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Pastimes : Business Wire Falls for April Fools Prank, Sues FBNers -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: The Philosopher who wrote (3184)	7/8/1999 11:46:00 PM
From: Jeffrey S. Mitchell	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 3795

Here's a copy of what Raging Bull sends out when member info is subpoenad: Raging Bull, Inc. {Date} VIA ELECTRONIC MAIL Re: Subpoena for Member Information Dear {Alias}: Raging Bull, Inc. has received a subpoena duces tecum issued by the District Court, District of {State}, on behalf of {company}, in the matter of {lawsuit name}. The subpoena duces tecum commands Raging Bull, Inc. to identify you as the owner of screen name {alias} [and to supply other information with respect to your use of the Raging Bull service.] As set forth in our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy, it is Raging Bull's policy to protect the privacy of its Members consistent with its obligations under law. The Terms of Service state: "The Raging Bull reserves the right to disclose any information, including registration data, in order to comply with any applicable current laws and/or government requests, for the protection of the corporation and its members." It is Raging Bull's policy to require service of a valid subpoena before it will disclose Member identity information. Upon receipt of a valid subpoena in a civil case, Raging Bull will attempt to notify the Member(s) whose information is sought, so that the Member may, if he or she so chooses, pursue any legal remedy that may be available to him or her. Pursuant to the subpoena, Raging Bull plans to produce the requested documents on or after {date}. If you would like us to send you a copy of the subpoena to you, please send us a return electronic mail message with your address. Very truly yours, Matthew Healey Webmaster@ragingbull.com DCDOCS: 153169.1 (3@6p01!.doc)

To: The Philosopher who wrote (3184)	7/9/1999 6:04:00 AM
From: Bill Ulrich	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 3795

“You are another one with that delusion.” I can't agree with 'delusion'. Yes, I'm very well aware that, as drafted in letter, it only pertains to government issues. I'm saying that in spirit, it's supposed to be an important issue to us, and in spirit, we'd like to believe that whilst you have every right to speak freely—so do I. Do we not tell ourselves and others, even on these very SI threads, "Well, it's your right to say so…"? Certainly, actual letter of the law and 'spirit' can be different things. Guys in big black robes spend years arguing about this stuff. Is the gist of what I'm saying really incorrect, though? Free speech is as important, citizen-to-citizen as it is government-to-citizen. Isn't that what we attempt to practice daily? Addressing the private property issue you brought up—whose private property? Who owns the Internet? Who owns Webnode? On whose private property was I speaking whereby 'they' are welcome to abridge the spirit of free speech? Strictly speaking, maybe the Webnode servers, where the material resides? That certainly isn't Business Wire's private property. And the intellectual property, which Webnode authored—the words, the text—certainly are Webnode's private property. The issues we spoke of were of public interest, of public importance, spoken on the public internet. Re: Cases Without Merit. What I was really saying—and this was referring to law in general, without any reference to the BW case whatsoever—is that under FRCP 11, defendant would only get back legal expenditures, not unlike a SLAPP recovery. I simply ask, "Is that equitable?" In a case which has merit, the defendant faces an attorney who was hired to ensure that appropriate legal remedies are applied for the infractions in question. In a case of dubious merit, seeking to bury the defendant in litigation costs (this was, after all, the original topic), the attorney was hired to essentially wreck the person who dared to speak his mind. You have a situation where a prudent attorney would not be under the illusion that he could win on legal merit itself, yet takes the case anyway. No actual punitive measure is taken against this—only a SLAPP-like recovery of defendant's legal expenditures (as it was explained to me, at least). So, as was my original point, 'law' and 'justice' are not quite the same, are they? I didn't completely understand your last few sentences: “…very few cases are really frivolous. After all, judges are also lawyers, and they don't want to shit in the pool they will be back in if the electorate turns them out of office.” It appears to say that a prudent judge makes himself aware of future consequences. Thus, whether a case is warranted or not, doesn't necessarily depend upon a legal defintion. Rather it depends upon what he feels the ramifications of such a ruling may have on his future. Did I interpret the message incorrectly?

To: The Philosopher who wrote (3184)	7/9/1999 10:04:00 AM
From: Peter V	Respond to of 3795

Christopher, to be fair, the First Amendment was drafted at a time when large corporations did not sue individuals to chill their free speech. That is what the anti-SLAPP laws address. But in this situation, large corporations are clearly analogous to the government, a large body with power to enforce its interpretation of the law through legal means. The corporation cannot send you to jail, but it can chill your free speech through monetary "penalties" just as a government regulation would. Even though the "penalties" take the form of attorney fees and costs to defend the suit, as opposed to government fines, it hurts the individual's bank account in the same manner. I think if the practice of large corporations suing individuals to chill their free speech rights were commonplace in the late 1700's, anti-SLAPP may have been included in the First Amendment. And I completely believe that Bidness Liar is pursuing this suit for an improper reason, to punish the FBNers for making fun of it in a public forum. It has little to do with BL (BW, whatever) trying to regulate the content of its releases (which as you point out, it is free to do). As such, it is an impermissible intrusion on FBNer's free speech rights, and a proper subject of an anti-SLAPP motion.