Stratton Oakmont, Inc. v. Prodigy Services Company
New York Supreme Court
1995 WL 323710 (1995)
Prodigy Services Company (defendant) owned and operated a computer network featuring online bulletin boards; Stratton Oakmont (plaintiff) sued Prodigy for defamation based on messages posted there, arguing Prodigy acted as a publisher because it held itself out as exercising editorial control -- including through "Board Leaders" who functioned as editors -- and used guidelines and screening software to remove content. Prodigy argued it had abandoned an earlier manual-review policy well before the messages at issue were posted, but presented no documentation of that change at trial.
Whether, if the operator of an online message board says it controls the content of the message board and implements such control through guidelines and screening programs, the message-board operator is a publisher for purposes of defamation liability.