Or at least it wasn’t for one video firm [Paul Alan Levy, Consumer Law and Policy]
Posts Tagged ‘online speech’
Bad new idea dept.: privacy takedowns
Jim Harper at Cato at Liberty says a proposed “Cyber Privacy Act” introduced by Thaddeus McCotter (R-Mich.) would “regulate every Internet site that has a comment section. He thinks it’s going to protect privacy, but he’s sorely mistaken. Its passage would undermine privacy and limit free speech.”
Permission to link, cont’d
“Gripe site prevails in domain cybersquatting case”
“A gripe site that incorporates a company’s entire trademark into its domain is still protected under the First Amendment, a US District Judge has ruled.” The site was posted by a disgruntled customer of the Career Agents Network. [Jacqui Cheng, Ars Technica]
“Cyber-harassment” and speech codes
Eugene Volokh and Scott Greenfield worry that free speech could be the loser from a buzz of law school interest in the topic of “cyber-stalking” or “cyber-harassment” — rather broadly couched in one description to include law students’ “using websites to make outrageous gender– or race-specific comments.” Volokh:
I’m sure that most backers of these restrictions would stress that of course they’re not trying to shut down substantive debate, only incivility. But once viewpoint-based restrictions are accepted, once speech can be suppressed because it’s “outrageous” or “smearing,” it’s pretty hard to have much confidence that substantive (but to some “outrageous”) discussion of ideas will remain untouched; and even if actual punishments for such speech are rare, the risk of punishment may powerfully deter the substantive debate as well as the nonsubstantive smears (of which I agree there is plenty). That has certainly been the experience with “civility codes” at university campuses, and governmentally coerced restrictions on “harassment” in workplaces.
January 22 roundup
- Early reactions to Supreme Court’s blockbuster Citizens United ruling striking down ban on independent election advocacy [Point of Law, more, yet more]
- Vision Media Television Group continues its legal push against online critics, Section 230 or no [Consumer Law & Policy, earlier]
- Big FBI sting operation could leave firearms business “wounded”, some say [Point of Law]
- Runaway’s suit against McKeesport, Pa. school district dismissed on statute of limitations grounds [AP/Law.com]
- “Sandra Day O’Connor Backs Campaign to End Judicial Elections” [Schwartz, NY Times, my two cents]
- “Sheriff Joe’s Enabler” [Radley Balko on Maricopa County D.A. Andrew Peyton Thomas; earlier here, here, etc.]
- Why some D.C. lawyers make so much money year in, year out [Hill & Lat, Washingtonian, quotes Ted; Ribstein and more]
- “Hampshire woman jailed for false rape claim” [BBC]
- P.S. At this point, politically, Dems almost have to pass something labeled health care reform whether or not the resulting legislation makes any sense [my comment in National Journal blogger’s poll, more]
January 8 roundup
- Pa. cash-for-kids judge allegedly came up with number of months for length of sentence based on how many birds could be seen out his office window [Legal Ethics Forum, with notes on ornithomancy or bird divination through history]; “The Pa. Judicial Scandal: A Closer Look at the Victims” [WSJ Law Blog on Philadelphia Inquirer report]; feds charge third county judge with fraud [Legal Intelligencer, more]; state high court overturns convictions of 6,500 kids who appeared before Ciavarella and Conahan [Greenfield]; judge orders new trial in Ciavarella’s eyebrow-raising $3.5 million defamation verdict against Citizens’ Voice newspaper in Wilkes-Barre; some web resources on scandal [Sullum, scroll to end]
- Says drinking was part of her job: “Stripper’s DUI Case Survives Club’s Latest Attack” [OnPoint News, earlier]
- Hundreds of lawyers rally to protest Sheriff Arpaio, DA Thomas [Coyote, Greenfield, ABA Journal, Mark Bennett interview with Phoenix attorney Jim Belanger, earlier here, here, and here]. In deposition, Arpaio says he hasn’t read book he co-authored in 2008 on immigration [Balko, Coyote] And as I mentioned a while back, Maricopa D.A. Andrew Thomas turns out to be the very same person as the Andrew Peyton Thomas toward whom I was uncharitable in this Reason piece quite a while back.
- Ted Roberts, of the famous sex-extortion case, begins serving five-year term [AP/Dallas News, KENS]
- New Hampshire lawsuit over leak of documents to mortgage gadfly site raises First Amendment issues [Volokh, earlier here and here]
- Did someone say paid witness? Judge tosses decade-old animal rights case vs. Ringling circus [Orlando Sentinel, Zincavage] Bonus: Ron Coleman, Likelihood of Confusion, on PETA and Michelle Obama;
- How’d foreclosure tax get into Connecticut budget when both parties claimed to oppose it? [Ct. News Junkie]
- Best-legal-blog picks of Ryan Perlin, who writes “Generation J.D.” for the Maryland Daily Record, include one that’s “humorous though sometimes disheartening”, while La Roxy at Daily Asker salutes a certain website as “Lurid, i.e. satisfying”. Thanks!
“Prosecutor Pays a Price for Chasing Commenters”
An Oklahoma district attorney issues a subpoena in search of the identities of critical online commenters. Events don’t develop in the way he was hoping, though, and he’ll be leaving office at the end of his term. [Eric Robinson, Citizen Media Law; McAlester, Okla.]
Internet service providers liable for online securities frauds?
Andrew Moshirnia at Citizen Media Law sounds the alarm about a provision of the proposed Investor Protection Act of 2009 that could punch an exception in Section 230 of the Communication Decency Act, which now generally protects ISPs from liability for actions of third-party users. An investment-fraud exception could serve (he warns) as an entering wedge for other groups to pursue similar exceptions for other types of online content.
Careful about criticizing N.J. school board officials
Paul Levy, Consumer Law and Policy:
The Freehold School Board has subpoenaed New Jersey Online to identify several citizens who chimed in to discuss stories published in the Newark Star Ledger and New Jersey Online about several high administrators who got fake degrees from an online diploma mill, and hence received higher pay. After New Jersey Online notified its subscribers of the subpoena, the ACLU of New Jersey and Freehold attorney Stuart J. Moskovitz stepped in to represent various anonymous posters, and NJ.com has refused to furnish identifying information about the posters.
Howell representative William Bruno on the school board said he was in favor of the Aug. 31 subpoena.
“If they have nothing to hide, what’s the problem?” Bruno said.