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MD Appellate Ct. Sets "New Standard" For Anonymous Posting
A Maryland court of appeals has set what they are calling a new "standard that should be applied to balance the First Amendment right to anonymous speech on the Internet with the opportunity on the part of the object of that speech to seek judicial redress for alleged defamation." The court overturned an earlier ruling that would have required NewsZap.com to turn over the names of anonymous posters who posted negative remarks about the cleanliness of a Centreville Dunkin' Donuts. "In a defamation case involving anonymous speakers, the ruling said, courts should first require the plaintiff to try to notify the anonymous posters that they are the subject of a subpoena. That notification could come in the form of a message posted to the online forum in question, and the posters must be given sufficient time to respond. The plaintiff must then hand over the exact statements in question, so the court can decide whether the comments are obviously defamatory. Finally, the ruling says, the court must weigh the anonymous poster's right to free speech against the strength of the defamation case and the necessity of disclosing the poster's identity."
that ruling actually makes sense. there is no way that it will be allowed to stand!
Lets face it... corporations ARE going to hammer this until they get their way. At least a court is coming up with some sort of fair way to arbitrate and say 'let the courts decide what is libelous before handing over identities'. That seems more than fair and it gives the anonymous user the opportunity to seek counsel should they feel the need.
It's a libelous world but at least the courts are trying to err on the side of caution.
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What I got from the article was a tacit admission that people would inevitably try to abuse the system to supress legitimate voicing of concern, analagous to the legal cheap shot of invoking the DMCA to supress complaints or discussions of product defects, for example.
Insults are usually not considered defamation. The more outrageous the insult, the less likely it is for anyone to believe it to be true, and the less likely it is to actually cause damages to the offended party. Purely by posting anonymously, you are greatly reducing your credibility, which means the other party is going to have to show some pretty clear evidence that your writings were the ones that people believed.
Now, if you happened to be a clerk working for the MD Supreme Court and you were in a position to say such things as fact instead of just wild accusations, then you might be liable for defamation/libel.
-Rick
"Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
It feels like everything even a tiny bit negative is suddenly grounds for a lawsuit.
Food critic gives a bad review? Don't make better food, sue the critic, the newspaper, and the corporation that owns it for defamation, even if the fries WERE soggy that day.
It seems like the issue is it's way cheaper to try and suppress negative information (even if it's simply random people's opinions) - and furthermore make it clear that it will be extremely costly to even utter such information, by way of having to defend oneself in court, even for pure opinion-laced statements. Some states, if I recall, have laws and remedies available when companies sue under such circumstances, but many, it seems, do not.
And hell - I've noticed that in some countries, forget opinion - it's getting to the point where even truth is no longer an absolute defense to libel, because truthful statements can still be "defamatory".
"Fame" and "Respect" shouldn't be a right just via the existence of a person or company, it's one of those things that is (or used to be) hard to earn, and easy to lose. What's the point of having a review or sharing thoughts if any negative one leads to a lawsuit?
Actually, according to the courts (I do not have a citation handy, but you should be able to look it up), anonymous speech is particularly protected, because anonymous speech is essential to honest political debate.
Imagine that if you spoke your political mind publicly that your neighbors or your boss, who had different political opinions, decided to punish you for what you said? It has certainly been known to happen. The Federalist Papers, and other important documents that led to the formation of our Constitution, were published publicly but anonymously. Why? Precisely because the authors feared serious repercussions should their names be attached to the documents.
If anonymous speech were not protected, then the concept of "freedom of speech" would be a joke. It is essential that people be able to speak their minds, without being harassed or injured or jailed for their opinions. Remember, however, that opinion and libel are two different things.
This is because of the erosion of our rights. There was a time when first amendment lawsuits involved people like Larry Flynt, saying things like "If the first amendment will protect a scumbag like me, then it will protect all of you, because I'm the worst." These days, the cases that set precedent tend not to involve the worst scumbags, but normal people. Today you can easily see that if there's any question that the constitution will protect us in trivial and petty cases, there's NO chance it will protect us when it's important.
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