Weblogsky: Legal Aid for Bloggers

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Legal Aid for Bloggers

Jason Kottke's being hassled by attorneys for Sony over his posting about Ken Jennings' loss on Jeopardy, including a video clip from the program. The legal hassle and resulting expense may knock Kottke offline. Jeff Jarvis suggests that we need a Bloggers' Legal Defense Society, and Britt expands on that idea, and offers suggestions

If called by a lawyer, calm your mind and lower your pulse.

Ask politely that they put it in writing.

Take the letter to your city or county's Public Recorder's Office.

File it for the public record for a small fee.
(you may enter anything into the public record, even a movie stub).

Scan the letter and post it online as a GIF and a PDF.

List the official record number.

Let us do the rest.

None of this is fair to the lawyers who do this because they're only doing their job. Tough noogies. In every transition of power, force is projected by the rising elite against the old, and careers and reputations are lost and individuals are hurt. It is the way of nature. The question is, are we bloggers willing to discover and expose the words and identities of the individuals, having no fear of retribution, who threaten our friend Jason? We're certainly willing to track down every other detail that interests us, why not when one of us is attacked?

The exercise of real power is never fair. In the last year there's been a shift of power to citizen journalists who simply examine the public record and report what we've learned. We must rise up now that they have come for Jason, for they will surely come for us next.