Xref: utzoo alt.config:3504 news.admin:11789 comp.org.eff.talk:1141
Path: utzoo!utgpu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!pacific.mps.ohio-state.edu!linac!att!pacbell.com!ucsd!ucbvax!tornado.Berkeley.EDU!gwh
From: gwh@tornado.Berkeley.EDU (George William Herbert)
Newsgroups: alt.config,news.admin,comp.org.eff.talk
Subject: Re: Anonymous postings
Summary: Ok, let's define some responsibility then...
Message-ID: <40305@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU>
Date: 10 Jan 91 06:12:33 GMT
References: <1991Jan7.190403.9267@alphalpha.com> <Z89HV8w163w@cynic.wimsey.bc.ca> <1991Jan09.175609.6303@looking.on.ca>
Sender: usenet@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Organization: The OCF Gang: Making Tomorrows Mistakes Today
Lines: 36

In article <1991Jan09.175609.6303@looking.on.ca> brad@looking.on.ca (Brad Templeton) writes:
>Assume serious legal action begins.  It has to look for a target.  There
>are no targets.  Perhaps it goes away frustrated, but all it takes is one
>plaintiff not willing to go away.
>
>Targets include uunet and the NSF to begin with.  Or some big sites.
>
>Problem is that at many sites all it would take is a whiff of a lawsuit to
>have the site removed from the net by admins who are unaware of usenet or
>uncomfortable with it.   "Who needs trouble?"

Ok, Brad has neatly summarized the crux of the real problem here.  I have a
suggestion, a small proposal for 1) a Usenet local admin policy and 
2) a law to back it up.

	What I'm suggesting is this:  We create an administrative policy guide
for News admins.  Simply; it is not the responsibility of a news site to check
any information about any incoming news; however, if the site admin is notified
that an article at that site is illegal/libelous/etc, it is that site's 
responsibility to as soon as reasonable locally cancel it.

	Supporting this, we mount a drive to get the US Congress to approve a
law that supports this: basically, absolving any computer owner from legal
responsibility for an article that they did not origionate that they did not
know to be illegal in some way.  

	Suggestions?  Flamage?  I'm willing to send _my_ congresspeople a horde
of letters... are you, for the long-term good of Usenet and other computer
systems.


  == George William Herbert ==   * UNIX ate my last .sig, Waiting for Plan 9! *
 == JOAT for Hire: Anything, ==  ######### I do Naval Architecture,  ##########
== + Anywhere, at my price. + == # Spacecraft Design, UNIX Systems Consulting #
 == + gwh@ocf.berkeley.edu + ==  # RPG writing/development, and lots of other #
  == +   ucbvax!ocf!gwh   + ==   ## random stuff, of course.  I'm a JOAT 8-) ##