Legal Niches

Another First Amendment Win in Ohio

By pete_gallagher

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, in Cincinnati, Ohio has ruled that a state statute, which imposes penalties for disseminating sexually-explicitly material to minors, cannot be applied to open communications, such as websites, public chatrooms or email-based listservs and mailing lists.

In American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression (ABFFE) v. Strickland, the Court ruled (PDF) that the law should apply only to 'personal directed' communication—such as person-to-person email or a private chatroom—'between an adult and a person that the adult knows or should know is a minor.'

The San Francisco Examiner previously noted the importance of the case to a variety of online sellers, including videogame retailers:

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Full post as published by GamePolitics.com on April 22, 2010 (boomark / email).