Appeals Court Says Internet Content Should Be Held To Standards Of Strictest Jurisdiction
from the pandora's-box-just-opened... dept
One of the issues we've talked about repeatedly over the years is the question of what is the "internet jurisdiction." Since content is available anywhere there's an internet connection, under which laws should it apply. If you think that just because it appears on the internet, anyone's laws apply, then you reach an untenable situation where all online content is controlled by the strictest, most draconian rules out there. That makes little sense. And yet some courts still think this is the appropriate interpretation of the law. In the US it's already troubling enough that the issue of indecency is measured on an amorphous "community standards" basis, but when it comes to the internet, what community applies? As we discussed a few years ago, this raises all sorts of legal questions. Chris points us to a recent ruling in the 11th Circuit Court of appeals on a pornography case, where the court seems to have made a ruling that effectively says all online content should be held to the standards of the strictest communities. Thus, an erotica website targeting a NY subculture should be held to the standards of a southern bible belt rural community? That seems ridiculous, but it's what the court said.In this case, a guy who produced porn content in California was tried in Tampa, Florida, because investigators downloaded his content there:
The Atlanta-based court rejected arguments by Little's attorneys that applying a local community standard to the Internet violates the First Amendment because doing so means material can be judged according to the standards of the strictest communities.Of course, the court did say that punishment had to be limited to just looking at how many people in that smaller community accessed the content -- which could limit the punishment given by the court, but it still seems problematic. Other courts, including one in California, have found differently on similar questions, so it seems likely that, at some point, this issue will finally go back to the Supreme Court. Unfortunately, it seems likely that the Supreme Court will focus on what counts as "community standards" rather than whether or not laws against obscenity even make legal sense under the First Amendment.
In other words, the materials might be legal where they were produced and almost everywhere else. But if they violate the standards of one community, they are illegal in that community and the producers may be convicted of a crime.
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Filed Under: community standards, jurisdiction, obsenity
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I can picture Rush Limbaugh having a celebratory OxyContin for this one.
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*inebriated comment #3
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Am I hallucinating?
What the hell was in that drink anyways ....
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Just because I don't like obscenity doesn't mean I won't fight like hell for your ability to view smut that should be legal in your local!
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It's a catastrophic nightmare and pitchfork mobs should be assembled to overthrow the retards responsible for this injustice.
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I have to either talk to some of you folks or else study your church the way I have plenty of other organized religion to find out if the stuff I hear about you guys is as fucked up as some would have me believe.
Please don't infer any offense; I've got the same issues with just about every other religion out there, and like I said, I am admittedly rather ignorant when it comes to official LDS positions....
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http://rfmorg.wordpress.com/2008/10/06/line-upon-line-part-1/
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While he hasn't given up the trolling entirely, let's give credit where credit is due.
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While he hasn't given up punching me in the face entirely, let's give credit where credit is due.
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Re: Good
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Basically, the moral code which apparently drove this decision itself runs afoul of this case law.
Since Christianity is considered illegal speech in parts of the world that do have internet connection, it can therefore be inferred based on the ruling that discussing Christianity online is illegal. The point, however, is not that discussing Christianity should be illegal, rather that the ruling ahs implications which clearly have not been considered.
You probably missed all that, though, from up there on your soapbox.
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Community standards
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Re: Community standards
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Re: Re: Community standards
And you should be prosecuted for breaking the second rule.
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Re: Community standards
decent people shouldn't be using the internet. they would be happier doing something else.
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Is it hockey season on the Styx?
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Or worse
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so does this mean ......
The internet is worldwide but I can't really see an American judge agreeing to the the rule of Sharia law for instance.
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Re: so does this mean ......
To defend itself against a lawsuit by the widows of three American Soldiers who died on one of its planes in Afghanistan, a sister company of the private military firm Blackwater has asked a federal court to decide the case using Islamic law, known as Shari'a.
The lawsuit "is governed by the law of Afghanistan," Presidential Airways argued in a Florida federal court. "Afghan law is largely religion-based and evidences a strong concern for ensuring moral responsibility, and deterring violations of obligations within its borders."
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Re: Re: so does this mean ......
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Ba‘al Zebûb is indeed enjoying a Popsicle
... And I agree with all of the above
Is that one of the signs of the apocalypse?
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Don't do that, TAM!
Now you have me wondering: I *figured* some of your posts read like "Sam I Am". Or do you just post anonymously and battle with yourself? I know you *claim* not to do that, but considering the fact you just admitted to using sock-puppets, you never can tell.
(Whoa -- he's like Techdirt's very own "Bond Villian" -- "Doctor No(brain)" :)
But yeah, this decision makes me get a rather disturbing visual of Limbaugh, wallowing naked in a huge vat of spoiled mayonaise......
(gaaaaagh!) :(
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Re: Ba�al Zebûb is indeed enjoying a Popsicle
As a card carrying "bible nutter" I can definitively say no it isn't. In fact Mike DH and Tam aren't mentioned by name at all.
Still, It's scary as hell.
It seems to me that if this standard were held world wide any site with a woman wearing anything but a burka would have trouble.
Colg
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Re: Re: Baâ��al Zeb�»b is indeed enjoying a Popsicle
Ah .... in France a woman WITH a burka would be illegal. With conflicting laws, you's have to just pull the plug on the internet and jail Al Gore.
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Re: Re: beelzebub etc...
Can you imagine if you could actually be shipped from the US to stand in an iranian court for offending the nation's morals?
US do as i say not as i do policy coupled with your economic muscle is a great tool to lord it over weak governments the world over (hi ACTA!).
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Canadian law and jurisdiction
WHAT ever you do where ever you do it canadian law applies
so if i put a website in iran while local laws might say i could do something canadian law would preclude it maybe.
also in a way and more rarely this may conflict with local law and actually protect the canadian form prosecution abroad and its why americans can't sue me for any DMCA violations even if i hosted it in the USA.
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Re: Canadian law and jurisdiction
That are some laws, mostly sexual abuse of minor type stuff, which legislation says applies to all Canadians, anywhere in the world.
The stated goal is to stop the practice of "child sex tourism".
I'm not aware of others.
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Re: Re: Canadian law and jurisdiction
Something like, as a NZ citizen, no matter where you are, NZ law applies when it comes to things being forbidden.
Which is to say, if it's forbidden under NZ law, but allowed where you are, it's still forbidden for you to do it.
So far as I'm aware the 'reverse' is that NZ law applies to anyone in NZ regardless of citizenship, no that you can avoid getting in trouble for doing something that's against the law where you did it but allowed under NZ law.
And yeah, the whole sexual tourism thing is one of the reasons for that.
It also makes it a lot easier to keep order in military units stationed outside the country, too.
probably helps with drug trafficking issues and other stuff as well.
of course, I'm not a lawyer or anything, and i may be miss remembering, but... *shrugs*
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Re: Re: Re: Canadian law and jurisdiction
That still wouldn't apply in the situation this article is about. The creator created the content and made it available in a jurisdiction where doing so is legal. he is presumably the equivalent of a 'citizen' of that jurisdiction also.
worst case scenario, logically speaking, he should be required not to take orders from customers in places where it is not legal, if such is possible, and it should be the Buyers, who are violating applicable law, who get in trouble.
so it seems to me, anyway.
If we were applying the same principle to the subject and pretended states in the USA were separate legal jurisdictions...
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Re: Canadian law and jurisdiction
WHAT ever you do where ever you do it canadian law applies
the reverse is also true. for example: if you die in canada you also die in the real world.
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This is weird we havebeen here before ....
The internet should be as simple as ... "You dont like it dont dial there"
Which is where we will eventually get after people start thinking of the internet as the new phone system.
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http://www.textfiles.com/news/sysopjl.txt
Another one, in 1995. Two California-based BBS owners were convicted in Memphis for the adult content on their website.
http://www.spectacle.org/795/amateur.html
A terrorist-related case:
http://cu-digest.org/CUDS5/cud569.txt
There were at least a few more convictions, and I know this because I was a co-sysop of a mainstream BBS during those years. I'm in the process of searching through my old emails and notes to see if I can pull up the names of the defendants as well as active links to any web pages with relevant information.
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Jurisdictions
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everything is ilegal
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Does Federal Law Preempt?
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The charges have little (pun) to do with the website, but rather with DVDs purchased and shipped to the particular conservative southern county. The prosecution rests almost entirely on that one act, as it is interstate commerce in obscene materials, and with the materials being shipping into the area, it is the standards of that area that judged the level of obscenity.
So it wasn't about the download, as much as it was about physical product shipped. Most obscenity cases are made in the same manner, because the physical product is easier to explain in court that attempting to set the standards for web traffic. This case is entirely about physical product delivered when ordered from the internet.
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Porno and SCOTUS
It may come down to getting it to change what it has done in the past.
In the past content was of a physical nature, now it is not.
Personally I am of the opinion that where the content is uploaded that should be the foundation of jurisdiction for that content, what ever the content might be.
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Off shoring our legal system?
Is the Strictest Jurisdiction for porn China or Iran? Oh and you can't write about tank Man or democracy or Christianity, Judaism, Islam or much of anything else because it is illegal somewhere.
I guess that leave LOL Cats.
This should go down pretty quickly in the courts. I just hope it does.
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Re: Off shoring our legal system?
Let's just say that the government picked content that is likely to be found obscene by a jury of little old ladies and bible thumpers in almost any part of the US. Putting the case into one of the most conservative counties in the US just sort of sealed the deal.
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Re: Re: Off shoring our legal system?
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Pornography
Then would you say laws against child pornography may not make legal sense under the First Amendment?
That's the question that gets to the heart of how fundamentally illogical it is to defend pornography!
If the pro-pornography person is consistent and says that child pornography should be legal, then he will vilify himself and make people think he's a pedophile, so he wouldn't dare say that. If on the other hand he says that child pornography should not be legal, then he is completely inconsistent within his own thinking and any argument he makes for the legality of pornography will be illogical and indefensible because of that.
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Re: Pornography
By your logic, because minors are not allowed to drink, vote, or be in the army, those things should also be unconstitutional.
What you are doing is mixing a legal issue (age of consent) with an expression (pornography).
Just because you cannot drink at 20 but you can drink at 21 doesn't make drinking or producing liquor illogical.
To quote the python: "all wood burns, thus all that burns is wood". It's a fail.
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Re: Pornography
If you're going to bring up child pornography then it would make more sense to draw a comparison between the availability of child pornography and the availability of equivalent or more serious crimes such as that of non statutory rape, or murder. As TAM points out, the distinction you pick is one that allows pro pornography folk to be entirely consistent; they are not necessarily pro statutory rape.
Whether or not you believe the first amendment applies to distribution of criminal evidence, that has nothing to do with non child pornography.
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Re: Pornography
Look, the whole deal of what's so horribly wrong with child porn and pedophilia in general is that an adult's implicit position of power precludes the possibility of consent.
As far as I'm concerned though, consenting adults can do whatever the hell they want to each other, even if I think it's gross.
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Re: Pornography
the only difference being that it is illegal to produce child porn. Last time I checked it is not illegal to produce puke porn or whatever it was the the case involved.
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Re: Pornography
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Strictest community standard
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Scar them for life
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Eleventh Circuit on subjecting citizens of far-away places to suit
The Eleventh Circuit, however, has not followed this approach, holding, for example, in Licciardello v. Lovelady, 544 F.3d 1280 (11th Cir. 2008), that anyone who commits a tort affecting someone they know to be a Florida resident to be sued in Florida without violating due process.
The Florida Supreme Court is currently considering this same issue in Internet Solutions Corp. v. Marshall; my colleagues at Public Citizen filed a friend of the court brief urging Florida not to follow the Eleventh Circuit's lead.
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Wow...
Wow... I'm starting my own cult. I wonder what interesting rules we can pass...
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The only community standard...
"An idiot and his rights are soon parted..."
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re: ponography
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