how the traditional media clasifications fail to protect in t.txt

1000 HOWTOs for various needs [WINDOWS]

disappeared completely beginning with the sixth season episode "Chain
of Command," which aired just before the "Galactic Breasts" thread
started and seemed to spark the discussion. A captain in temporary
command of the program's starship ordered Sirtis' character to "wear a
standard uniform." She hasn't switched back to the revealing uniform
since despite the return of the permissive commanding officer.

18 See note 16 above.

19 Echo networks are also known as shared network systems and
store-and-forward networks. Though messages may enter the network from
a specific point, it passes through many systems before reaching
everyone on the network.

Such systems are organized in a hierarchical tree fashion.  Naturally,
if one of the major hub systems goes down, anyone "downstream" from
that board is cut off until the hub recovers.  In the case of
Knoxville's ILink connection, problems on Data Warp BBS in Houston,
Texas would disrupt the mail flow to and from Knoxville and 10 other
cities. (Boone, Earl. ILink International Network Map.)

Because individual systems vary in how quickly they receive messages
from different points on the network, a message entered in one city
may appear on one BBS the next day and another BBS as much as a week
later. (Public message from a moderator to a user returning from a
suspension on how exchanges were delayed due to slow mail delivery.)
Internet-based discussions tend to appear on member systems within
minutes or hours. (Just try it.)

20 Rose, Lance and Jonathan Wallace. SysLaw, Winona, Minn.: PC
Information Group. p. 15.

21 A similar situation occurs with mail loss, a phenomenon considered
to be tamed but never really controlled. As an example: The author one
day noticed replies to the announcement of a new moderator for a Star
Trek conference. The original message which named the new moderator
never arrived.

22 555 P.2d 556 (Wyo.1976), 2 Med.L.Rptr. 1166.

23 Ibid., 564-567, 2 Med.L.Rptr. at 1173-75.

24 An interesting idea is that the (limited purpose) public figure
status could be extended to include online participants who log on
frequently so that they become well known even if they would be
considered private individuals offline. (Rose and Wallace. p. 75)
Their involvement may not necessarily include participation in debate
conferences but their identity is common. Even stronger a case might
be made for users who post numerous messages on topics in debate
areas. Debate by its very nature (barring academic mock competitions
which is not the issue here) demands that someone place themselves
into the spotlight.

25 Rose and Wallace. pp. 8-17.

26 See a long-standing argument from ILink's BBSPolicy conference
July-August 1992. See generally messaged labeled "Your Freedom, My
Toys" and "Free Speech -- Again." The "common carrier" and "public
forum" principles were initiated by a user.

27 Ibid. Property and privacy rights defended by sysops and network
volunteers.

28 Cavasos, Edward A. "Computer Bulletin Board Systems and The Right
of Reply: Redefining Defamation Liability for a New Technology," 12
Review of Litigation (Fall 1992) pp. 231-248 at 239-240.

29 Your Freedom, My Toys.

30 Rose and Wallace. p. 15.

31 Hunt, Eric. In the "Opinion Conference" thread from the general
Your Freedom, My Toys discussion (August 6, 1992):

"USENET is a full-fledged anarchy. ... It contains some of the most
informative and technical discussion areas available in cyberspace. It
also contains some of the worst message areas in terms of the
signal/noise ratio."

32 Satirical versions may be discovered under alt.fan, however.

33 Krol. p. 131.

34 LuciferNet is a worthy exception. There are no rules, although one
user reportedly was expelled for publicly stating that he hoped to
embarrass the network and its users. That user also was expelled from
the ILink network after several concurrent suspensions.

35 Kapor, Mitch. "Keep the Switches Open. Prodigy: A Cautionary Tale,"
Wired 1.3 (July/August 1993) p. 57.

36 Taylor, Marianne. "Users say computer network is muzzling their
give-and-take," Chicago Tribune, January 7, 1991. sec. 4 p. 1,4 at 4.

37 "The Lessons of the Prodigy Controversy," EFF News 1.00 (December
10, 1990) lines 444-588.

38 Godwin, Mike. "What's Important About the Medphone Libel Case?" 5
EFFector Online No. 5 (April 2, 1993) lines 258-436, at ln. 388-389.

39 On the ILink echomail network, such attempts at disguising "potty
mouth" still warrant warnings from the conference moderator. (Bibich,
Larry. Message dated July 14, 1993 in Politics conference listing
rules by which users should abide.)

40 Gaffin, Adam. Prodigy: Where Is It Going? Available from the files
of the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

41 Di Lello, Edward V. "Functional Equivalency and Its Application to
Freedom of Speech on Computer Bulletin Boards," 26 Columbia Journal of
Law and Social Problems (Winter 1993) pp.  199-247, at 207.

42 Taylor. sec. 4 p. 4.

43 Feder, Barnaby J. "Toward Defining Free Speech in the Computer
Age," The New York Times (November 3, 1991) p. E5.

44 Steele, Shari. April 26, 1993 letter to the National
Telecommunications and Information Administration on behalf of the
Electronic Frontier Foundation. The letter was in response to the
NTIA's request for comments on hate crimes as related to
telecommunications, including computer bulletin boards.

45 Godwin at lines 387-389.

And a good thing too. Earlier this year, Prodigy user Peter Denigris
posted messages to the Money Talk forum that led to a business
disparagement suit being filed against Denigris, an investor who
reportedly lost $9,000 on Medphone stock and encouraged others to
steer clear because the company was financially and managerially
unsecure, and "appears to be a fraud." Prodigy was not named in the
suit. Ibid. See also Lance Rose, "When Modems Squawk, Wall Street
Listens," Wired 1.3 (July/August 1993) p. 30 for a brief article
raising the question of a "chilling effect" that resulted on Prodigy
during the discovery portion of the suit.

46 Feder.

47 Cubby v. CompuServe 776 F.Supp. 135 (S.D.N.Y. 1991)

48 Ibid. The Journalism Forum is run by Cameron Communications Inc.
under contract with CompuServe.

49 Ibid. That statement unfortunately was not the only one at issue as
the court's background statement indicates:

"The allegedly defamatory remarks included a suggestion that
individuals at Skuttlebut gained access to information first published
in Rumorville `through some back door'; a statement that [Skuttlebut
publisher Robert G.] Blanchard was `bounced' from his previous
employer, WABC; and a description of Skuttlebut as a `new start-up
scam.'"

50 Garneau, George. "Ruling protects electronic services," Editor &
Publisher (November 16, 1991) p. 15.

51 Rose and Wallace. p. 12.

52 No attempt is made in this paper to defend known pirate boards such
as Rusty & Edie's or Event Horizons, both of which carried copyrighted
images from porn magazines. (Copies of images from both boards are
available on boards in other cities including Knoxville.)

Event Horizons settled out of court with Playboy (Public message dated
September 18, 1992 by Lance Rose in ILink's BBSPolicy conference).

Rusty & Edie's was temporarily shut down by the FBI after an
investigation by that agency and the Software Publishers Association,
which learned that the board was illegally distributing commercial
software. (Hobbs, Michael A. "FBI Shuts Bulletin Board -- Copyright
Probe Begun," Cleveland Plain Dealer, February 17, 1993. See also a
message dated February 27, 1993 in the ILink BBSPolicy conference
noting the board's return after one month.)

53 See a series of alt.censorship posts on USENET dated mid-July 1993.
Copy available from author if archives cannot be located.

54 Sumrada, Bobbie. "Users' Etiquette Guide to Interlink," ILink
information packet as file ILGUIDE.ZIP. Note that ILink(sm) has since
replaced the term Interlink, which was registered by a package
delivery service (public posting supported by LegalTrac index).

55 Your Freedom, My Toys.

56 Ibid.

57 Di Lello. pp. 225-226.

58 Rose. Cyberspace and the Legal Matrix: Laws or Confusion?
Available from the files of the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

59 Ibid. at line 360.

60 Your Freedom, My Toys. See specifically messages by Glenn Sieb.

61 Taviss, Michael L. "Dueling forums: the public forum doctrine's
failure to protect the electronic forum," 60 University of Cincinnati
Law Review. (Winter 1992) pp. 757-795 at 788.

62 Sumrada. For notes on extraneous ASCII, see the sections labeled
"Don't quote excessively" and "How to bug your fellow BBSer."

See also the "Intelec International E-Mail Network Operational
Guidelines." The Intelec Network Information File. (May 1993) The
latest release is available on computer bulletin boards as
IN-yymm.ZIP, where yy is the year and mm is the month.

This document, an unretrievably terse accounting of the network rules,
spells out in no uncertain terms that signatures can be no longer than
three lines and "taglines," the parting witticisms after a signature,
may be only one line.

Some other networks and/or sysops are not as generous.

63 Rose and Wallace. pp. 8-10.

64 Ibid. pp. 15-16.

65 Though high school libraries and bookstores have been known to
accept such restrictions, the concept that they as a whole abhor the
behavior defends the free expression and distribution of all ideas.

66 Pollack, Andrew. "Free-Speech Issues Surround Computer Bulletin
Board Use," The New York Times (November 12, 1984), pp.  A1, D4. See
also, Stiff, David. "Computer Bulletin Boards Fret Over Liability for
Stolen Data," Wall Street Journal (November 9, 1984) p. 33.

67 From an announcement in the early 1993 on Data World BBS' news
screen. That message has since expired and is no longer available.

68 Nathan, Paco Xander. "Jackson Wins, Feds Lose," Wired 1.2 (May/June
1993) p. 20. Federal District Judge Sam Sparks cited two Federal acts
which the Secret Service violated in its investigation of Steve
Jackson Games: the Privacy Protection Act barring government officials
from searching publishers, and the Electronic Communications Privacy
Act severely limiting who can intercept and read private electronic
mail.

69 Lehrer, David. "Akron Anomaly BBS Update," 5 Computer underground
Digest No. 56, File 1. The update by the sysops' father has been
widely circulated around the Internet; this reference to CuD is only
one of several where the report can be obtained. The editors at CuD
note:

"Subsequent events indicated that the raid was an excessive exercise
in local law enforcement zeal. Under pressure, the sysop pleaded
guilty to a minor misdemeanor charge to avoid costly legal
entanglements. But, the case continues to raise issues ..."

70 Kapor. "Where is the Digital Highway Really Heading?" Wired 1.3
(July/August 1993), pp. 53-59, 94.

71 Rose and Wallace. pp. 71-74.

72 Kapor. "Legal and Policy Projects," EFF News 1.03 (March 7, 1991)
ln. 115-470, at ln. 117-123, 157-198.

73 See: Di Lello, note 41 above;

Sassan, Anthony J. "Comparing apples to oranges: the need for a new
media classification," 5 Software Law Journal (December 1992) pp.
821-844; and

Taviss, note 61 above.

74 Schwartz, John. "Sex Crimes on Your Screen?" Newsweek (December 23,
1991) p. 66. After a user received computer graphic files of minors
engaged in sex acts in his private mailbox, America Online president
Steve Case said: "People ask, `How can you permit this?' It's the same
question that could be asked to the postmaster general."

______________________________________________________________________
Jonathan Bell                          Internet: [e-mail]