EFFector, Vol. 14, No. 8; Apr. 27, 2001

EFFector Vol. 14, No. 9 May 10, 2001 editor@eff.org

A Publication of the Electronic Frontier Foundation ISSN 1062-9424

IN THE 169th ISSUE OF EFFECTOR (now with over 27,400 subscribers!):

2600 Court Asks For Further Briefing on First Amendment

Electronic Frontier Foundation Media Advisory

For Immediate Release -- May 10, 2001

Contacts:

New York - The Federal Second Circuit Court of Appeals today asked the parties in the 2600 Case to file supplemental briefs on May 30, 2001, focusing on the First Amendment issues raised in the case.

"This is good news," noted Stanford Law School Dean Kathleen Sullivan who argued the case for 2600 Magazine. "It means that the Court took our First Amendment arguments seriously. They are asking for very specific answers about how the First Amendment should be applied here and we welcome the chance to tell them."

"Dean Sullivan did a wonderful job did in the argument," added Cindy Cohn, EFF's Legal Director. "We credit her for focusing the Court on these issues. We are especially pleased that the Court asked specifically about the section of the injunction that prevents linking to DeCSS." During the argument the court asked questions about whether this kind of injunction could chill expression by the New York Times and other mainstream media publications.

The case arises from 2600 Magazine's publication of and linking to a computer program called DeCSS in November, 1999 as part of its news coverage about DVD decryption software. DeCSS decrypts movies on DVDs that have been encrypted by a computer program called CSS. Decryption of DVD movies is necessary in order to make fair use of the movies as well as to play DVD movies on computers running the GNU/Linux operating system.

The Movie Studios have sued 2600 Magazine under a 1998 law that prevents even the publication of programs that can decrypt DVDs or other digital media. Most recently the law was used to frighten a Princeton Computer Science Professor, Edward Felton, from presenting a paper describing how to break proposed watermarks on CDs at a scientific conference. For more information see:
http://www.acm.org/usacm/IP/DMCA-release.html

About EFF:

The Electronic Frontier Foundation is the leading civil liberties organization working to protect rights in the digital world. Founded in 1990, EFF actively encourages and challenges industry and government to support free expression, privacy, and openness in the information society. EFF is a member-supported organization and maintains one of the most linked-to Web sites in the world:
http://www.eff.org

EFF Moves to Protect Anonymity of Online Speech

Defends Critics of Failing dot Com Company

Electronic Frontier Foundation Media Advisory

For Immediate Release - May 7, 2001

Contact:

San Francisco -- The Electronic Frontier Foundation, along with San Francisco law firm Farella, Braun & Martel, today filed a motion in the Federal District Court in the Northern District of California to defend the right of anonymous critics to express their views online without fear of arbitrary disclosure of their identity. The motion seeks to prevent an Idaho company called Medinex Systems, Inc. from learning the identities of 14 John Does who participated on a Yahoo! message board devoted to discussions about the company.

Medinex sued the John Does, identified by their screen names such as "zippershut", "awe2bad4mdnx", and "dotcommie2000", after they made remarks critical of the company on Yahoo! message boards. Medinex stock has dropped precipitously in the past few months and is allegedly on the verge of being dropped from the NASDAQ exchange for non-compliance with NASDAQ's $1 minimum bid price requirement.

The critics, some self-identified as shareholders and employees of the company, stated their opinions about the mismanagement of the company and other factors leading to its financial difficulties. Medinex alleged defamation, tortious interference with business relationship and wrongful interference with a prospective economic advantage. The company then issued a subpoena to Yahoo! in California seeking the identities of their critics without first proving any illegal actions.

"This case is another in a disturbing trend where failing dot com companies seek to silence their critics using the civil discovery process," said Lauren Gelman, Public Policy Director for EFF. "We are hopeful that this court will agree with a recent Seattle District Court decision stating unequivocally that the First Amendment protects anonymous online speech." Gelman referred to a case entitled In re 2theMart.com, in which the court quashed a subpoena seeking the identity of Internet posters on an Infospace message board after a motion brought by the EFF and the ACLU of Washington.

"These people were simply expressing their opinions. Unfounded subpoenas such as these chill everyone's speech on the Internet. Since some of the Does claim to be employees, we are also worried that Medinex has brought this suit in order to identify and retaliate against them, rather than because of any real defamation," added Robert Holtzapple of Farella, Braun and Martel, which is handling the matter pro bono.

Background materials about this case are available on the EFF website at: http://eff.org/Cases/Medinex_v._Awe2bad4mdnx/

Materials concerning the 2TheMart case are available at: http://www.eff.org/Cases/2TheMart_case/

Administrivia

The Electronic Frontier Foundation
454 Shotwell Street
San Francisco CA 94110-1914 USA
+1 415 436 9333 (voice)
+1 415 436 9993 (fax)
http://www.eff.org

Editors:
Katina Bishop, EFF Education & Offline Activism Director
Stanton McCandlish, EFF Technical Director/Webmaster
editors@eff.org)

Reproduction of this publication in electronic media is encouraged. Signed articles do not necessarily represent the views of EFF. To reproduce signed articles individually, please contact the authors for their express permission. Press releases and EFF announcements & articles may be reproduced individually at will.

to majordomo@eff.org, which will send you a confirmation code and then add you to a subscription list for EFFector (after you return the confirmation code; instructions will be in the e-mail).

(Please ask listmaster@eff.org">listmaster@eff.org to manually add you to or remove you from the list if this does not work for you for some reason.)

To change your address, send both commands at once, one per line (i.e., unsub your old address, and sub your new address).

To get the latest issue, send any message to effector-reflector@eff.org (or er@eff.org), and it will be mailed to you automagically. You can also get, via the Web: