More on the Government’s attempt to control blogs, and the people who comment on them.
HOUSE BILL NO. 1278
Representatives Hamiel, Bolin, Brunner, Carson, Cutler, Deadrick, Fargen, Gibson, Gosch, Greenfield, Hoffman, Hunt, Iron Cloud III, Jensen, Juhnke, Kirkeby, Kopp, Krebs, Lederman, McLaughlin, Moser, Olson (Betty), Schlekeway, Sly, Sorenson, Turbiville, Vanneman, and Verchio and Senators Turbak Berry, Brown, Dempster, and Vehle
FOR AN ACT ENTITLED, An Act to provide for a process of obtaining certain information from online content providers in slander and libel actions.
BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF SOUTH DAKOTA:
Section 1. That chapter 20-11 be amended by adding thereto a NEW SECTION to read as follows:
Any person who allows internet posts shall keep a record of the internet-protocol logs adequate to provide identification and location of otherwise unknown, anonymous, or pseudonymous persons who leave or upload content. However, no person may be compelled to produce such information except in response to a court order.
Section 2. That chapter 20-11 be amended by adding thereto a NEW SECTION to read as follows:
Any party seeking an order compelling production of internet-protocol logs, whether in an action brought under this chapter or under common law shall establish:
(1) That the request for information is made in good faith and not for any improper purpose;
(2) That the information sought relates to a material claim or defense;
(3) That the identifying information is directly and materially relevant to that claim or defense; and
(4) That the information sufficient to establish or to disprove that claim or defense is unavailable from any other source.
Section 3. For the purposes of this Act the term, internet, is the same as the term is defined in § 37-24-41.
You ever have one of those moments where you’re scratching your head over what legislators propose?
“Any person who allows internet posts shall keep a record of the internet-protocol logs adequate to provide identification and location of otherwise unknown, anonymous, or pseudonymous persons who leave or upload content.”
This literally sets the gold standard for Nanny-statism. Not just the annoying “we think it’s for your own good misguided over-altrusitic efforts.” This is more akin to out-and-out a police state type of control fascism.
Frankly, this is the type of thing that should offend South Dakotans to the inner core.
Why? For example….
Let’s (for instance) say my daughter who just turned 13 decides to create a blog designed to give herself an on-line journal to write stories about flying Unicorns. She does it via the blogger platform, a popular and free forum for her to create “Unicorn Land.” It has nothing to do with politics – it’s “All Flying Unicorns – All the time.”
Under the Hamiel/Turbak measure, because the software format allows the ability to post anonymously, or via a pseudonym…. Her flying Unicorn Blog would be subject to what we’ll call “the Hamiel/Turbak Blog Control Act,” and this little 13 year-old redheaded girl would have to install IP Address tracking software as mandated by state government.
Government mandated comment tracking.
This would be like telling newspapers they have to track and be able to identify any anonymous sources for news stories, except in this case, it goes far beyond news.
And the Hamiel/Turbak Blog Control Act should scare everyone witless.
All the way down to prospective unicorn story authors.
This weekend, take a moment to contact your legislator – and tell then they need to kill this ridiculous measure.
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Comments
Here grndznick…HOUSE BILL NO. 1277
http://legis.state.sd.us/sessions/2010/Bill.aspx?File=HB1277P.htm
Just a thought. These aren’t unreasonable or stupid people who treat the legislature or the laws lightly.
Blogs should be rightly flattered.
My guess is that it’s the possibility that the media, as we used to know it, was held accountable i.e. don’t give up a source and go to jail (ala Judith Miller and the Times) and that this is actually holding blogs and the online media to the same standard. High praise indeed.
But that does raise the stakes for bloggers to protect a source.
So this is interesting topic for journalism classes everywhere, should the MSM regain rights of being able to ignore the court or should bloggers lose the rights to publish anything and the truth be damned.
You can frame that question anyway you want to fit your own party or persuasion…it’s still interesting.
You know, I don’t know where I sit on this yet. The unicorns example is a little over the top, because comments can ALWAYS be disabled. But, a reasonable person should not be allowed to do that.
Secondly, don’t you keep I.P. logs of who posts on your site? That’s how you tracked down the weed head, right?
think –
It’s actually a dead on example of the problem with the bill. The issue is that they shouldn’t have to disable comments.
Yes, I keep IP logs, but I’m probably one of the 2 or 3 people who do this in the active political blogosphere who understand the technology.
I’m not sure how in difficult economic times legislators still find time to be preocupied by their own stupidness.
I can’t imagine what these people would do if they were on the job fulltime.
I want to thank Schoenbeck personally the day he defeats Tubak-Berry.
First off I want to say if these are the sponsors I’m a little upset right now. I thought most of them were conservative?
Representatives Hamiel, Bolin, Brunner, Carson, Cutler, Deadrick, Fargen, Gibson, Gosch, Greenfield, Hoffman, Hunt, Iron Cloud III, Jensen, Juhnke, Kirkeby, Kopp, Krebs, Lederman, McLaughlin, Moser, Olson (Betty), Schlekeway, Sly, Sorenson, Turbiville, Vanneman, and Verchio and Senators Turbak Berry, Brown, Dempster, and Vehle
Just a thought PP but why don’t you threaten to “out” the identity of any legislator who supports this bill and perhaps anything stupid they’ve said on here about a fellow legislator? I know some of the legislators above comment regularly or have at one time. I also know they too say things under pseudonyms they wouldn’t want to sign their name to.
I say play hardball with the nannystaters careers.
But please don’t out me. haha!
PP is right, political speech is the essential protected speech (and the most attacked by politicians since it generally opposes the political class). Politicians ARE public figures and, for the most part, don’t have much standing when suppressing critical speech.
Most bloggers, let alone their contributors are not “techies”, nor should they be. I’ve personally seen government data storage requirements that exceed the “lifespan” of the media that is mandated for backups. We recently got a “trouble ticket” to fix an O/S 2 system that came with documentation from 1989!
IF, and only if, a truly criminal act is at issue, should a “blogger” or ISP be required to attempt to isolate an individual by their “internet address”. The truth is, most large organizations use “private addressing” within their firewalls and only their “public address” may be contained in the site logs.
Isolating an individual behind that firewall will always and SHOULD always require evidence of actual criminal wrongdoing.
Sounds good, FEELS GOOD, legislation. IF you have no idea what you’re actually attempting to do…
Wow. Two of the people on that list are from my district. What are they thinking?
Well, now I know what I’ll ask them about at the upcoming crackerbarrel.
BA @ 9:44 Couldn’t be more right on….Conservatives???? Ha, Schlekeway, Hunt, what the heck is the matter you? Krebs, remember your aspirations, people in SD dont forget when you co-sponsor something this. What in Gods name has happened to our legislature.
Hey John,
Are they “uniters” or “dividers” when they’re opposed from both the “left” and the “right.
How long will it take before “incumbent” = “underdog” in 2010?
This reminds me of the dram shop laws that attempt to hold bar owners responsible for the actions of their drunken patrons. Or holding gun shop owners responsible for people who buy a gun and go shoot somebody? Or blaming the ag chemical dealer who sells fertilizer to someone who makes a bomb and blows up a building?
Unless terrorists have contaminated the water supply in Pierre, it looks like a pretty thorough “cleaning house” is in order”.
Business “as usual” is NOT going to play well in November.
Rightfully so!
I totally agree with “well… @8:53.” This bill is attempting to hold blogs to the same standards as the rest of the media world enjoys. They should be flattered.
I have also noticed that some of the previous comments seem the believe this bill is going after the Blog, this is quite the opposite. It is simply forcing the blog host to keep a record, making it easier to go after anyone who posts libelous or otherwise inappropriate words not protected under the first amendment.
I also somewhat agree that the standard to turn over the records might be a little low. Although, without some reasonable suspicion of wrong doing it is really tough to get a court order, so that may be a high enough burden.
Well, Johnathan…
Some of us have always kept a record, but others don’t know how. This bill mandates tracking for all blogs that allow comments.
ALL… No exceptions for kids blogs on unicorns.
And we have always been subject to the same standards that any other medium is held to. (unless you’d like to point out the magical “blog exception” that you seem to intimate exists.)
The issue here is that we’re now being singled out for mandatory tracking, which is BS.
To me the bill is saying nothing about squelching the freedom of speech. Libel and slander are very serious crimes that cause people, sometimes, to lose their livelihood or ruin their reputation and is punishable in a court of law. The bill then proposes to keep records to identify people who actually write under assumed names with the intent of harming someone’s reputation with vicious lies.
They can go suck an egg. I think the best way to fight this stupidity is just ignore the law, it’s clearly unconstitutional, so who cares.
Just repeating this information from a previous post so all can email this House State Affairs committee and tell them to bury this thing!
I hope all readers commmunicate with the members of the House State Affairs Committee to which these bills have been referred. If you feel this is an intrusion on the First Amendment, email these committee members to vote no on this.
Go here to find the members of this committee.
http://legis.state.sd.us/sessions/2010/CommitteeMembers.aspx?Committee=23
Then go here to send the email.
http://www.legis.state.sd.us/email/LegislatorEmail.aspx
You add your email and subject, then click on a committee member, then write the email, send it; and for the next member all you need to do is change the name. Simple to do.
Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA) has already forced all providers of IP networks to change out their modems for calea compliant(they are tracking us all). Now Pat, how about some of Sibs comments on the black helicopters?? Looks to me like they are hovering over Pierre.
A couple of major problems that I can see right off the top. How are they going to identify someone using a public access computer, such as those in Sanford’s Hospital lobby, or a public library. or someone using the wireless net access at McDonald’s?
Security camera’s Mike, they are on you almost everywhere. Mac address’s on puters go with you everywhere. Of course you can always steal a laptop as with guns the crooks will always have them. Guess the laws are just for us honest folks.
OMG. The oppressive policies of the current national administration, which tries at every turn to squelch anybody who says bad stuff about them, have trickled down to Pierre.
Hey, Anon 5:41, shut up with the stupid partisan attacks, all right? We’re trying solve a problem here.
Les mentions security cameras… hmmm… so suppose run around town and tape defamatory posters to various fences. Are the owners of those fences to be forced to buy security cameras and monitor all activity on their property so they can help law enforcement catch people who commit crimes there?
“Hey, Anon 5:41, shut up with the stupid partisan attacks, all right? We’re trying solve a problem here.”
There is the pot calling the kettle black. Cory is on record personally attacking those of us who express our religions beliefs in the political arena. So much for free expression in his world. And he allowed a comment that was more than a little insulting to Bob Ellis.
So Cory, who made you Pope and the supreme judge of what others can say?
And Pat, didn’t I leave a comments on this thread last night?
(Steve –
Either you are for government mandated tracking software on your website, or you are against it. Get the stupid chip off your shoulder for once, and either lead, follow, or get out of the way.
-PP)
Will supporters of this bill bring in people to testify they’ve been slandered by anonymous comments on blogs, and as a result suffered tangible losses? I’m unaware of that type of case ever going to court, let alone being successfully argued. We’ll see if such people, like unicorns, exist.
(Disclosure: I worked for Noel Hamiel in the 1990s. Love the man. Hate this bill.)
They’ll have to pry the Forum’s guests IP’s from our cold, erased hard drives.
I’m with Detroit on this one. Ignore ‘em. It’s ridiculous and unenforceable.
Anyone who followed the “IranElection” activity on Twitter knows that.
Pat,
You are for government mandated campaign finance tracking. Is money automatically evil, and libel not? You already have IP tracking logs right?
Sibby –
We all know you’re against disclosing who is financing campaigns, as you helped to hide out of state money on 2008’s Initiated Measure 10.
But I never imagined you were against the bill of rights.
Clearly, all of your talk about freedom from government intervention is and was bs.
You should be ashamed.
(BTW, are you blogging from work? That looks like a different IP address)
Pat,
Thanks for ducking the question. I have not taken a position on the legislation. I am simply trying to see if those opposing it are on solid ground. You are sinking fast. And so is Heidelberger, if you haven’t seen my last post. And thanks for proving yet again you will use the IP tracking against those you disagree with, while you protect the identity of the SDBWM. You are making a solid case to support this bill, aren’t you?
No Steve, you are trying to obfuscate the issue because of the chip n your shoulder about anyone who in your mind you believe has ever wronged you, including the SDWBM, who hasn’t said a thing in 5 freaking years.
With regards to this issue as it applies to bloggers ability to do it free from government interference and mandated software monitoring, quit muddying the issue because you want attention.
Either lead, follow, or get out of the way.
I cannot believe that the AG’s or LRC’s office hasn’t chimed in and shot this down even before it got to this point. Someone needs to get ahold of the responsible state attorneys to testify against this bill. I can see nonlegal rep’s putting this in, but you have one of the main sponsors as an attorney and the other involved in newspapers. Unbelievable.
I can’t find House Bill No. 127820. I looked hard until my old man eyes nearly popped. I called my granddaughter who is swell with a computer, but she couldn’t find it. Is this a fabrication?