Law to change on internet 'trolls'- effect on SF?

[Jeffrey Shaw]

Facebook has recently been forced to identify people (trolls) in order to allow a civil prosecution for libel. Facebook are themselves of course not liable for the libel that people posted.

But libel is a tort (civil wrong); so there would be no "prosecution" at all.

[Anna B]

I'm also interested in the definition of trolling. A hearty, interesting discussion with opposing views is not trolling or bullying. Rudeness or personal attacks, on the other hand have no place on any forum.

 

On a personal note, I would like to see Sheffield Forum moderators, who on the whole do a very good job, give reasons when they suspend a thread. They often say the thread is 'closed for review.' If that is so, I would like to see the conclusions they've come to, otherwise they might as well just put 'Closed.'

[natjack]

Why would such a move affect people who haven't broken any laws ? why would such people need an opportunity to delete accounts? wouldn't the forum owner be guilty of conspiring to pervert the course of justice or whatever the equivalent would be in the target country by alerting users and allowing such behaviour ? if the site owner did not alert anyone to such a move who would sue them and why ?

So why did you post what you posted in #28? You were trying to imply that if the owner decided to move his private club to another country people who were members of it, might be running the risk of breaking laws in that country. Even though they might not know the laws of that country or even be aware that their site was based in that country. But that we were probably all safe, for now.

 

Are you even following your own train of thought on this thread? And, more to the point, have you been given permission by the owner to even post such conjectures as you did in #28?

[Anna B]

Mod Note

 

Just to clarify this point, comments posted on internet forums are not hearsay, or regarded as a private chat between friends and never have been.

 

The website owner is already responsible for any content that is published on the website that is allowed to remain after a legal complaint has been issued.

 

The original poster is, and always has been, responsible for the content of any posts they make, whether those posts are subsequently removed or not, please note "removal" does not mean there is no record of the post, these are available to the authorities.

 

Further a website, such as this one is regarded as a publication in the same class as a newspaper and is bound by the same rules.

 

Also because of the international nature of the internet, what you post may not break any laws in this country but could break laws in the country in which it is read, for example holocaust denial is not a crime in the UK but it is in Germany and you can be extradited for this.

 

All this ruling is doing is making it harder for people to break existing laws and remain anonymous, the authorities already have and use the ability to trace such people, this is just extending the same abilities to civil proceedings.

 

Which is why the moderation team remove posts which we think may come under these rules and as this is a private forum we reserve the right to remove anything we perceive as breaking our rules or the law of the land.

 

Well this explains why Sheffield forum has lost its bite lately and is now full of banality rather than interesting and cogent political argument.

 

What happened to free speech? The Internet is the People's Press. The powers that be have been desperate to control it since they discovered its massive power and influence.

 

Looks like they're succeeding.

[esme]

Any suggestions or criticisms of the moderation of this forum should be forwarded to the Helpdesk where the Admin team will deal with it, discussion of SF moderation is not allowed in the general forums.

 

The Admin team moderate the Moderation team, if they tell us to do something, we do it, they are the ones you need to complain to if the mods are getting things wrong.

 

And before anyone says it doesn't make any difference, I can assure you it does, I've had my own moderation corrected by Admin before now I just do my best to ensure it doesn't happen again

[esme]

So why did you post what you posted in #28? You were trying to imply that if the owner decided to move his private club to another country people who were members of it, might be running the risk of breaking laws in that country. Even though they might not know the laws of that country or even be aware that their site was based in that country. But that we were probably all safe, for now.

 

Are you even following your own train of thought on this thread? And, more to the point, have you been given permission by the owner to even post such conjectures as you did in #28?

I believe it's a fair point in response to the one you were making

Obviously as it's a private owned forum, be too much to expect the owner to give anyone a say, not even the people that are running it for him, but wouldn't it be a bit dangerous, say, moving it to Germany and letting your members run the risk of infringing unknown laws without even giving them the option of deleting their accounts first? There must be some duty of care?

 

The people running it might even get sued if that happened, not saying they would, or that a move would even happen, so you're all probably safe, for the moment.

Which seemed to imply that any user who fell foul of such a move might have grounds to sue the forum owner, my apologies if I misread that.

Well this explains why Sheffield forum has lost its bite lately and is now full of banality rather than interesting and cogent political argument.

 

What happened to free speech? The Internet is the People's Press. The powers that be have been desperate to control it since they discovered its massive power and influence.

 

Looks like they're succeeding.

This is a private forum, you do not have free speech on this forum, you never had free speech on this forum.

 

If you want free speech on a forum, feel free to start your own where you can be held responsible for the content.

[mort]

And that i think is the final word on this subject.

closing.