A California court has found that trolls are protected by the first amendment and are entitled to anonymity. The ruling comes despite previous cases where trolls have been arrested (be it once they have been disclosed) and hearings in other courts.
The court reversed a previous decision that would have allowed Lisa Krinsky, COO of a Florida based drug service SFBC, to subpoena 10 anonymous Yahoo message board trolls, according to Ars Technica.
The 10 trolls posted on Yahoo message boards in 2005 with “scathing verbal attacks” including referring to the management team of SFBC as “a management consisting of boobs, losers and crooks,” and responding to Krinsky with comments such as “I will reciprocate felatoin with Lisa even though she has fat thighs, a fake medical degree, ‘queefs’ and has poor feminine hygiene.”
The court found that although the Internet is still bound by rules about libel, what was posted were not assertions of “actual fact” and not actionable under defamation law, therefore protected under the First Amendment, in sort of the same way parody is.
(photo credit: Richard Dawkins)
Reasonable.
BUTSEX IS COOL!
I think butsex is pretty cool too.
butsex nATION! BUTSEX R US!
I WANT BUTSEX IN MY SOUP!
Poor Lisa Krinsky wanted to fire some of her subordinates.
Spelling of “amendment” = FAIL
haha…..I know Micheal wouldn’t like this….
“I will reciprocate felatoin with Lisa even though she has fat thighs, a fake medical degree, ‘queefs’ and has poor feminine hygiene.”
That is one of the best insult sentences ever written. If someone had written a similar insult about me i’d be proud and give them a pat on the back.
This article was inspiring, so much so I just Twittered, “Good morning I just queefed!”
Does this mean that anonymous speech that is clearly insanely stupid is protected, but falsehoods that might reasonably be believed by someone of average intelligence might still be a basis for legal action?
We’ve got a detailed entry on this case in our legal threats database — http://www.citm...krinsky-v-doe-6.
I think as long as people don’t make threatening statements or admit crime, they should be allowed to remain anonymous.
wasn’t she the lady involved in that huge health scandal?
if by any chance the so-called trollers contributed to expose her and prevent more people from dying at the hands of her company, in my book, they’re more than welcome to call her a queefer.
Any blog owner can, and may well hand over identifying information should you leave an anonymous comment that comes to the attention of authorities, or others.
Everyone should note that this decision makes Lisa Krinsky the only person in the world whom one can describe as “having fat thighs, a fake medical degree, ‘queefs’ and poor feminine hygiene” without fear of reprisal. I bet she’s glad she brought the case.
arresting Trolls is stupid – the law is so anal
That is cool
http://www.jhat...lerHomePage.htm
(The Light Browser)
Sounds not that good..
So what’s the difference btw a troll and a cyber-bully?
phew.. so, as a troll from under the illest bridge, i’m still safe for now.
p.s. the “law is so anal”? the court decided that the trolls CANNOT be subpoenaed. The law, in this story, is protecting the anonymity of some yahooligans… seems to me like the queefing quack is the anal one. (although from the comments it’s clear she’s more oral.)
@16 a troll is generally making comments to a stranger… stirring up dust in an anonymous fashion… cyberbullying is where individuals take real world rivalries and perpetuate them online… very NON-anonymously, having many real world implications….
i think #16 has a great point in that question… we want more penalties for cyber-bullying.. but we want to be able to voice our opinions at times as well (however “trollish” someone might think that is…) there’s a fine line between trolling (harmless) and cyber-bullying (very harmful and dangerous)…
tough situation, but what can you really do now seriously?
Has anyone figured out how to monetize trolling? I think we could be on to something.
Companies should pay more attention to what people say on message boards and COMMUNICATE effectively instead of just subpoena posters. Look at http://www.boardcentral.com – you can read some real discussions from 13 message boards!
If someone had written a similar insult about me i’d be proud and give them a pat on the back.
According to Wikipedia: An Internet troll, or simply troll in Internet slang, is someone who posts controversial messages in an online community, such as an online discussion forum, with the intention of baiting other users into an emotional response.
It goes on to say:
The contemporary use of the term first appeared on Usenet groups in the late 1980s. It is thought to be a truncation of the phrase trolling for suckers, itself derived from the fishing technique known as trolling.
So I guess based on that definition what we have in this case really isn’t trolling. The intent was to damage the company and the reputation of those who run it, not attract suckers into a flame war.
i’m trolling! i’m trolling!
midgets are short people and retards aren’t that smart and your a loser if you think trolls don’t have rights.