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From: davidli@umn-cs.UUCP (Dave Meile)
Newsgroups: news.admin,misc.legal
Subject: Re: Responsibility for postings.
Message-ID: <2294@umn-cs.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 8-Oct-87 13:15:32 EDT
Article-I.D.: umn-cs.2294
Posted: Thu Oct  8 13:15:32 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 11-Oct-87 12:15:29 EDT
References: <378d6016.b8ab@apollo.uucp> <5261@jade.BERKELEY.EDU>
Reply-To: davidli@umn-cs.UUCP (Dave Meile)
Organization: University of Minnesota
Lines: 33
Keywords: meaningless speculation
Summary: Let's get it over with and HAVE the test case...
Xref: mnetor news.admin:1139 misc.legal:3048

In article <4611@videovax.Tek.COM> stever@videovax.Tek.COM (Steven E. Rice, P.E.) writes:
>There have been a number of articles posted recently (see the "References:"
>line) about whether it is or is not possible to sue the originating site
>for libelous postings.  In article <21748@lll-tis.arpa>, Michael C. Berch
>(mcb@lll-tis.arpa) pointed out that the law in this area is not settled.
>(Mr. Berch is an attorney.)  The general tone of Mr. Berch's posting seemed
>to imply that Mr. Lippman's outrage had no legal outlet.
>....[text removed]
>If Mr. Lippman were a litigious person, it is very possible that he
>might file suit against not just the site that originated the offending
>article, but against *all* sites on the USENET that carried *any* of the
>newsgroups that contained the article in question.  This could be done on
>the theory that each site that made the article available to be read was
>in fact a "publisher" of the article, and therefore had committed the
>crime of libel.  Given an ambitious lawyer prepared to pose a number of
>undecided issues to the court, such a suit could drag on for years. . .

I am getting rather tired of all of this rather meaningless speculation.
If everyone is so scared of the possible outcomes, we should force a test
case to get it over with once and for all....  Then people such as
Mr. Lippman will no longer have to read "difficult" material on USENET, since
it will obviously shut itself down.  And the Internet will be much less
crowded, since mailing lists will close themselves down, etc.

On the other hand, the courts may just decide that "individuals are
responsible for their own words" and put an end to this discussion.

-- Dave Meile

davidli@simvax.labmed.umn.edu
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