Chill This!

With threats of legal action, it’s quite fortuitous that the California courts have recently ruled on the issue of defamation on the internet.

From MSNBC.com:

The California Supreme Court ruled Monday that bloggers and participants in Internet bulletin board groups cannot be sued for posting defamatory statements made by others.

In deciding a case closely watched by free speech groups, the court said a federal law gives immunity from libel suits not only to Internet service providers, like AOL, but also to bloggers and other users of their services.

“Subjecting Internet service providers and users to defamation liability would tend to chill online speech,” today’s unanimous ruling said…

Other articles in the SF Chronicle and by Reuters, and the entire ruling.