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OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185108] Mon, 09 January 2006 13:27 Go to next message
Gernader8 is currently offline  Gernader8
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http://news.com.com/Create+an+e-annoyance%2C+go+to+jail/2010 -1028_3-6022491.html?part=rss&tag=6022491&subj=news

Quote:

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."
It's illegal to annoy

A new federal law states that when you annoy someone on the Internet, you must disclose your identity. Here's the relevant language.

"Whoever...utilizes any device or software that can be used to originate telecommunications or other types of communications that are transmitted, in whole or in part, by the Internet... without disclosing his identity and with intent to annoy, abuse, threaten, or harass any person...who receives the communications...shall be fined under title 18 or imprisoned not more than two years, or both."

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.


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Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185109 is a reply to message #185108] Mon, 09 January 2006 13:38 Go to previous messageGo to next message
rm5248 is currently offline  rm5248
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...

What the hell, is the world going crazy or something?


w00t?
Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185113 is a reply to message #185108] Mon, 09 January 2006 14:18 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Mindtzar is currently offline  Mindtzar
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So much for the land of freedom and opertunity, eh?

Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185115 is a reply to message #185108] Mon, 09 January 2006 14:28 Go to previous messageGo to next message
ben5015se is currently offline  ben5015se
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there goes nopic's possition on the internet

i hate crimson, i hate lardass.
Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185116 is a reply to message #185108] Mon, 09 January 2006 14:38 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Scythar is currently offline  Scythar
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Somehow I have a feeling this is just the beginning when it comes to Internet freedoms/privacy in America.... Rocked Over

There's a hole in the sky through which things can fly.
Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185117 is a reply to message #185116] Mon, 09 January 2006 14:44 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Jaspah is currently offline  Jaspah
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Scythar wrote on Mon, 09 January 2006 16:38

Somehow I have a feeling this is just the beginning when it comes to Internet freedoms/privacy in America.... Rocked Over


You're annoying me!

Tell me your real name or I will press charges!!11oneone

>:O
Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185118 is a reply to message #185108] Mon, 09 January 2006 14:56 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Mad Ivan is currently offline  Mad Ivan
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lol and what if you piss someone from the US off and live in some other country? I believe there is no such thing in international law Razz

[Updated on: Mon, 09 January 2006 14:57]

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Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185119 is a reply to message #185108] Mon, 09 January 2006 15:05 Go to previous messageGo to next message
idebo is currently offline  idebo
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Hello, my name is Ian and screw you all. Tell Me
Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185121 is a reply to message #185115] Mon, 09 January 2006 15:35 Go to previous messageGo to next message
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ben5015se wrote on Mon, 09 January 2006 16:28

there goes nopic's possition on the internet

Rofl.


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Aircraftkiller wrote on Wed, 31 May 2006 22:30

I've been Nodbuggered. =( =( =(
Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185128 is a reply to message #185108] Mon, 09 January 2006 16:41 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Renx is currently offline  Renx
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Lol, so we can annoy Americans and they can't annoy us back? Confused

~Canucck

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[Updated on: Mon, 09 January 2006 16:41]

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Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185130 is a reply to message #185108] Mon, 09 January 2006 16:54 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Mad Ivan is currently offline  Mad Ivan
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evil...

Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185139 is a reply to message #185108] Mon, 09 January 2006 18:30 Go to previous messageGo to next message
icedog90 is currently offline  icedog90
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This country is fucked.
Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185142 is a reply to message #185108] Mon, 09 January 2006 18:32 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Nineball is currently offline  Nineball
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Just another reason to move to Canada ASAP...
And the worst part? It was tied in with some Defense budget bill, so it was impossible to deny, or we'd have some serious problems...


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Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185145 is a reply to message #185128] Mon, 09 January 2006 19:34 Go to previous messageGo to next message
JeepRubi is currently offline  JeepRubi
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Renx wrote on Mon, 09 January 2006 15:41

Lol, so we can annoy Americans and they can't annoy us back? Confused


Dont give me ideas..........


HORQWER wrote on Tue, 18 September 2007 20:47

this is not a real renegade forums ,some one made it up

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Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185147 is a reply to message #185142] Mon, 09 January 2006 19:48 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Hydra is currently offline  Hydra
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This is just one more reason to institute a presidential line-item veto. Scores of state governors have that power to combat pork-barrelling and underhanded measures such as this; why can't the President?

Damn Arlen Specter and his Republocrat cohorts....
Nineball wrote on Mon, 09 January 2006 20:32

It was tied in with some Defense budget bill

Justice Department budget bill.


Walter Keith Koester: September 22, 1962 - March 15, 2005
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[Updated on: Mon, 09 January 2006 19:48]

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Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185154 is a reply to message #185108] Mon, 09 January 2006 21:54 Go to previous messageGo to next message
warranto is currently offline  warranto
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now, the question remains: What qualifies as "Identify yourself" is it enough to get an annoying letter from the IRS, or does the employee have to identify himself directly?

"Hello I am from the Internal Revenue Service, and we are emailing you to tell you that you owe us money!"

"This is so annoying."

*Lawsuit occurs*
Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185157 is a reply to message #185108] Mon, 09 January 2006 22:46 Go to previous messageGo to next message
cheesesoda is currently offline  cheesesoda
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I hate our politicians. Republican and Democrat alike. Who the fuck gives them domain over cyberspace? I don't give a fuck how big of a nation we are, WE ARE NOT IN CHARGE OF THE INTERNET. I don't see how our politicans get off thinking differently. Fucking morons.

whoa.
Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185173 is a reply to message #185108] Tue, 10 January 2006 07:11 Go to previous messageGo to next message
RTsa is currently offline  RTsa
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Quote:

lol and what if you piss someone from the US off and live in some other country? I believe there is no such thing in international law

I thank god I do not live in the USA.

This has to be the stupidest thing ever though...I bet conspiracy theorists are going crazy right now (with the budget thing I mean...) Smile


[Updated on: Tue, 10 January 2006 07:15]

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Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185174 is a reply to message #185108] Tue, 10 January 2006 07:27 Go to previous messageGo to next message
SCOTT9 is currently offline  SCOTT9
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as i am foreign fuck you all rofl

Humvees own you!
Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185175 is a reply to message #185108] Tue, 10 January 2006 07:28 Go to previous messageGo to next message
SCOTT9 is currently offline  SCOTT9
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the fucking american goverment dont own you why let it happen

Humvees own you!
Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185178 is a reply to message #185108] Tue, 10 January 2006 07:55 Go to previous messageGo to next message
sloth4urluv is currently offline  sloth4urluv
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Yeah our government is pretty dumb.
Mindtzar wrote on Mon, 09 January 2006 16:18

So much for the land of freedom and opertunity, eh?

I believe that place died a long time ago, freedom is only an illusion in this country. I dont see how our country is anymore free than any other country?
America has more stupid laws and less personal freedoms than most countries.
Where is my right to protest without being beaten by a cop? Where is my right to smoke weed if I want to? (Is there a difference between being drunk and being high besides that the government regulates and makes money from alcohol?)
Where is my right to believe what ever I want to believe in school (not saying I have to make everyone else participate but if I want to create a group of people to assemble together thats my fucking right.)

Ireally hate this country sometime.



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Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185180 is a reply to message #185128] Tue, 10 January 2006 08:39 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Ma1kel is currently offline  Ma1kel
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Renx wrote on Mon, 09 January 2006 17:41

Lol, so we can annoy Americans and they can't annoy us back? Confused

Lol, good point.

Now we only have to wait for people making fun of this with pictures and movies.


Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185188 is a reply to message #185108] Tue, 10 January 2006 09:55 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Jecht is currently offline  Jecht
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I will continue to belligerently annoy and mentally pillage everyone who deserves it. This law changes nothing.

http://img148.imageshack.us/img148/9146/hartyn4.png
Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185195 is a reply to message #185178] Tue, 10 January 2006 11:27 Go to previous messageGo to next message
cheesesoda is currently offline  cheesesoda
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sloth4urluv wrote on Tue, 10 January 2006 08:55

America has more stupid laws and less personal freedoms than most countries.
Where is my right to protest without being beaten by a cop? Where is my right to smoke weed if I want to? (Is there a difference between being drunk and being high besides that the government regulates and makes money from alcohol?)
Where is my right to believe what ever I want to believe in school (not saying I have to make everyone else participate but if I want to create a group of people to assemble together thats my fucking right.

I have yet to see someone, from my city, be beat up for protesting on the side of our busiest street.

Weed should be legalized, but any person caught in public under the influence, just like it is with alcohol, they should be arrested and fined. Same goes for impaired driving.

You can thank the liberals for that. Somehow religious beliefs are offensive to non-spiritual people, but barring (non-mandatory) spiritual activities and programs from schools is OBVIOUSLY not offensive to religious people... Sarcasm

This country is becoming more and more strict as the liberals continue to increase the size of the government, which ultimately gives them more and more power. You can't have freedom and big government. You have to sacrifice one or the other. Personally, fuck the intrusive government. Keep it small and my freedoms large.


whoa.
Re: OT: It's now illegal to annoy someone online [message #185207 is a reply to message #185108] Tue, 10 January 2006 13:32 Go to previous messageGo to previous message
cypher909 is currently offline  cypher909
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Couldn't have said it better myself jball.
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