so when I feel like rmusering I read Slashdot to begin the rage / cause I don't really got shit else so that shit helps when I'm depressed / I even got a tattoo of slashdot across the chest / Sometimes I even packet myself to see how much it floods / It's like adrenaline, the DDoS is such a sudden rush of blood / See everything you say is real, and I respect you cause you tell it / My girlfriend's jealous cause I talk about you 24/7 / But she don't know you like I know you Rob, no one does / She don't know what it was like for people like us growin up / You gotta call me man, I'll be the biggest fan you'll ever lose / Sincerely yours, Stan -- P.S. / We should be together too
Dear Mister-I'm-Too-Good-To-Waste-A-Packet-On-My-Fans, / this'll be the last packet I ever send your ass / It's been six months and still no word - I don't deserve it? / I know you got my last two emails / I wrote the @ signs on 'em perfect / So this is my payload I'm sending you, I hope you hear it / I'm on my modem now, I'm doing 9600 baud so fear it / Hey Rob, I drank a fifth of vodka, you dare me to code? / You know the song by Deep Purple or Slayer / its irrelevant by playing on my linux player / while I write some php scripts and play some Dragonslayer / That's kinda how shit is, you coulda rescued me from drowning / Now it's too late - I'm on a 1000 downloads now, I'm drowsy / and all I wanted was a lousy letter or a call / I hope you know I ripped +ALL+ of your pictures off the wall / I love you Rob, we coulda been together, think about it / You ruined it now, I hope you can't sleep and you dream about it / And when you dream I hope you can't sleep and you SCREAM about it / I hope your conscience EATS AT YOU and you can't BREATHE without me / See Rob {*screaming*} Shut up bitch! I'm tryin to code / Hey Rob, that's my senior admin screamin from the comode / but I didn't cut the power off, I just rebooted, see I ain't like you / cause if rm -rf'd we'd suffer more, and then the boxes die too / Well, gotta go, I'm almost BGP bridged now / Oh shit, I f
So, moderating a comment (-1, Troll) is unconstitutional? Cool!
"[...] the statements [...] , while reflecting the immaturity of the speaker, constitute protected opinion under the First Amendment."
That is a very nice way of protecting free speech, while still making very plain that that kid should work on his argumentative skills.
I've always felt that one should be able to say or write anything that suits their fancy. Short of something that could put someone in immediate harm (i.e. shouting, "Fire!" in a crowded place).
It's like when people put parts of Scientology's texts in public forums. To a true believer, those words are putting them in actual danger or at the very least greatly offending them. But no one cares about that, their a bunch of not jobs.
But in my own experiance, trying to get a t-shirt made that simply says F*** Jesus, has been very hard. And I can't wait to get one made to wear to Wal-Mart... Granted that will probably put me in physical danger, but that's part of the fun of it all.
The point is, the world is a dirty grubby place. And if you can't use your intellect to help you see beyond it all. That's you're problem, people talk shit. Always have always will. IMHO.
I'm sick of following my dreams. I'm just going to ask where they're goin' and hook up with 'em later.
I really don't understand how they wouldn't be under free speech. Defamatory remarks are only ones made that where stated as fact, as so people will believe them when they're not true. That has been decided it doesn't fall under freedom of speech because of its deceiving nature. Whereas trolls aren't trying to deceive anyone, they're just ranting. What it comes down to for me is that the right to freedom of speech is useless unless you piss someone off, the reason its in the constitution is so you can use it to piss people off. If no one ever pissed anyone off with speech then there would be no need for the first amendment.
-----
Oh and go ahead and troll this comment, just for kicks.
If i had one dollar for every brain you dont have, i would have $1.
Oh come on, why are there 18 comments and no one's done this yet? Do I have to do everything myself? Let's get it out of the way:
_____________________________
That idiotic dumb-ass judge wouldn't know a good judicial decision if it bit him in his lame-ass ass. Where did he go to judge-school anyway, The Universduhity of Dumbasia?
I see it came from California. Everyone knows everybody in California is a stupid liberal anyway with their stupid activist liberal judges who just do whatever their retarded Governator tells them to do. Retards. Someone should shoot them all, wouldn't that be ironic? Here they all go crying "free speech, free speech," and then they get shot? Well, if you don't see the irony, then you're even dumber than that retarted freakin judge.
_____________________________
OK, now mod it + funny, - troll and we can be done with it.
Can anyone tell me how to set my sig on Slashdot?
I, for one, would not mind being "among boobs".
:)
And i guess that goes for most of us here.
NOT FR1ST protected by law PS0T
Give me a break, this judge is an idiot. Freedom of speech is fine when you have something important to say, but in this case this guy's intent was clearly just to insult that poor woman. Why should posting that garbage be constitutionally protected!!! If people were locked up for such antisocial behavior early on, we would have a much more polite society and less crime as well.
Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
Dear Hon.(?) Socrates P. Manoukian,
It is well known that you are a mega scum bag, nothing more than a snivelling cockroach. Your court room is run by a bunch of boobs, losers and crooks. I will reciprocate fellatio with your wife even though she has fat thighs, a fake medical degree, queefs and has poor feminine hygiene. Please note that my comments are quote, "in context, mere opinion and therefore protected by the First Amendment".
Further quotes from the pdf that protect me:
calling him/her a cockroach obviously cannot be interpreted as a statement of actual fact. No reasonable reader would have taken this post seriously; it obviously was intended as a means of ridiculing...Sincerely yours,
Double Doe 7
bla, yah, abortion, yadda, mohammed cartoon, yack yack, George Bush, bla bla...
Seven Days with Ubuntu Unity
This is good news in an age where free speech is under attack from so many quarters. Let's all remember this famous quote:
... [and] sentenced to serve 10 years in prison . . . ."
... and the victims of the Montana sedition law.
"I may mod down what you have to say, but I shall defend to the death your right to say it."
-- Voltaire
This has not always been the land of the free. Remember Eugene V. Debs:
"June 16, 1918 -- Debs made his famous anti-war speech in Canton, Ohio, protesting World War I which was raging in Europe. For this speech he was arrested and convicted in federal court in Cleveland, Ohio under the war-time espionage law
(from here)
$META_SIG_JOKE
It's allowed to indulge online in sarcasm, irony and foulmouthed namecalling, even if this is done anonymously.
If they're using comcast, then they don't have the first amendment. Again sorry to repost/whore.
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=446180&cid=22344224
import system.cool.Sig;
the statements were held to 'fall into the category of crude, satirical hyperbole which, while reflecting the immaturity of the speaker, constitute protected opinion under the First Amendment.'"
Translation for those who don't read legalese: "You guys suck at the intertubes, he's a troll get over it"
Burn Hollywood Burn
Someone had to go to court to prove that people can be rude to each other people on the internet?
What...the...fuck...
At what point did 'land of the free' cease to be true? Did I miss a memo?
I told you you were wrong and dumb and a poopie head and I was right and you were wrong.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Okay, there are basically two kinds of companies that follow suits like this: Young companies with inexperienced leadership and companies have a valid tarnished image who want their day in court to clear their name or to just scare critics into silence. Experienced leadership understands that maintaining a good image means fixing problems, not hide them. Also, you don't go out of your way to highlight critics. These guys are making the news circles, which is leading people to read about the company history, further tarnishing their image. Not exactly the kind of thing an experienced leader does.
I'm pretty sure those who do seek to actively silence public critics are those who have something to hide, not am image to maintain. If you run the company right, people will rightfully ignore the trolls.
Burn Hollywood Burn
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Are first posts protected speech? What if I call all of you boobs, idiots, and liars?
is that you're going to be exposed to things that annoy you or that you disagree with. Some things might even offend you. Deal with it, it is a part of real life.
"To those who are overly cautious, everything is impossible. "
While I'd love for some of the "neteratti" out there (please comment below) to tell me how internet- (or more specifically, forum- or comment-) trolling is any different from those people who used to leave messages at my house, when I was in HS, inviting me to "book burning parties" (I was the only Jewish kid in my HS), I'll settle instead for not only being irritating with my run-on sentences and eerily perfect grammar but also with the fact that neither I nor your mom cares much atm. BTW I knew who they were because they routinely made my life difficult even though it was not possible to to tell exactly who they were by just listening to the recordings. (Phone records would probably have identified them though). Did their supposed anonymity give them constitutional rights to be fucktards, or more importantly, to cause my family grief and humiliation?
I think not. Nowadays, you come on my forums and threaten vile things against me and I'm not going to "shrug it off". No I'm going to see to it that you get a nice, friendly visit from the local PD (or maybe a friendly local goon) for harassment (yes I know where you live, troglodyte). Thick skin notwithstanding, how am I supposed to know that some lunatic won't actually track down my address and cause harm to my families, just because they can? Yes, an extreme example to be sure, but still. I bet if I try hard enough I can track down anyone who posts a reply to this, and all I gotta say is that you're lucky I'm not a sociopath*.
This is an incredibly murky subject area. Who's to say what's right and what's wrong on the internet besides some fuckwit judge who can't even operate her pc's on/off discriminator, much less have a clue to what actually goes on in these tubes? Are our Wild West days of saying whatever the fuck we want coming to a close, or will these days ever end? Is disparaging a person separate and distinct from disparaging a product? A corporation? The calls stopped, btw, right around the time I grew a pair (hey, I'm a late bloomer).
Well, for what it's worth, I am not anonymous and if I wouldn't say something to a person's face, I won't say it online. (Unless it's in jest, of course.) So fuck you. JK. Maybe.
brb, gotta burn some books. Yearbooks, that is...
*or am i...
There is simply too much glass..
In Soviet Russia, government trolls YOU!
In South Korea all trolls are robots!
Get your Unix fortune now!
There are extremely strong pressures for anonymous posting to be removed from all national newspaper and discussion sites, pretty much every site "run by a company", which is all of them. The social pressure on companies to conform to this could be compared with the Chinese social pressure on companies not to allow 'socially objectionable material' to filter into the public consciousness.
Additionally, every Norway-based social networking site requires a mobile phone for registration, and mobile phones are required by law to be registered to a valid address with SSN-equivalent. You can't buy one without ID.
One person's obnoxious poster is another's modern day Mark Twain. It's time people realised that calling someone a "troll" is just a stereotyping, dismissive way of dealing with things you can't be bothered to discuss. It would be much more mature to simply ignore them.
Newspapers have printed worse.
Respect my first Amendment - Bitch!
If you read the summary and the verdict, it actually appears that the main question was whether the statements could reasonably be read as facts, because defamation rules only protect against false factual claims. The judge found that no reasonable person was likely to read them as statements of facts, but rather as 'crude, satirical hyperbole'.
The very strong implication that is likely to have consequences is that the deciding question about any claims is whether they are "likely to be read as facts", which again is going to depend on the professionalism they are delivered with. Whereas posting the commment "Ms. Krinsky likes to suck goats" in a Youtube comment is unlikely to be defamatory, creating a professional-looking blog and writing a post entitled "My disturbing meeting with Ms. Krinsky where she hinted at zoophilia" on the other hand is likely to be.
I completely agree that this is the only sensible and real-life-compatible way for things to be done to be honest, but it is interesting that the court has now spelt it out explicitly. Look forward to the 'convincingness' of internet posts to become an issue in defemation cases in the future. Of course, even if something is not defamatory it could still be harassment or criminal in other ways.
Whenever I get a package of plain M&Ms, I make it my duty to continue the strength and robustness of the candy as a species. Taking two candies between my thumb and forefinger, I apply pressure, squeezing them together until one of them cracks and splinters. That is the "loser," and I eat the inferior one immediately. The winner gets to go another round.
I have found that, in general, the brown and red M&Ms are tougher, and the newer blue ones are genetically inferior. I have hypothesized that the blue M&Ms as a race cannot survive long in the intense theatre of competition that is the modern candy and snack-food world.
Occasionally I will get a mutation, a candy that is misshapen, or pointier, or flatter than the rest. Almost invariably this proves to be a weakness, but on very rare occasions it gives the candy extra strength. In this way, the species continues to adapt to its environment.
When I reach the end of the pack, I am left with one M&M, the strongest of the herd. Since it would make no sense to eat this one as well, I pack it neatly in an envelope and send it to M&M Mars, A Division of Mars, Inc., Hackettstown, NJ 17840-1503 U.S.A., along with a 3x5 card reading, "Please use this M&M for breeding purposes."
This week they wrote back to thank me, and sent me a coupon for a free 1/2 pound bag of plain M&Ms. I consider this "grant money." I have set aside the weekend for a grand tournament. From a field of hundreds, we will discover the True Champion.
There can be only one.
Macs are better than PCs. Window$ sux!!!! Vote Ron Paul! Know the truth about 911. Jesus saves.
--
LaskoVortex (n) the vortex where you squander your mod points.
Just callin' it like I see it.
ul need 2 copy 2 monospace format
Word List: gay nigger association
of america trolling
jesuitx timecop lode
tarzana nigeria kikes
jewsdidwtc lastmeasure goatse
k g m v w k u u y e p j c g x p z s x.
t o o f t h d o n j q u g c b q w v s.
i a t i t b w i k h k u s r w l y j v.
m t q l m b g s i g a i n l w a e h h.
e s l s o g l x j n a r k g z s x a w.
c e y h e d o u b i h f p e u t n d f.
o g i r t j e j m l d r a i s m i v a.
p q d o r a e p k l u u t a v e y y u.
f j o q b w r s w o i x a d i a h e m.
o q e y d m s z y r v n m f y s g d o.
w p a w f f f x a t s k e o h u p h o.
t s l i s k u k d n q y r g k r w n a.
x k d k h d s q o d a t i k k e i u u.
h a s s o c i a t i o n c p i g n l s.
x g a e w t g d b g v z a t e h s o x.
i a r y x g b u w w h i t r c e g w a.
n m r a t e c o f t f u i n t h h r t.
r t d u n c t x k m c a n n l t a w d.
a v y j z z a n e f o m v o b n o i n.
g p w j d d k m n k w m q i m f o c b.
that's the point.
IMO, this ruling is basically: free speech means you can prove yourself an ass. that's bad enough. the courts shouldn't be used to make it worse.
I've had my sig for a couple of years now.
Support the First Amendment. Read at -1
When in the course of human events it becomes necessary for one person to separate himself from the association of the other members of a learned discussion, and to assume among the trolls of the earth a separate and equal station, it becomes incumbent upon the troll to enumerate the reasons for his separation.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
are a mega scum bag and a cockroach, and there are probably more cockroaches at the company you work for
however, i will reciprocate felatoin with you even though you have fat thighs, a fake medical
degree, queefs and have poor feminine hygiene
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
When someone posts "trolling" comments on his blog, fine. But is this supposed to mean that I have to allow it or at least may not take legal steps against someone trying to troll on a board, message system or blog I am responsible for?
To me, this is akin to a party. It's your party, do what you want. You may even kick me out for being no troll, you may do whatever name calling you like, but when you're on my lawn, you either keep your mouth shut or get off it. You will not come to my party and advertise for amway, you will not get drunk and harrass all the girls and you will not start political campaigning for a party I do not like.
I do sincerely hope that the courts see that fine difference. Just because I open my house for anyone who wants to party with me does not mean that I allow anyone to come in and do what they like. And the same applies to internet servers. A server is not a "public space". It is owned by someone who may (or may not) present the rules under which this server may be used. Play by those rules or get off my lawn.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
> And, even though some of the statements were crudely sexual and accused Ms. Krinsky
> of being among 'boobs, liars and crooks,' the statements were held to 'fall into the category
> of crude, satirical hyperbole which, while reflecting the immaturity of the speaker,
> constitute protected opinion under the First Amendment.'"
the obvious smart-arse thing for Ms Krinsky to do here is to immediately turn around and say "In my opinion, this decision just proves that Californian judges are boobs, liars and crooks".
No, that's preventing everyone else from seeing their opinions too. That's censorship, not personally choosing to ignore something that doesn't interest you. Huge difference.
Are you suggesting the trolls seek reparations?
Every time I start to have faith in humanity, I ruin it by driving to work between 7 and 8 am.
who calls people 'Boobs' any more srsly?
"and eerily perfect grammar"
BZZZZT. Not even close.
"Did their supposed anonymity give them constitutional rights to be fucktards, or more importantly, to cause my family grief and humiliation?"
Listen crybaby, I'll explain this to you so you'll avoid looking like a bitch again.
THEY DID NOT CAUSE YOUR FAMILY ANYTHING. THEY ENGAGED IN AN ACTIVITY, WHICH YOU CHOSE TO RESPOND TO WITH GRIEF AND HUMILIATION. YOU CHOSE HOW TO REACT TO THEM AND YOU ARE THE ONLY ONE TO BLAME FOR HOW YOU FEEL.
Grow the fuck up. Your post was the definition of pathetic.
I almost have to agree with them AC's. And them low UID bitches, note free speech here, are the worst!
I only look human.
My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling
I am kind of a big deal
FOXTROT UNIFORM CHARLIE KILO
I hope there's an end run around this. Since the intent is to annoy, the source of it should be able to deal with the consequences that come with the statement.
Twitter supports and protects racists - by smearing their critics with the "Hate Speech" label.
fuck shit ass cunt pussy
Look at it this way, how many of the boneheaded ideas that people like Ted Turner or Steve Jobs had that people remember? I look at posting on /. in the same way. Throw out a dozen or so comments on the subject or not and don't look back.
/. and if you do go against them just ignore their rating. With enough posting over time your Karma will be excellent all the time and who cares if the Neanderthals don't like it.
The things that get you modded well are...
1. being first helps
2. appropriate subject line
3. knowing what your talking about
4. going along with popular opinion
Being first helps alot. Coming late to the party and your view will lost in the crowd. The subject line helps those of us with moderator points pick out the people who missed rule #1 and those who get crossed up in rule #4 PC mods, this also is about the only way I read AC posts - if their subject line catches my eye. Knowing what your talking about can help you get points even if someone scored by being first with similar information. Still, you can't help but being first.
Just remember, one person's troll can be another person's hero. There are many very unpopular categories to express support for on
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
This is the single most brilliant comment I've ever read on /.
You sir, are a man among men.
Of course, in the spirit of the thread, I should have just responded "Me too!"
Reason why there is hope for the future generation #364:
"I wish my grass was emo so it could cut itself."
I'll put a stop to comments like this once my boob patent is accepted. Then anyone who wants to write about boobs (software) will have to license the technology first ;-)
Shitcock, baby!
this article is gay
Furthermore, considering how the people you mentioned react to being moderated "Overrated", imagine the moral indignance that would be generated from moderating them as "Wrong". I think we are better off not adding more specific negative moderation tags. The Overrated moderation is abused, but so would any other tag. The only problem that I have with Overrated is that it doesn't show up in meta-moderating.
And just to keep in line with the ruling, the judge called the blogger Crude, Immature and Hyperbolic.
And yes, I know what i wrote. You didn't get the joke perhaps?
You can get rich if you own a politician, but you have to be rich to buy one in the first place.
I can't moderate in this thread because I already posted, but this should be +5.
Furthermore, if you want an idea of what kind of speech the American Revolutionaries wanted to protect, just look at the kind of speech they were using. For every civil and well-reasoned "Common Sense", "Declaration of Independence" and "Federalist Papers", there are dozens of newspapers articles and pamphlets published that were crude, hyperbolic, and dripping with vitriol. They were nothing if not flamebait. The founders of this country clearly felt that no one should be above this sort of criticism, and that no government should be able to suppress this sort of dissent.
Admiral Ag is correct in saying that this sort of speech is nothing but a nuisance, but if someone thinks they need the government to step in and "protect" them from something as insignificant as trolling then they have bigger problems on their hands.
Think about your breathing.
--
Stay tuned for some shock and awe coming right up after this messages!
It is a well known fact that the M's are the drones of the bite-size candy world. The F's or Queen Bites are kept in heavily guarded rooms nested deep within the Mars,Inc facilities. A good queen is worth thousands of dollars and are carefully protected. They are carefully breed and cared for, with lineages meticulously documented for as far back as a hundred generations.
The GP was clearly just a mere dilettante of bite-breeding and would never be let near a Queen Bite. However, his efforts in the breeding of M's show that even they have a place in this fascinating pursuit.
One poster (Doe 6) describing Krinsky when he said "I will reciprocate felatoin [sic] with Lisa even though she has fat thighs, a fake medical degree, 'queefs' and has poor feminine hygiene."
Ok, bitches, it's me and I won! Yeah for me! I'm your average stupid internet troll and I'm too much of coward to post under a nick. And you know it, I love to insult pussies! Hell yeah! Victory, fags!
What if the physically strongest M&Ms also tend to be the worst tasting? You may end up breeding a race of really tough but poor-tasting candy. Wouldn't it make more sense to select for taste rather?
The first amendment, excellent. Um yeah, the rest of the world has no such position.
Biomech
Your wrong.
(See how useful that is?)
My sig man.. my sig.. I almost missed this on Slashdot.
A Good Troll is better than a Bad Human.
Kenneth, what is the frequency?
You can't talk about Wikipedia's flaws on Wikipedia
Just host the site anonymously, outside the country. The US won't give up your anonymity for mere trolling, per this ruling, so...?
Yeah, no kidding.
I said "Ubuntu sucks because you can't use an ATI video card."
The response was fantastic. People modded me as a troll, yelled at me to get a new card, and blamed the problem on ATI's lask of professionalism.
I went back to Win2000. It's a lot faster than Ubuntu anyway.
---
ECHELON is a government program to find words like bomb, jihad, plutonium, assassinate, and anarchy.
No, I modeled it as a nod to the Declaration of Independence.
Once in a while an extremely canny judge directs his court to rule on some particular case, knowing that the precedent will be devastating in the next case over.
If the ruling says that trolls, while somewhat irritating, are one of the edge cases of free speech, it's a colossal step against the Big Brother direction our country has been headed in.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
whether you like it or not
Cyberstalking law opens debate on what's annoying Now how many of you have already forgotten this? The law makes it a crime to anonymously "annoy, abuse, threaten or harass" another person over the Internet. Oh that's right it was two years ago. Perhaps now you should be concerned about Infragard and deadly force. No, 99% of you sit on your ass doing nothing, someone else will fix the government for you. Oh wait, there's that small problem with the FISA law and telcom immunity.
The stated purpose of the United States' patent system is to encourage innovation, for profit. Pursuing the best ideas and being first to market them is not the only means of profiting. Many successful companies have profited by developing the best refinements of the expression of the previous generation's best ideas. If property was defined only to include tangible assets, free market competition would increase many avenues of innovation, which are presently retarded by restrictions on access to patented ideas.
All 19 hijackers were known terrorists 09-10-2001. Lack of FBI intelligence does not justify warrantless wiretaps..
I'm glad to see that the AutoAdmit.com case was mentioned in the current article, because I still have more to say about it and hopefully, I can comment on it without being down-modded off-topic.
The content above was satire, and the name-calling is obviously not intended literally, thus cannot be considered libel, according to the aforementioned. What follows, in contrast, is meant to be interpreted literally.
Ars Technica, AutoAdmit 1
The two plaintiffs, anonymously listed as Doe I and Doe II, are female students at Yale Law School and claim that the users of a third-party law school message board have consistently and regularly made such disparaging remarks about their characters that it has cost them not only their emotional wellbeing, but internships and jobs. And despite repeated requests to remove the offensive posts, the site's administrators continually refused to do so.
On what grounds did AutoAdmit.com refuse to remove libelous messages? On what grounds did they later claim to be unable to identify the defendants?
In the complaint as seen by Ars Technica, Doe I and II claim to have lost sleep, fallen behind on schoolwork, suffered strained personal relationships with their families, and were forced to attend therapy as a result of the postings on AutoAdmit. Additionally, Doe I claims to have lost job prospects. She says that at some point, she applied for 16 different on-campus interviews at Yale, which resulted in a mere four callbacks and zero offers. "On information and belief, it is unprecedented for a second-year law student from Yale to participate in so many interviews without obtaining a single summer associate offer," the complaint reads. Her academic qualifications were similar to that of other classmates who had received offers, the complaint says.
I am not a lawyer, nor do I need to be, to see that the plaintiffs can demonstrate real, measurable damages.
The posts occurred on AutoAdmit, a site that describes itself as the world's "most prestigious" college discussion board and claims to help students with law school information, hiring practices at law firms, and more.
Assuming they're any good at anything they do, how is it possible that they both refuse, when requested, to remove content that is so obviously incitement to violence and defamation of character, but also neglect to keep records pertaining to that content? Even if AutoAdmit.com had no "no outing" policy [see the linked article], a marginally competent administrator and a marginally competent lawyer should, between the two of them, have the expertise & intellectual capacity to at least have concluded that responsible hosting of a discussion forum requires that they begin keeping records after a pattern of abusive content is observed from some, if not all, of the 28 pseudonyms used to harass Doe I & Doe II, auto-deleting most as is standard maintenance of servers, but specifically archiving those noticed as illegal, either as libel, incitement, or direct threat of illegal actions. I have no Linux certifications or CS degrees, and I can write the cron jobs for that, easily. It is not rocket science!
It is simply not plausible that at no point did anybody at "[t]he most prestigious college admissions discussion board in the world" notice the pattern of messages that are not protected by the First Amendment, and know that those messages are, from that point forward, evidence of a crime. As "[t]he most prestigious college admissions discussion board in the world," they had a professional responsibility to start logging that information, independent of their declared ["no outing"] site policy. There are really only two [non-e
All 19 hijackers were known terrorists 09-10-2001. Lack of FBI intelligence does not justify warrantless wiretaps..
Interesting take. I just got around to looking at this case and I will have to say I like the direction that some of these cases (this one, the NJ Township blogger case, etc) seem to be going, not only in the fact that individuals can speak anonymously online, but also that ISPs do not have to turn over this information, or aid in uncovering who is posting what, searching for what, etc.
To your point that this case raises the deciding issue of whether claims are "likely to be read as facts", I've gotten about 1/2 way through Daniel Solove's new book Future of Reputation, and there are some troubling issues we'll have to confront in the future regarding some of this stuff. One of the responses to issues such as defamation, etc, that Solove discusses in the book is using the law to give individuals more power to have defamatory or privacy invading information taken down. I wonder if such a law were to be hammered out somehow (not likely, i imagine, but still) if such a law would have to be narrow tailored to only work for things "likely to be read as facts" on a blog or message board.
It seems like that would leave open a lot of trash talk/smearing without recourse for the smeared. There is something about a takedown notice which appeals to me, although I'm wary of the overuse of this and individuals overpowered to the extent it stifles speech. I'm glad this sort of anonymous speech is still being protected but it seems like we've still got to figure out how to come up with a better balance.