Looks like I have to go to jail

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[!--QuoteBegin--][div class=\'quotetop\']QUOTE[/div][div class=\'quotemain\'][!--QuoteEBegin--]Annoying someone via the Internet is now a federal crime.

It's no joke. Last Thursday, President Bush signed into law a prohibition on posting annoying Web messages or sending annoying e-mail messages without disclosing your true identity.

In other words, it's OK to flame someone on a mailing list or in a blog as long as you do it under your real name. Thank Congress for small favors, I guess.

This ridiculous prohibition, which would likely imperil much of Usenet, is buried in the so-called Violence Against Women and Department of Justice Reauthorization Act. Criminal penalties include stiff fines and two years in prison.

"The use of the word 'annoy' is particularly problematic," says Marv Johnson, legislative counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union. "What's annoying to one person may not be annoying to someone else."

Buried deep in the new law is Sec. 113, an innocuously titled bit called "Preventing Cyberstalking." It rewrites existing telephone harassment law to prohibit anyone from using the Internet "without disclosing his identity and with intent to annoy."

To grease the rails for this idea, Sen. Arlen Specter, a Pennsylvania Republican, and the section's other sponsors slipped it into an unrelated, must-pass bill to fund the Department of Justice. The plan: to make it politically infeasible for politicians to oppose the measure.

The tactic worked. The bill cleared the House of Representatives by voice vote, and the Senate unanimously approved it Dec. 16.

There's an interesting side note. An earlier version that the House approved in September had radically different wording. It was reasonable by comparison, and criminalized only using an "interactive computer service" to cause someone "substantial emotional harm."

That kind of prohibition might make sense. But why should merely annoying someone be illegal?

There are perfectly legitimate reasons to set up a Web site or write something incendiary without telling everyone exactly who you are.

Think about it: A woman fired by a manager who demanded sexual favors wants to blog about it without divulging her full name. An aspiring pundit hopes to set up the next Suck.com. A frustrated citizen wants to send e-mail describing corruption in local government without worrying about reprisals.

In each of those three cases, someone's probably going to be annoyed. That's enough to make the action a crime. (The Justice Department won't file charges in every case, of course, but trusting prosecutorial discretion is hardly reassuring.)

Clinton Fein, a San Francisco resident who runs the Annoy.com site, says a feature permitting visitors to send obnoxious and profane postcards through e-mail could be imperiled.

"Who decides what's annoying? That's the ultimate question," Fein said. He added: "If you send an annoying message via the United States Post Office, do you have to reveal your identity?"

Fein once sued to overturn part of the Communications Decency Act that outlawed transmitting indecent material "with intent to annoy." But the courts ruled the law applied only to obscene material, so Annoy.com didn't have to worry.

"I'm certainly not going to close the site down," Fein said on Friday. "I would fight it on First Amendment grounds."

He's right. Our esteemed politicians can't seem to grasp this simple point, but the First Amendment protects our right to write something that annoys someone else.

It even shields our right to do it anonymously. U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas defended this principle magnificently in a 1995 case involving an Ohio woman who was punished for distributing anonymous political pamphlets.

If President Bush truly believed in the principle of limited government (it is in his official bio), he'd realize that the law he signed cannot be squared with the Constitution he swore to uphold.

And then he'd repeat what President Clinton did a decade ago when he felt compelled to sign a massive telecommunications law. Clinton realized that the section of the law punishing abortion-related material on the Internet was unconstitutional, and he directed the Justice Department not to enforce it.

Bush has the chance to show his respect for what he calls Americans' personal freedoms. Now we'll see if the president rises to the occasion.[/quote]

[a href=\'http://news.com.com/Create+an+e-annoyance%2C+go+to+jail/2010-1028_3-6022491.html?part=rss&tag=6022491&subj=news\' target=\'_blank\']Source[/a].

The land of the free and the home of the brave...

Seriously, I'm sure I can be a pain in some of your arses, and maybe two or three people on this board know my real name. Does this mean anyone of you can sue me and I have to go to jail by American law? What the fuck is happening here?
 
I think some of the people I've annoyed don't know my name.

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I'd like to see how this is enforced - if annoying people don't know their real name, how can they be tracked?

(Yes, I know IP addresses are easy to figure out, but they can be masked.)

This is probably just some senator wanting to be seen to be doing something in an election year....don't read too much into it without first seeing the text of the bill itself.
 
By the way, I don't see why this must affect me. It's a US law and I'm not from the US. I am posting on the internet, which is not US property.
 
Don't worry too much Perun, I'm sure a pretty boy like you won't be too lonely in prison [!--emo&:D--][img src=\'style_emoticons/[#EMO_DIR#]/biggrin.gif\' border=\'0\' style=\'vertical-align:middle\' alt=\'biggrin.gif\' /][!--endemo--]
 
Damnit! LC made that comment on MSN more than a year ago, and I had one of the worst nightmares ever afterwards!
 
[!--QuoteBegin-Metal_made+Jan 10 2006, 02:32 AM--][div class=\'quotetop\']QUOTE(Metal_made @ Jan 10 2006, 02:32 AM)[/div][div class=\'quotemain\'][!--QuoteEBegin--]HAHAHAHA, now kids we are going to learn :10 reasons why the jail is a bad place...
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Turkish jails are known to be especially exotic. Don't spend your hollidays there Perun...... [!--emo&;)--][img src=\'style_emoticons/[#EMO_DIR#]/wink.gif\' border=\'0\' style=\'vertical-align:middle\' alt=\'wink.gif\' /][!--endemo--]
 
You must take a look at that discussion below called 'SPAM' by grkuntzmd. I think I know who's going first.
 
[!--QuoteBegin-Perun+Jan 10 2006, 12:28 AM--][div class=\'quotetop\']QUOTE(Perun @ Jan 10 2006, 12:28 AM)[/div][div class=\'quotemain\'][!--QuoteEBegin--]By the way, I don't see why this must affect me. It's a US law and I'm not from the US. I am posting on the internet, which is not US property.
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This is actually quite an interesting point in an otherwise light hearted discussion. How can a country claim to have rights over the Internet (world wide web)? I think this is merely a publicity stunt by some Senator to get votes and nobody will go to jail over this, unless there is a major new age virus released or something. In all seriousness though, there needs to be a reign put on the Internet. An international commision needs to be set up to monitor what new (and existing) junk is on the web. I know freedom of speech is important, but there needs to be some level of censorship on the rubbish that is on the net.
 
I'd suggest this is the American's first step to making identity fraud even bigger....

If you reveal your identity on everything you do on the Net, you might as well just give them the keys to your house and the PIN to your bank account.
 
If I'm not mistaken the Internet was created by the U.S government and civilians first got a taste for it in U.S universities in the early 80's. The Internet didn't become a wide spread or even popular phenomenon until 1996. My point is, as "international" as the internet is it is basically ran by the U.S (World Wide Web...hello! that's English) even things like ".org" (organization) and .gov (government) are well... in english. So I think they have a very good "owenership" of it giving them enough jurisdiction and rights to arrest anybody "annoying" people online.

The claim is still completely ridiculous and I agree it must have been made by some bored senator....
 
I was watching C-Span the other day and our old friend Al Gore was up there speaking agains the Bush Administration ( no surprise there), but one of the last things he said was what we are discussing on this thread. He said that the Internet must remain unregulated and free from the encrouchment of government and media corporations, because free information is the basis and key to democracy. Then he lost me because he went into this morale boosting cheesy speech about how he senses the dawn of a Golden Era for American democracy and that "we are on the rise" blah blah blah. Pfft, dream on buddy boy.
 
Al gore eh, it's been a while since I'e heard of him talking. he seems a bit washed up these days, why is he giving a "morale boosting cheesy" speech? I wouldn't value his opinion at all, he's just another politician in a sea of clones to me. I do think that the internet needs to be moderated, or at least some sort of specialists we can trust with our problems that will swiftly be dealt with. I don't even know if the British or any other Government has such "Internet Police" (Tom Clancy's "Net Force" springs to mind)
 
I read this and thought this is never gonna work. No one country can own the internet, and it would turn it into another opressive regime if it did. It should stay as it intended to be, a place for free speach and freedom of information.
 
[!--QuoteBegin-Atvarussmak+Jan 23 2006, 10:13 AM--][div class=\'quotetop\']QUOTE(Atvarussmak @ Jan 23 2006, 10:13 AM)[/div][div class=\'quotemain\'][!--QuoteEBegin--]I read this and thought this is never gonna work. No one country can own the internet, and it would turn it into another opressive regime if it did. It should stay as it intended to be, a place for free speach and freedom of information.
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...and where paedophiles and sexually frustrated people unleash their sick minds on impressionable youths [!--emo&:unsure:--][img src=\'style_emoticons/[#EMO_DIR#]/unsure.gif\' border=\'0\' style=\'vertical-align:middle\' alt=\'unsure.gif\' /][!--endemo--]
 
unfortunately that's a fact of life conor and it comes with the freedom and size of the internet. Oddly that is the beauty of it, where even sick freaks can run freely (well, almost, police do hunt down child pornographers) and again, it is not the responsibility of the government to be our nannies. It is up to the individual what he wishes to view or not. Not into midget porn? don't go to midget porn websites. Don't like hunting? don't go to hunting websites that simple. If you are a concerned parent it is up to you what you teach your child what is or is not acceptable and install the proper filters.
 
Time to Godwin this topic:

And if you don't agree with Neo-Nazis and the KKK, don't visit their websites.

The internet was not designed to be "a place for free speach and freedom of information." It was designed as a tool for the US military to communicate over long distances in the event of a nuclear war.


...just sayin'
 
I beg to differ. Arpnet which became the internet. Was set up to connect univercities and research facilites to share information and research. The DARPA agency i believe.

The neclear missile idea is just a myth
read this if you dont believe me
[a href=\'http://www.answers.com/main/ntquery?method=4&dsid=1512&dekey=ARPAnet&gwp=8&curtab=1512_1\' target=\'_blank\']http://www.answers.com/main/ntquery?method...8&curtab=1512_1[/a]
 
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