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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."
No, it does not. An anonymous statement holds no weight and thus cannot be defamatory. At least, not enough to rise to the level of court intervention. These types of cases should be thrown out (without wasting all this effort) and our government's resources put to better use. And Dunkin' Donuts needs to grow a pair.
I agree. All this means is that anonymous posters need to start using Tor and other technologies because otherwise, they will find you if they want to do it badly enough.
If it were up to me, the right to anonymous free speech would greatly outweigh the right to sue someone for libel. That would even mean eliminating the ability to sue an anonymous user for libel. I'd much rather people finally learn, once and for all, to never believe anything they see or hear or read without first confirming it themselves or testing whether it's consistent with what they already know to be true. I'd much much rather see that happen than try to use the courts to track down and sue every last false source of information. It's like a "default-allow" firewall versus a "default deny".
It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
Here's the problems. First, there's this idea that people who excercise their fifth amendment rights are guilty. Then there's this idea that anonymous speakers are "evil". Nevermind arguments about the 4th amendment, or about privacy and other things -- this all points to a systemic and popular change of opinion in the general public that excercising one's rights is synonymous with abusing them. This is very dangerous -- those rights were enacted to precisely and explicitly to protect innocent people who might otherwise be snared by ambiguous testimony, false witnesses, or procedural mistakes (amongst other flaws in the justice system that hang innocent people).
But that aside, the crux of the matter is, should anonymous speech be entitled the same protections as non-anonymous speech? If you're tempted to answer yes, consider that an "anonymous poster" stating that a pharmaceutical company is engaging in price fixing doesn't carry the same weight as a former accountant of the company in question stating it. Who you are does indeed matter when it comes to credibility. Just a talking point here. Here's the other problem -- people often post anonymously precisely because they have more to lose because of who they are, yet wish to perform a public service by drawing attention to a problem. Anyone remember F*ckedCompany during the dotcom bubble burst? The court fails to address these questions.
And the argument could be made they should not address them. Our court system is based on the concept that everything should be public, unless of course it has anything to do with terrorism, the government, or some government official's nuts in the vice, in which case it's Uber-Super-Double-Top-Secret. This is a problem for people found not guilty because public mentality is that even an accusation means you did something wrong. People's lives are ruined daily by false accusation, false witnesses, etc., because the system declares that everything should be public -- not just those found guilty, but also those found not guilty, or even innocent!
And in a digital age, I don't know that we can afford this anymore. The needs of the many (the public's need to know) is NOT outweighed by the individuals needs (for privacy) any longer, and a foundational aspect of our justice system now needs reform. Specifically, court actions should not be made public until the case is finalized and no longer appealable. Yes, that does mean the public gets less information. In my opinion... Deal with it. If this dynamic were the case, then the collateral damage in involving legal action against anonymous posters would be reduced a hundred-fold. Doing this eliminates the "chilling effect" that these actions provide.
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In the case of the Emily Vance versus the Bathroom Wall Writer of the Baltimore Golden Corral, Men's Room, 2nd Stall, sometime between 6:30 PM on January 25th 2009 and 10:45 PM on January 27th 2009, the Court finds that Emily Vance, with whom the Bathroom Writer suggested a short-term relationship might result in a pleasant outcome, did effectively write on said wall in reply, letting the Bathroom Writer know he or she was the subject of a subpoena. The Bathroom Writer, who knowingly and wantonly failed to respond, is hereby subject to the default judgement of $840,000. The next time the Bathroom Writer writes on that wall, Ms. Vance should let him or her know that he or she is liable.