“The First Amendment does not depend on whether everyone is in on the joke.”
“…when it comes to parody, the law requires a reasonable reader standard, not a ‘most gullible person on Facebook’ standard. The First Amendment does not depend on whether everyone is in on the joke.”...
View ArticleOctober 30 roundup
Under investigation and facing the same sorts of tactics he once used against Wall Street, Giuliani may now have reason to appreciate the sorts of principled civil libertarians who stand firm against...
View ArticleSocial media law roundup
Despite warnings that its “copyright small claims” format could call forth a new troll business model and trip up ordinary Internet users, U.S. House of Representatives votes lopsidedly in favor of...
View ArticleDecember 11 roundup
“Bad writing does not normally warrant sanctions, but we draw the line at gibberish.” And Judge Sykes had much more to say besides that [Kevin Underhill, Lowering the Bar] Man claiming to possess vast...
View ArticleAppeals court strikes down Maryland law regulating online political ads
I’m in the Baltimore Sun discussing a bad Maryland law passed in response to the furor over Russian trolling on social media. I wrote about it earlier when a federal district court struck the law down,...
View ArticleFebruary 12 roundup
Did the Supreme Court err in Employment Division v. Smith when it ruled that the Free Exercise Clause provides no exemption from burdens on religious conscience resulting from neutral and generally...
View ArticleCrow for them, Pai for us: American Internet policies outpace Europe’s in the...
As demand for videoconferencing and other online services soars in the pandemic emergency, European policymakers “are now eating crow and entreating video platforms to downgrade the quality of their...
View ArticleFree speech roundup
“New Puerto Rico law threatens jail time for spreading ‘false information’ about COVID-19” [Committee to Protect Journalists, earlier] Freedom for publishers and platforms to associate with whomever...
View ArticleSocial media moderation and the First Amendment
Kristine Frazao of Sinclair Broadcasting interviewed me for this clip, which ran on many broadcast stations from coast to coast, and also in this associated news article: “In America, we’ve got First...
View ArticleFree speech roundup
“To no one’s surprise, Hungary’s coronavirus emergency bill — which criminalizes fake news — has already resulted in police detaining and questioning social media users who criticize Orbán.” [Sarah...
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