November 19, 2006

Don't sue the blogger!

Jeff Jarvis just received "a grant from the Knight Foundation to create a guide with the top 10 rules bloggers and amateur journalists need to stay out of court." He links to this list of lawsuits against bloggers, which makes useful reading to get an idea of what actually moves people to file lawsuits.

10 comments:

The Drill SGT said...

I looked at the list. The common threads I saw were:

1. porn
2. libel
3. exposure of trade secrets info
4. porn
5. libel (jk here :)
6. are blogs "press"?
7. access via ISP to poster info data
8. exposure of "privacy" info
9 what state has jurisdiction? e.g where does the INTERNET reside?
10. libel :)

Meade said...

Sobering stuff.

And just when I was thinking about starting my own blog. Oh well.

Guess I'll just stick to photos of puppies and kittens.

Anonymous puppies and kittens.

Anonymous alleged puppies and kittens.

Anonymous alleged puppies and kittens with those black bar things covering their eyes.

Randy said...

I looked at the list, too, and figure it is best not to disagree with Apple Computer (the computer company of the people, by the people, and for the people unlike that evil empire Microsoft), or be Luke Ford.

The Drill SGT said...

and the plaintiffs were most likely:

1. porn star
2. politician
3. sports star
4. Apple :)

see any commonality?

Randy said...

Drill SGT: I'm afraid to say - Apple might sue me. ;-)

Ann Althouse said...

Is there one where a blogger gets a restraining order against a commenter who won't go away?

Randy said...

Would this be a good time to segue into a lively discussion of Greek mythology, beginning with Sisyphean or Herculean tasks and their modern-day equivalents?

Mortimer Brezny said...

That hurt, Ann.

Maxine Weiss said...

Where is Quixxo?

Ann Althouse said...

The "commenter who won't go away" only refers to trolls who are nasty and awful and then won't leave when I repeatedly tell them to leave. It doesn't mean the regular crowd, even the people who disagree with me!