How craven can you get?
Tim Ireland's Bloggerheads blog has vanished this evening. Iain Dale reports that this is because Tim's webhost withdrew its services after receiving a legal threat from an Uzbek billionaire named Alisher Usmanov. Other sites affected include www.boris-johnson.com.
If the mere threat of legal action means that blog publishers fold and cut blog writers off from the outside world, we might as well give up on the idea of free speech altogether.
In the short term, I'm sure Bloggerheads (and Boris Johnson) will be back up - I wish Tim the best of luck in finding an alternative host. If this is a case of bullying billionaires vs bloggers, GO BLOGGERS!
In the long term, I don't know what the solution is. Perhaps a law to say that in certain circumstances where the identity of a web content provider is verified, the hosting company isn't liable for any defamation that occurs? Just an idea.
Thursday, 20 September 2007
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