Northwest Indiana Discussion

The Preacher is doing all kinds of saber-rattling on the thread he uses to promote his radio show,which I won't advertise here, implying that I am going to be sued for comments I made on the Times board. Just so we are clear about what was said, I will use his words.

My question is how the Preacher so certain that I am going to be sued?
He has repeatedly denied he had anything to do my posts being deleted from the Times forum, but now he is "certain" I will be sued.How could he be so certain if he didn't have a hand in what happened?
Is he making this BS up in a further attempt to silence me or is he party to some inside information that no one else is aware of? Either one of these scenerios makes the Preacher a liar.Here is an interesting discussion from USATODAY about suing message board posters for what they write. This excerpt is the most relevant to the topic.
To date, though, judges have been hesitant to force message board hosts to reveal the identities of posters, ruling that anonymity is an important protection of free speech.

The right to post messages anonymously has been defended by the American Civil Liberties Union and an Internet privacy group called the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

"These exchanges (on message boards) can be very heated and ... are sometimes filled with invective and insult," foundation lawyers wrote in a court case involving Medinex Systems. "However, most things, if not everything, said on these types of message boards are taken with a grain of salt."

If anyone else has some legal background and cares to chime in, your comments are welcome. I would also like to thank those posters who have pasted some of my thoughts on the Times board. I may gone, but I am not forgotten. Rock on,dudes!

Here is a link to Mattlap's blog about the Times deleting entire threads on it's board.http://hammondbigpicture.blogspot.com/
At least we can post here without being censored.

I was able to solicit the following on the Times Board ( bolded added for emphasis based on this readers interpretation.)

I find it all quite troubling that we are being robbed of our freedoms by means of frivolous lawsuit apparently against a mere medium of the free exchange of ideas. It is high time these instigators of un-American activities be dealt with and the perpetrators set straight.

We WILL know who these entities are in due time and we must act to end their tyrannical actions to quash freedom of speech.

people get sued all the time. even more often people threaten lawsuits that never come to fruition. when i was on the radio i got at least 1 letter a month threatening a lawsuit. none ever came though.

so i wouldnt worry about anyone threatening to sue. and if anyone ever does sue you remember the number 1 rule in liable cases. truth is the best defense. so as long as any facts you state are truthfull, or can be successfully argued to appear truthfull from your perspective. you are fine.

as far as opinion...this is still america. and you are free to voice your opinion however you wish. the only risk is that you dont somehow appear to post your opinion as fact. but as long as it is clearly an opinion...theres no liable risk there.

but after all is said and done ask yourself this. is preacher acting like someone who is afraid of a lawsuit in his recent posts? if anything, he seems to have posted more outrageous stuff lately. and he is the guy who supposedly knows of impending lawsuits? to me that is enough information right there to assume he isn't very concerned about it. and that his comments should be taken with some grains of salt.

as far as opinion...this is still america. and you are free to voice your opinion however you wish.

Apparently not!

If the right to peaceably assemble, by electronic means here, is abridged then you have no freedom to speak outside of one on one conversation.

Again, if the medium is silenced who's ever gonna hear what you wish to express? Perhaps it's time for the Federal government to address limited immunity for the mediums of expression from frivolous lawsuits intended to intimidate and bully in order to quash the rights of the people to assemble and express opinions.

-------------------------------------------

but after all is said and done ask yourself this. is preacher acting like someone who is afraid of a lawsuit in his recent posts? if anything, he seems to have posted more outrageous stuff lately. and he is the guy who supposedly knows of impending lawsuits? to me that is enough information right there to assume he isn't very concerned about it. and that his comments should be taken with some grains of salt.

Here's the thing! The damage is done. Sparks, and all of his posts related and otherwise, are gone along with many of our own comments and ideas.

How do we get made whole?

edited

Probably just a coincidence. It's back now.

Still - despite Yuri's assurances to the contrary a deliberate "outage" could indeed come without warning at the direction of "higher powers" for the very reasons I have (according to BA) been on my soapbox about.