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Judge: Media must reveal IDs of online posters
Chicago Tribune ^ | March 6, 2011

Posted on 03/06/2011 9:33:44 AM PST by digger48

INDIANAPOLIS — A judge in a defamation case has ordered news media outlets in Indianapolis to reveal information that could help identify people who posted disparaging comments about an official on their online forums.

An Indiana journalism shield law that protects reporters from having to reveal their sources doesn't protect web sites from being forced to disclose who made anonymous posts, Marion Superior Court Judge S.K. Reid ruled.

Reid held that The Indianapolis Star and the Indianapolis Business Journal must provide names or other information that would help Jeffrey Miller, the former chief executive of Junior Achievement of Central Indiana, identify who wrote online comments that described him as "greedy" and warranting an investigation by the state attorney general.

Kevin Betz, an attorney for Miller, told the Star the rulings were the first of their kind in Indiana.

The case is part of a national trend of claims that target anonymous Internet posters to web sites operated by news media and other owners, the Star reported.

(Excerpt) Read more at chicagotribune.com ...


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Crime/Corruption; Front Page News; Miscellaneous; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: constitution; freedomofspeech; internet; skreid
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To: digger48

IANAL, but this suit sounds like a fishing expedition with just a touch of shakedown.


41 posted on 03/07/2011 1:37:38 AM PST by Slings and Arrows (You can't have Ingsoc without an Emmanuel Goldstein.)
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Comment #42 Removed by Moderator

To: guerito1

I think you can post any opinion you want as long as it is not anonymous.


43 posted on 03/07/2011 7:02:28 AM PST by TxDas (This above all, to thine ownself be true.)
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Comment #44 Removed by Moderator

To: guerito1

I like the British system where if you sue and lose you have to pay all the expenses for both sides.

So I agree, an institution with deep pockets can sue you beyond all reason regardless of who is right.

What we need to do is change the tort laws so the common man does not have to lurk in the darkness and blog anomalously to tell the truth about some evildoer.


45 posted on 03/07/2011 2:10:48 PM PST by TxDas (This above all, to thine ownself be true.)
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To: redpoll
You are free to write what you want, but you’re responsible for damages. Rule of law 101.

Rule of law, or rule of SLAPP? Remember Lillian Hellmann (Communist playwright) and novelist Mary McCarthy (who criticized Hellmann on Johnnie Carson's Tonight Show).

46 posted on 03/08/2011 12:53:15 AM PST by lentulusgracchus (Concealed carry is a pro-life position.)
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