Links 7/27/11

More like this

Actually, the linked article "How a 1995 court case kept the newspaper industry from competing online" quite clearly says the opposite. The 1995 Prodigy case held Prodigy responsible for libel because they hired people to monitor online forums, and somewhere, somewhen, someone said something false and defamatory about a company in one of those forums, and what a surprise, the online monitor didn't know one way or the other. Congress in 1996 then granted an explicit exception to this--the yahoo who made things up remained responsible--but the newspapers for the most part were quite happy to let others develop and monetize moderated or semimoderated online communities. The court case in 1995 affected everyone online the same, and the 1996 law ditto. No court forced the newspapers to stick to the horse-and-buggy.

By william e emba (not verified) on 27 Jul 2011 #permalink