[Seattle-editorial] Fwd: RE: [Imc-legal] Questions on liability

[anarch3m]

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--------- Forwarded Message ---------

DATE: Tue, 23 Mar 2004 21:08:40
From: "John Windmueller" <john at conflictresolver.com>
To: "'SuZQ'" <suzq at riseup.net>, <imc-legal at lists.indymedia.org>
Cc: 

Big disclaimer up front: I'm not an attorney.  Not legal advice, just my
research and thinking.  

Those are great question.  The big liability issues Editorial groups usually
face are: 
1. Copyright violation
2. Libel liability

Here's just my own current opinion/take:
1. As long as editorial groups comply with requests to remove copyrighted
material posted by users, things should be ok.  Assuming it's not some
systematic publishing of copyright material that is usually on a pay-for-use
access site, I have a hard time seeing substantive damages being an issue.  

If we want to start getting DMCA protection as a safe harbor, we really need
to better research the requirements.  There's a lot of wrong information and
assumptions about the implications of the DMCA for indymedia.  

2. Libel is more tricky, and the bizarre thing is that the degree of
editorial control you exercise on the newswire really might be used in
assessing your liability for libel posted by your users.  

I stuck some links on useful resources here:
http://dc.indymediagonewild.org/tiki-index.php?page=Libel+Resources

Personally, I think it's a risky and unwise gamble to assume that a hands-
off policy on the newswire is going to excuse you of libel liability for
what gets posted there.  Even in the best case of which case law is seen as
relevant, you're not libel until someone notifies your group about the
libelous material, but once you are notified not acting absolutely leaves
you in the lurch.  

I don't want to misrepresent anything, so I'd suggest reading over the
resources (the cubby v compuserve and prodigy cases seem like the most
likely relevant cases).  

 - John


> -----Original Message-----
> From: imc-legal-bounces at lists.indymedia.org [mailto:imc-legal-
> bounces at lists.indymedia.org] On Behalf Of SuZQ
> Sent: Tuesday, March 23, 2004 8:16 PM
> To: imc-legal at lists.indymedia.org
> Cc: micro.zen at verizon.net
> Subject: [Imc-legal] Questions on liability
> 
> Hi.  We at Philly IMC have a question.  We currently have no policy to
> hide any articles from our newswire; instead, we use a ratings system to
> (hopefully) cycle harmful articles off the front page quickly; however,
> they do remain on the newswire.  The question is, if we were to adopt a
> policy to remove certain articles (copyright violations, slander/libel,
> incitement to crime, etc.) would that increase our liability for articles
> that appear in the open newswire?  If we are sued over articles that
> appear in the open newswire, as IMC New Jersey was last month, can we
> legitimately claim the defense, "We claim no responsibility for articles
> in the open publishing newswire, as we have no editorial process to censor
> them," or is it better policy to simply hide posts that might cause us
> liability?
> 
> Thanks!
> -Susanna
> 
> ****************************************************************
> "Prison is a crime against humanity."
> "Political prisoners: they are inside for us.  We are outside for them."
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Imc-legal mailing list
> Imc-legal at lists.indymedia.org
> http://lists.indymedia.org/mailman/listinfo/imc-legal



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