Tony Sidaway wrote:
On 4/22/06, Anthony DiPierro wikilegal@inbox.org wrote:
The Prodigy case is irrelevant, because the CDA was passed after that case. In fact, section 230 of the CDA was created in large part as a response to the Prodigy case. See [[Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act]].
Well, almost. The common law elements of the Prodigy case stand if the elements of the statutory exemption of CDA 230 are not satisfied. It is *probably* the case that Wikipedia can *sometimes* satisfy CDA 230, but not always. If someone is trusted with access to sensitive information in order to facilitate the smooth running of Wikipedia and then proceeds to publish that information, then a plaintiff, having notified Wikipedia of defamation and then seen the defamation published via a leak by a Wikipedia administrator to WikiTruth *might* argue that Wikipedia did not take all reasonable steps to limit damage, and a court might accept this as a prima facie case for third party liability.
This is hypothetical, but I think it demonstrates that Wikitruth, if its purported evidence of Wikipedia admin collusion is correct, represents a fairly serious problem for Wikipedia.
Very hypothetical. I grant that it's a lawyers job to stretch given ridiculous facts as much as is necessary to satisfy the desires of the claimant. There is always a chance that a ridiculous claim will succeed. No position is ever safe in the courts. In some cases wheel-war logs might be enough to dispel any allegation of admin collusion.
With 800 administrators how can you possibly determine the level of trust that we can put in each. And there have been arguments made that we need more admins. The mantra is that being an admin is no big deal. Once a person is an admin he has the technical ability to put the goatse.cx image on the main page, but we trust him not to do that. An agent acts with the authority of Wikimedia in an external environment; is there any evidence that any ordinary admin is acting on behalf of Wikimedia when he is dealing with the real world? Agency is often linked with employment, but none of our admins are being paid to do that job. Nobody is required to sign an agreement saying that they won't give away secrets or even defining what would be a secret.
I think it would be a safe bet that in the more than 1,000,000 articles that we now have on the English Wikipedia (perhaps 4,000,000) when we combine all the projects defamatory statements continue to exist; they just haven't been identified. We have no control over who can initiate a suit; a determined but penniless nutcase can keep you tied up in expensive court action for years. He may have no realistic chance of winning, but you have no chance of recovering legal costs. Where do you set the risk bar? Surely it can't be set so low that you are at the mercy of the nutcases.
Ec