Message boards have immunity from libel when they don't monitor.
When they do, they lose immunity.
If RB is monitoring, and they deleted the post before reciveing an email complaint, (or a phinr call, as the case may be) they are taking an active part in the process.
That causes them to lose their immunity.
ragingbull.com
At one time, message boards that monitored had potentially greater liability than those that did not. However, this is no longer true.
The poster may have based his/her assertion on the case of Stratton Oakmont and its president Daniel Porush vs Prodigy and an unknown poster. The NY Supreme Court found that Prodigy could be considered as a publisher of the posts in question based on the monitoring of its boards by "board leaders" as well the use of software to rid posted messages of offensive language. Prodigy argued unsuccessfully that they should be treated as a distributor rather than a publisher of the disputed material. A distributor is subject to more favorable standards in libel cases than a publisher, though neither is immune. As noted on the NY Supreme Court decision:
... A finding that PRODIGY is a publisher is the first hurdle for Plaintiffs to overcome in pursuit of their defamation claims because one who repeats or otherwise republishes a libel is subject to liability as if he had originally published it. In contrast, distributors such as book stores and libraries may be liable for defamatory statements of others only if they knew or had reason to know of the defamatory statement at issue. A distributor or deliverer of defamatory material is considered a passive conduit and will not be found liable in the absence of fault. However, a newspaper, for example, is more than a passive receptacle or conduit for news, comment and advertising. ...
jmls.edu
Many felt that this decision unfortunate since it penalized message boards that attempted to clean up their boards relative to those that exercised no control over posted messages. This situation was reversed by the Telecommunications Act of 1996 which allowed message boards to exercise some control over posted messages without incurring legal liability such as that seen in the Stratton Oakmont vs Prodigy case:
... Congress acted to limit the potential liability of computer services for defamation with the enactment of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, . In what appears to be a direct response to the Stratton Oakmont case, Congress included in the new Telecommunications Act a provision (47 U.S.C. õ 230(c)) designed to protect "good samaritan" services which exercise some editorial control over user postings. This exception prevents a service from being treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another content provider, and further precludes treating such a service as a publisher or speaker simply because it makes voluntary, good faith efforts to restrict other content providers from posting objectionable material, regardless of whether or not such material is constitutionally protected.
The cases that have come down since the enactment of the Telecommunications Act have afforded strong protection to on-line service providers. In particular, American Online has reaped many of the benefits of the new law, simply because of dominance in the field of on-line service providers. ...
ssbb.com
The Stratton Oakmont vs Prodigy case was settled out of court (Prodigy said they were sorry - no money was paid to Stratton Oakmont). As a postscript, the following may be of interest: #reply-11342075
Further material on legal liability of message boards can be found in Jason Anders article on the AZNT lawsuit: #reply-12851462 |
