Somebody on another forum, who I believe is also on here, raised an interesting point that by having unnacceptable URLs posted on the forum the site becomes responsible and is potentially then in breach of the law, depending on the content of the site being linked to. MSE also don't edit posts on their forum, and instead remove them, because by editing the posts they are therefore then responsible for all the messages posted.
Is this the case? And if so, should we be posting unsuitable URLs so we can all check our local filtering?
Freedom of speech strikes again!
It depends on how unacceptable they are if anything. I don't see the harm in it if said URL's are not there for the purpose intended by that site, and more importantly they are in a non-publicly accessible place. The forum administrators are not responsible for content posted as long as it's otherwise legal - i.e. you can show as many blue movie URLs as you like as long as they're not outside the laws regarding depravity etc.
However you do raise an interesting point with it - I might have a word with some of the admins I moderate for elsewhere and ask for their POV. Obviously DosBox might like to comment here too
Perhaps it might be wise to ensure said links are not clickable or otherwise posted in the good ol' fashioned method of www dot nastysitename dot com as another line of defence.
My second job is in a community moderation role and it was discussed at the end of last year on a distribution group that by editing posts you become responsible. I'm going to try and dig this out. It's only when you edit posts that you become responsible.
I think the argument is that if you edit *some* posts, then it could be inferred that anything which hasn't been edited must be endorsed (or at least approved of) by the site, whereas if you don't edit anything you can argue more effectively that posts are owned by and the responsibility of the poster.
Not sure if that stands up in a court of law though!
Well I could cause some havoc with ShadyURL if you like.
But on a serious note, we keep the diffs. So you can still go back to the original post and see all the edit(s). Just like a wiki page.
That's the one!Originally Posted by SteveBentley
But by the same token, removing some of the posts then means that you must endorse the ones that remain so surely you are still liable
i think its more down to once you press save on the edit form your saying that "this post now meets the minimum level for content on our site" and if you leave the in-appropriate link in then your saying its allowed on the site.But by the same token, removing some of the posts then means that you must endorse the ones that remain so surely you are still liable
Also on a site this size it cant be expected for the mods to read every post and find every bad piece of content.
Slippery slope alert :P
Not really as you're only editing one reported post for example, you may not see the others so in which case until you start to edit those then they're not endorsed.But by the same token, removing some of the posts then means that you must endorse the ones that remain so surely you are still liable
I wonder if we didnt edit and left the originals up and then just passed on users ips to the cops etc that would be better?
I would doubt it would be seen as approved after an edit in the eyes of court as its still user generated content and still has not been made by the editor as well as the fact edits are logged. If youtube edits a comment on a video have they approved it implicitly then which becomes much more their comment then the users. Also if youtube edits a video to place an advert does that count as a edit and then its their responsibility for the video content? Thats even more controversial as they have directly profited from the edit too.
I think these are relative non-issues due to the nature of user generated content, we are not responsible for it unless we fail to act when appropriate and I cant see how edits could be seen as approvals, it would cause a huge amount of problems big sites but yet they dont have the issue and they have better paid lawyers to look into it
As I said, as long as there is an audit trail I think it's a non-issue.
No-one should be viewing anything in front of students anyway ... im not a supporter of a nanny state where everyone spoon feeds the people who cant think for themselves, and you have to accept some sort of responsibility for your actions.
If someone posts content of unsuitable content, and someone see's it to the point of you being in trouble ... ITS YOUR FAULT for allowing it to happen. If you bring it in from the outside world then its your fault.
In my opinion the whole darn internet should have a huge "use at your own risk" sign around it. And we can never make it 100% safe, and shouldnt be expected to.
With planning and preperation, it can be close ... but please lets not turn this into a spoon feed the numpties exercise.
The local newspaper had an issue like this:
Took it to court: kperch: UGC ruling comfort for bloggers
So basically they're saying remove comments as soon as they're reported rather than edit them?4 therefore, publishers have no liability if posts are removed as soon as a complaint is received.
I was not in any way questioning EduGeek; this was a more general question. Perhaps it was wrong to mention EduGeek however it was an example of where people often post URLs which could be questionable, and they do so for the purpose of protecting others.
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