There’s a story worth paying attention to in The Wall Street Journal (available via MediaChannel.org): Blogger Faces Lawsuit Over Comments Posted by Readers. I firmly believe that bloggers themselves need to make sure they follow commonly-held standards about libel, copyright violation, fair use, and other legal niceties (and not simply because it’s required.) But fact-checking and/or editing your comments? I’d worry about the negative message that sends your readers, and know that going down the slippery slope of editing/vetting comments could very well create more troubles than it solves. I know, for example, that the standard for bulletin boards and other forums used to be the ‘hands off’ model - or in other words, to treat the service as a common carrier instead of an adjunct of your own publishing model, following the theory that AT&T can’t be held liable if you transmit information about bomb-building over their telephone lines, for example. And, in fact, the article’s initial conclusion supports my stance:
Legal analysts said the case falls into somewhat murky legal territory, but that Mr. Wall may have some protection from liability under federal law. Courts generally have held that the operators of computer message boards and mailing lists cannot be held liable for statements posted by other people. Blogs might be viewed in a similar light, they said.
Of course, you want to reserve the right to delete truly egregious comments (not to mention spam or off-topic postings) - but I’d recommend that you do so as part of an overall comment policy that you make readily available to your readers - and you do so with a very light hand. Should bloggers fact-check their commenters, though? I’d argue against it. First of all, in an open comments system, anyone has the right to reply, to refute, or to take on critics. And secondly, unless the errors are truly glaring, I think it’s not necessary. Agree? Disagree? Have at it…!
Technorati Tags : Blogger+Lawsuit, Aaron+Wall, Blog+Comments, Wall+Street+Journal
Wow, that is a very interesting article. I will be very disappointed if Mr. Wall looses in court. These large company’s shouldn’t have a say on what the public says on thier blogs. That’s part of the beauty of the blogging world, the freedom of speech. I never thought about fact checking blogger comments, and I do take a very light hand when deleting comments, however, I quickly remove the spam, no second thoughts. Very thought provoking article, thanks for sharing.
If it comes to that, I’d sooner turn off the comment tool.
In my not-so-humble opinion, this case is going to be thrown out of the courts. The line between a blog and a message board is very slight. And you have more admin privileges on a message board.
Great post. You must post the results of the case after a decision is reached.