Libel lawsuit against citizen journalism blog owners
November 28, 2007
This libel lawsuit against blog-site owners, where their responsibility is allegedly equaled to that of a traditional publisher, “is wrong as a matter of law,” writes David Ardia on Citizen Media Law Project blog. The suit, brought against the co-founders and owners of iBrattleboro.com, a citizen journalism website, refers to a comment posted by one of the website’s visitors. The plaintiff’s lawyer claims the publishers of the site failed to “edit out or e-mail [the commenter] and say ‘we can’t publish it as it stands’.”
According to section 230 of Communications Decency Act (”CDA 230″) the blog owners are exempt of liability for the visitors’ comments, Ardia writes. The owners of the site, Chris Grotke and Lise LePage, expressed willingness to comment on the case, but only after they are legally allowed to. “What we can say is that we believe the suit to be without merit and will be taking appropriate legal action,” they said.
Still, the lawsuit is out, and Citizen Media Law Project promises to follow the case as it goes.
Photo: Flickr
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