Europe considers tough online privacy law

Europe is considering a new law that would require Internet companies like Amazon and Facebook to obtain consent from consumers to  use their personal data. The law would force companies to delete personal data forever at the consumer’s request or face fines for failing to comply. -db From The New York Times, January 23, 2012, [...]

Comments using pseudonyms of higher quality

Disqus which provides commenting services for news websites and blogs says that those using pseudonyms are the most likely to post quality comments that elicit positive feedback (likes) and replies. Sixty-one percent use pseudonyms, 35 percent are anonymous and 4 percent use their real identity. -db From the Poynter Institute, January 11, 2012, by Jeff [...]

Free speech: School district struggle to regulate student-teacher contact on social media

As the social media becomes a useful tool for teachers to contact students about work or to help reluctant or shy students, abuses have surfaced with teachers making inappropriate contact leading in some cases to sexual abuse. Citing free speech issues, a Missouri judge recently threw out a new law banning contact on the social [...]

New Jersey teacher’s job in jeopardy over Facebook post disparaging students

A New Jersey elementary school teacher may lose her job for calling her students “future criminals.” An administrative law judge said she should be fired. The teacher intended that her comments be seen only by  her Facebook friends. -db From a commentary in Mobiledia, November 11, 2011, by Janet Maragioglio. Full story  

Opinion: Business reporter calls for transparency in financial status

Transparency is needed as shown by the examples of LinkedIn, Groupon and Demand Media who claimed to be more profitable than they were before they were forced to show their hand and their actual financial data as they prepared to go public, writes James Temple for the San Francisco Chronicle. Temple opposes the bill introduced [...]

Louisiana student sues in federal court after suspended for criticizing teacher on Facebook

A Baton Rouge high school student sued school officials for suspending him and throwing him out of the honors club for criticizing a teacher on Facebook. The student made the comment from his home and removed it before school the next day. The boy’s parents contend that the comment was intended as a joke and [...]

Charges dropped against North Carolina student thrown off campus for criticizing college

The Catawba Valley Community College dropped charges against a student, allowing him back on campus after they suspended him for two semesters for criticizing the college’s aggressive marketing of a debit card company to its students. But the college has yet to change its policy regarding free speech online and is still requiring the student [...]

Coverage of ‘Occupy Wall Street’ growing

Media coverage of the protests on Wall Street in New York City is picking up steam four weeks after people began to camp out near the site of their protests. Increased media coverage has seemed to provide the movement with some legitimacy even as opinions of the protests vary. Protests are now planned in locations [...]

Student punished for criticizing college deal with debit card company

A North Carolina college student was thrown out of a classroom and barred from campus after he went on Facebook to criticize the college for its marketing of a debit card company to students. “CVCC not only must reinstate Marc Bechtol, but also must revise its unconstitutional policy,” FIRE Vice President of Programs Adam Kissel [...]

Man challenges constitutionality of federal cyberstalking law

A man indicted for threats on Facebook is challenging the federal cyberstalking law on the grounds that the law makes free speech a crime and is vague and overbroad. The Pennsylvania man is charged with making a series of threats on Facebook after he was fired from his job at a theme park. The man [...]

Free speech: Mexican citizens murdered for using Internet to speak out against drug violence

Mexican drug cartels are murdering journalists and bloggers using the Internet and social media to protest the cartels’ drug-related violence. The Electronic Freedom Foundation makes some suggestions for Mexican citizens who want to continue the protests, “EFF recommends that bloggers who are concerned about their security and safety should post under a pseudonym, use Tor [...]

Opinion: Google and others can perform a great public service by identifying online ‘journalism’

Writing in ZDNet, Sam Diaz says that Google, Facebook and Twitter have the information that could enable them with the help of the analysis of real journalists to identify which blog sites, tweets and news outlets should be labeled “journalism.” Diaz says “news” is different from “journalism” and the latter must be identified and labeled [...]

Parents go to court for details of $100 million Facebook donation to reform Newark schools

With support from the American Civil Liberties Union, the Newark Secondary Parent Council (SPC) is asking the City of Newark to release correspondence from the city to Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg involving  Zuckerberg’s $100 million gift to the Newark schools so that the parents will know of any stipulations the gift might carry. Said Laura Baker [...]

EFF director argues for use of online pseudonyms

With advent of the Google+ policy requiring users to identify by “the name your friend, family or do-workers usually call you,” Jillian York, a director for the Electronic Freedom Foundation argues that the benefits of pseudonyms outweigh the negatives, particularly for gays and other people subject to violence or harassment such as victims of domestic [...]

China: Microbloggers defy censorship in relaying facts of high-speed train crash

Chinese censors are failing to contain the flood of online messages about the wreck of a high-speed train outside Wenzhou that killed 40 people and injured 191. Messages total 26 million. Citizens began the posts right after the accident and in many instances foiled the manipulations of government officials. In Wenzhou, officials ordered lawyers not to [...]

North Carolina college bans student from graduation for negative Facebook post

Saint Augustine’s college has banned a student from graduation ceremonies after the student posted comments on Facebook critical about how the college was handling its recovery from a tornado. FIRE claims that in the absence of a policy sanctioning the punishment, the college improvised by declaring that a Facebook post challenging their decisions could keep [...]

Multiple sources including those on Twitter pose challenges for journalists

As one journalist described it, he has “a personalized wire service” of over 2,000 sources on Twitter who provide him with tips and on-location news reports. While this sort of access is of inestimable value, it present immense difficulties as well. Writing in GigaOM, Mathew Ingram says that with gathering so much information on the [...]

Facebook downplays trashing of Google in planted stories

Facebook hired a PR firm to persuade reporters and privacy advocates to write critical stories about Google’s Social Circle. Facebook denied that they had acted unethically, “No ’smear’ campaign was authorized or intended. Instead, we wanted third parties to verify that people did not approve of the collection and use of information from their accounts [...]

Legislator seeks to set privacy rules for Facebook

A state senator from San Leandro has introduced legislation that would require Facebook and other social networking sites to let new users establish privacy settings at the same time they register. State Sen. Ellen Corbett, a Democrat, argues that users shouldn’t have to give up their private information by default. Opponents object to government imposition [...]

Facebook to feds: Don’t make us disclose sources of political ads

The social networking site Facebook is arguing that when it comes to disclosing the backers of political advertising, size matters. Federal regulations require political advertising to say who’s behind it and who the money came from. But there are exceptions. Some ads, such as bumper stickers, can be too small for disclosure statements. In a [...]

WikiLeaks founder says social media operate as tools for U.S. intelligence

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange called Facebook the “most appalling spy machine that has ever been invented.” Assange pointed out that a trove of information about people, their relationships, conversations and locations exists on the social media and that U.S. intelligence agencies could bring pressure on Facebook, Yahoo, Google and others to extract that information. -db [...]

Free speech: Police officer gets desk duty over indiscreet posting on Facebook

Free speech rights of police officers in the social media are clashing with their law enforcement responsibilities as illustrated by a recent case in Albuquerque where a police officer listed his occupation on Facebook as “human waste disposal.” A TV station discovered the gaffe after the officer was involved in a fatal off-duty shooting in February. In [...]

Facebook offering resources to journalists to help them make greater use of the social network

Following Twitter’s example, Facebook has plans to help journalists use the network to greater advantage. It wants to provide more information on its service to make it more than just a social site. Facebook has launched a page that will be a resource for journalists with “best practices” showing how reporters have used Facebook effectively [...]

New Jersey first grade teacher suspended for Facebook reference to students as ‘future criminals’

A first grade teacher from Paterson, New Jersey was relieved of her teaching duties after she posted on Facebook that she felt like a warden supervising future criminals. The teacher was suspended after parents complained. The teacher’s lawyer said the comments on Facebook were on her own time and to friends, “My feeling is that [...]

California Supreme Court orders rehearing in case of juror posting on Facebook

The California Supreme Court ordered the state appeals court to reconsider a case of a Sacramento juror required to release Facebook posts he made during a 2010 criminal trial. Both the juror and Facebook challenged subpoenas of the posts. -db From The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, April 1, 2011, by Rachel Costello. [...]

Political turmoil: Social media face challenges in remaining neutral

Social media sites are struggling to achieve the right balance in remaining neutral during the Middle East and North Africa uprisings and allowing freedom of expression. A recent case in which Flickr removed photos of officers from Egypt’s state security force demonstrated the difficulties. Is it feasible in some instances to remain neutral when people [...]

Libel rules with impunity on social network

The younger generation is filing few libel suits for such as lies and character assassination, fueling speculation that they have greater tolerance of “hurly, burly Internet conversation.” Or is it just that young people realize that bloggers have limited resources, decimating the chances of obtaining damages? -db From the Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune, March 14, [...]

High school student suspended for critical Facebook posting

A Mississippi high school senior is suing his school administration in federal court for suspending him for a rap song he wrote off campus in his free time and posted on Facebook. The song criticized two coaches he observed who allegedly flirted with female students and contacted intimate  body parts of the students. The senior [...]

New York middle school parents sue after school fails to censor newspaper

Claiming among other things that the Mahopac Central School District allowed anti-Semitic comments in their daughter’s middle school newspaper, parents sued the district. In their complaint, the parents cited the Hazelwood v. Kuhlmeier standard that  the administration should have censored the newspaper in support of the educational goal of fostering tolerance and preventing discrimination. -db [...]

Social media the new revolutionary pamphlet

While conceding that the social media did not cause the Egyptian revolution, Sam Gustin in Wired writes that the social media made significant contributions to the revolution’s success, a development that offers hope to repressed peoples of the Middle East. Gustin quotes Sascha Meinrath of the New America Foundation’s Open Technology Initiative: “In the same [...]

California appeals court upholds order requiring juror to release his online postings

After a jury foreman wrote on Facebook during the trial of alleged gang members that the proceedings were boring, defense attorneys issued subpoenas to Facebook and the foreman for the postings. The judge ordered the foreman to authorize Facebook to release the postings. That order was upheld by the appeals court without comment. -db From [...]

Ambulance company settles with NLRB over employee’s Facebook posting

American Medical Response of Connecticut agreed to settle a suit brought by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) after the company fired an employee for criticizing her boss and calling him derogatory names on Facebook. The NLRB contended that the firing was illegal in that employees have the right to discuss workplace issues with fellow [...]

Juror in gang case is contesting judge’s order to turn over Facebook posting

A Sacramento Superior Court judge gave a juror 10 days to comply with an order to turn over postings he made on Facebook last year during a trial concerning a gang beating. Lawyers for the Killa Mobb gang are asking for the postings to make sure that the juror was not biased. A lawyer for [...]

Egypt shuts down Internet in record time

Los Angeles Times January 29, 2011 With a few phone calls to the likes of YouTube, Facebook and Twitter, the Egyptian government  stymied the social media, effectively limiting its role in organizing the demonstrations against President Hosni Mubarak. -db

High school student insulting teacher online gets suspension from school expunged

San Francisco Chronicle January 29, 2010 By Bob Egelko SACRAMENTO COUNTY – A high school sophomore suspended for calling his teacher a “fat ass” on Facebook had the infraction erased from his record after his principal conceded that the posting was not disruptive to the school environment. The American Civil Liberties Union had argued that [...]

Florida student vindicated after suspension for criticizing teacher online

A former student at a Florida high school who was suspended for Facebook posts criticizing a teacher settled with the school district. The district expunged the record of the suspension and paid $15,000 in attorney’s fees. -db Student Press Law Center January 20, 2011 By Aly Brumback FLORIDA – A former Pembroke Pines Charter High [...]

Internet freedom reaffirmed in recent Chicago case

While the Blockowicz parents suffered greatly from scurrilous posts about their daughter, First Amendment Center’s Douglas Lee says their attempt to force a website to remove the posts was rightly denied in federal court thus making the internet “an even freer environment for speech.” -db First Amendment Center Commentary January 27, 2011 By Douglas Lee [...]

Suit filed for alleged online defamation of 13-year-old

Courthouse News Service January 11, 2011 By Bridget Freeland The parents of a seventh grader sued two of their daughter’s classmates and their parents for defamation alleging that the parents allowed their children to hack into the girl’s Gmail, pose as the girl and post “vile, sexual and violent” comments including that the girl was [...]

Federal law may save woman fired for Facebook comments about company and supervisor

All agree that an employee making critical remarks on Facebook about her company and supervisor violated company policy, but did the company violate federal labor law by firing the woman? -db Citizens Media Law Project Commentary December 24, 2010 By Andrew Mirsky A Connecticut company suspended and then fired an employee for making disparaging comments [...]

Facebook juggles civility and free speech in policing site

A special team within Facebook has the difficult job of policing hate and harassment on their site, forming a virtual police squad utilizing unprecedented power to regulate speech. -db The New York Times December 12, 2010 By Miguel Helft PALO ALTO, Calif. — Mark Zuckerberg, the co-founder and chief executive of Facebook, likes to say [...]

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