Comments on: Comments on 13132

Post number 13132

mattpfeff — Fri, 14 Dec 2001 12:12:49 -0800

Watch where you link. The recent court findings in the DeCSS case apparently included the ruling that linking to a site containing illegal material -- even if it's just to report that fact to others -- is not protected as free speech (and possibly illegal). [NYTimes link; login: metafi/metafi]

By: mattpfeff

mattpfeff — Fri, 14 Dec 2001 12:17:22 -0800

(Interestingly, from the article, it appears that if you were to provide the address of the site in plain text, and not as a link, you would be protected: The court began by observing that a hyperlink is not merely a high-tech footnote or reference card that conveys information to a reader concerning the location of additional content. Rather, the court said, a hyperlink contains a speech component and an additional "nonspeech" component -- some computer code -- that has the functional capacity to bring the content of the linked Web page to the user's computer screen at the click of a mouse. )

By: meep

meep — Fri, 14 Dec 2001 12:23:39 -0800

So... the =two= clicks it would take me to cut and paste means that something different is going on?

By: gramcracker

gramcracker — Fri, 14 Dec 2001 12:33:18 -0800

Sounds like it, meep. Don't you love digital semantics?

By: phalkin

phalkin — Fri, 14 Dec 2001 13:36:41 -0800

I'm relly restraining myself by not posting the code right here. Don't want Matt to get in trouble.

By: phalkin

phalkin — Fri, 14 Dec 2001 13:38:26 -0800

Aww, what the hey. please note that this is NOT a hyperlink. http://www-2.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/DeCSS/Gallery/hannum-efdtt-source.txt

By: th3ph17

th3ph17 — Fri, 14 Dec 2001 14:08:08 -0800

what if you just link into a directory where a link may be found? or link to a site where a link may be found? will google have to censor links?

By: lotsofno

lotsofno — Fri, 14 Dec 2001 14:45:51 -0800

what if someone linked to a site that did a redirect? the possibilities are endless... so is the dumbness of this loophole.