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• Member since: January 9, 2006

My posting summary

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My comments

• Do you suppose? Think again.
  The presupposition this article makes is disturbing, but it seems its just a less dubious matter of the letter of law not accurately corresponding to the spirit of it. Since the third sentence specifies this law is part of the Violence Against Women and Department of Justice Reauthorization Act it seems obvious that this type of prohibited use of the internet only applies when its being used to harass victims of violence against women. (The second definition of 'annoy' on dictionary.com is 'To harass...'.) Certainly a meritless claim by someone who was just 'slightly irritated' (the other basic definition of the word 'annoy') by a web post somewhere would not make it very far in the court system.
  
  The article references a good example of this scope of reference when the owner of the site Annoy.com felt his site would be impacted by the Communications Decency Act, but the courts ruled that this only applied to obscene material, not that which he was delivering. Scope of reference from the letter of the law to the spirit of the law established.
  
  Using common sense to interpret slight ambiguities wouldn't leave much for pundits and lawyers to do, though, would it? Makes for a good read though, especially when its never been hipper to be anti-establishment.

  January 9, 2006

  2 replies