By Laura Buddine and Dexter Davenport (September 27, 1998)
Less than a month after creating its controversial alt.discuss.no-rules newsgroup hierarchy, WebTV has pulled the plug, citing concerns over legal liability.
The no-rules groups had apparently been created to eliminate complaints about fraud in the newsgroup voting process. Newsgroups in the hierarchy could be created by a single user without a vote, but would be eliminated if there were no posts to the group for ten consecutive days. In the official announcement of the hierarchy posted in the WebTV-only newsgroup alt.discuss.config, the WebTV administrator stated that the term "no rules" applied to the voting and naming conventions only.
WebTV users in the alt.discuss newsgroups, however, had a different perception -- that there literally would be no rules at all and that WebTV's Terms of Service relating to disallowed behaviors would not apply within the no-rules groups. Hundreds of groups were created literally overnight, including over one hundred created in a single day by an individual user.
Although some of the no-rules creations were genuine discussion groups, many were created solely for the purpose of defaming or making obscene statements about individual users in the names of the groups, while the names of others contained graphic statements of racial, ethnic, religious and homophobic hatred. Complaints to WebTV's Abuse Department were either ignored, or complainants were told "if you don't like them, don't read them." When some disgusted WebTV users announced that they had contacted the national media about the situation, WebTV abruptly pulled the plug.
WebTV has had a long, tumultuous relationship with its newsgroups. To help you understand the controversy, we offer this guide to WebTV's newsgroup history.
webtv. Newsgroups
WebTV users were introduced to the newsgroups in spring of 1997 when WebTV released the 1.2 upgrade to the WebTV Classic. (The Plus did not exist yet.) Most of the newsgroups at the time were Usenet newsgroups from the Internet at-large. But WebTV had its own hierarchy of newsgroups, called the webtv. newsgroups, which included webtv.users and webtv.talk.
The webtv.users group was (and still is) a moderated newsgroup where every message is reviewed by a WebTV employee before it is posted. Unsuitable and off-topic posts are not published. The webtv.talk newsgroup was unmoderated, which allowed users more control in directing the topics of conversation. As the webtv.talk group grew in popularity, it came under attack by trolls and others determined to disrupt the group with off-topic, often defamatory and sometimes obscene posts. WebTV received a few tons of e-mail asking and demanding that the webtv.talk group be removed.
According to WebTV newsgroup administrator David Mack, the death of webtv.talk began with a posting labeled something like "Picture of Da Bunny." Mack described the situation in a newsgroup posting, saying that a WebTV user was demonstrating her WebTV to her grandchildren and decided to show them the "Da Bunny" picture. Unfortunately, instead of a rabbit, she was faced with a picture from a pornographic magazine. She contacted WebTV.
According to Mack, the major concern for WebTV was what would have happened if a consumer electronics reviewer had seen this.
This appears to be a common motivator to WebTV's management. User outcry over the SurfSpot ads did little to persuade WebTV to alter or end them, but when the media turned its light on WebTV, the ads were pulled and reworked.
Anyway, webtv.talk had become so popular that it didn't hold the interest of its inhabitants and they began to invade established newsgroups on Usenet. Some groups like alt.weemba were abandoned, so the invasion was not a problem. Other groups were more problematic.
According to Mack in a newsgroup posting:
Then they tried to move into gnu.emacs.gnews. Bad move. GNEWS is a macro package that runs inside the emacs text editor, and it still has some fans out there, even though
they don't post to that newsgroup very much. We received email about "off-topic posting" by our subscribers.
Luckily, the invaders gave up on gnu.emacs.gnews on their own. They took over alt.hahaha, alt.aber and alt.vvm soon thereafter. To me, this constituted a fairly ugly pattern.
Usenet newsgroups are generally intended to be used to discuss a specific topic, not for random chatter by a specific group of people.
Usenet is a self-policing entity that takes a dim view of poor off-topic posting, Spam and other invasions of its traditions. Internet Service Providers (ISPs) are expected to control their users' behavior. Those that fail to do so face what is called The Usenet Death Penalty. Essentially the other ISPs block all postings from the penalized ISP. Users can read postings, but their replies never appear. America Online faced the Usenet Death Penalty when it first allowed its subscribers to access Usenet. WebTV became concerned that they would draw other ISP's ire and in the process, negative press.
Meanwhile, some users in webtv.talk wanted to relieve the congestion in webtv.talk by creating several other groups, each for specific topics of discussion. They also wanted the groups to be accessible only to WebTV users because they had received poor reception in the Usenet at large. This was undoubtedly true as many WebTV users were (and still are) unaware of the netiquette surrounding newsgroup postings. Since then, WebTV has improved its educational efforts.
With all the above in mind, David Mack proposed the following to WebTV management:
Let's replace webtv.talk with a new newsgroup hierarchy called w. that only exists inside WebTV, but we won't publicize it or deal with it in any way. We'll create the playing field but deciding how they play on it will be up to our users. They can post pretty much anything they want to without us interfering, obvious exceptions being death threats, kiddie porn, and the like. If we get complaints from users about the behavior there, we'll deal with it the way we would if we received a complaint about a posting from one of our users to any other part of Usenet.
Thus, out of concern for their image and to protect the Internet from its users, the w. newsgroups were born--a place where the users could do everything but kill each other and the rest of the world would be blissfully unaware.
w. Newsgroups
The w. newsgroups were created on a wide variety of topics. Some of the groups were user-moderated. Others were not moderated. New groups were created by request to David Mack. He made the decision which ones to create and which ones to deny based on user requests. Many users complained that this wasn't fair, since their groups were being turned down.
WebTV became concerned that users perceived that what went on in the w. newsgroups was under their control and therefore their responsibility. As David Mack put it in a newsgroup posting, the w. hierarchy was moved into the alt.discuss hierarchy by WebTV in order to clarify the relationship between WebTV and the w. newsgroups, or rather, to clarify the absence of any relationship. Basically, WebTV was protecting itself from its users.
alt.discuss. Newsgroups
On the week of November 11, 1997, WebTV moved all the w. groups into its new home, alt.discuss. As before, these groups were only available to WebTV users.
WebTV began to cut its ties to the newsgroups in other ways as well. Again, David Mack in a newsgroup post dated November 7, 1997:
Part of the misconception regarding the relationship between WebTV and the w groups arose because a WebTV employee was acting as an administrator for the w hierarchy. This will no longer be permitted. As a result, no new alt.discuss groups will be created and no existing alt.discuss groups will be deleted. At some point in the future, we may create a mechanism to allow WebTV subscribers to create or delete alt.discuss groups without the assistance of WebTV personnel.
WebTV did create an automated system for newsgroup creation and a newsgroup (alt.discuss.config) in which to announce them. To create a newsgroup a user sends an e-mail to advotes@vote.munitions.com with the subject line "propose alt.discuss.groupname" where "groupname" is the name of the group being proposed. When we proposed the alt.discuss.senior.center, the subject line read:
propose alt.discuss.senior.center
Then, in the body of the message, the user puts the charter of the group so the people voting on it know what they are voting for or against.
Users then may vote for or against particular newsgroup proposals by sending a message to advotes@vote.munitions.com with the subject line "vote yes alt.discuss.groupname" or "vote no alt.discuss.groupname" where again, "groupname" is the name of the proposed group. Each BOX is allowed one "yes" vote and one "no" vote per proposal.
The automated system then tallies the votes every night at 1 a.m. Pacific and posts the results in alt.discuss.config. If a proposal has 50 more yes votes than no votes after the first seven days of voting, the group is automatically created and an article announcing its creation is posted to alt.discuss.config and alt.discuss.announce. When the voting system was established, the voting for a proposal could continue 90 days. It would then be terminated. Recently, that has been reduced to 60 days. The proposal is also cancelled if it doesn't receive any votes for 30 days in a row, or if in its first seven days, it receives no "yes" votes.
If a proposal fails, the name is in moratorium for 60 days and cannot be reproposed until then.
One of the major flaws in this system, like any democracy, it was subject to voter fraud. Users learned to create Web pages and e-mail signatures complete with voting buttons to make it easier to vote. Pushing the button would mail your vote to the proper address. The problem was that some of the "no" buttons sent "yes" messages, and some "yes" or "no" buttons sent "yes" messages for groups other than what was indicated on the page or in the sig.
WebTV's voting instructions indicate that a group that could be proven to be created through fraud will be permanently deleted without warning. No advice was given on what proof would be required. Also, there is no way to tell if a group has been defeated through fraud. Supposedly anyone caught committing voter fraud will be reported to abuse@corp.webtv.net and they will be recommended for subscription suspension or termination.
Another problem was human error where some newsgroup voting booths (which allowed users to vote on all the proposals) contained HTML errors which caused votes not to be counted.
Another flaw is that although each box was supposedly limited to one proposal per month, WebTV's system did not always prevent persistent proposal makers.
Also, the voting system created grudge votes where some users began to vote against proposals as a form of retribution when the person making the proposal had acted poorly in a newsgroup or when they had taken a stand against other proposals.
alt.discuss.no-rules Newsgroups
WebTV never made it clear why they created the alt.discuss.no-rules newsgroups. Repeated requests for comment made to Waggner Edstrom (WebTV's public relations firm) were not answered. The no-rules group hierarchy, created in late August 1998, allowed users to propose instant newsgroups; an hour after a proposal, the newsgroup would be created, without any voting process or evaluation for language or content.
According to a WebTV staffer, the alt.discuss.no-rules hierarchy was created by WebTV to serve as a warning to users that they may encounter objectionable material. A posting in the alt.discuss.config newsgroup said:
The name "no-rules" is intended as a warning to those who are unfamiliar with the hierarchy. alt.discuss.sex is a warning that groups at that level and below may deal with mature topics. alt.discuss.alt does not convey the type of warning that "no-rules" does, nor do the other suggested names.
The no-rules groups also served another purpose. There was no need to police the alt.discuss voting process for voting fraud because users could now create newsgroups whenever they wanted.
And they did. In one 24-hour period, 239 alt.discuss.no-rules newsgroups were established. Unlike the ordinary "alt.discuss" groups, users were not limited to the number of proposals that they could make; one user created 180 in one day all devoted to various kinds of food. That same day, a user proposed alt.discuss.no-rules.boy.i.am.tired.of.making.ngs.
Other newsgroup proposals were not as harmless. So many of the names of the no-rules groups were so objectionable, we will not repeat them here, but the following list shows some of the categories many of the groups fell into.
Nude video captures, both from pornographic videos and some that appeared to be from users
Anti-Jewish
Anti-Christian
Anti-Catholic
Anti-Muslim
Anti-Mexican
Anti-American
Anti-gay
Advocating murder of the groups mentioned above, of particular users (mentioned by username), or of other groups
Frivolous groups, including 180 by one user on the subject of food
Buying, using, and selling drugs
Advocating rape
Advocating or accusing groups or particular users of child molestation
Defamatory to a specific user
Bestiality
Abortion
Incest
Pornography
Probably the most troublesome legal issue raised by these groups was defamation and obscenity. Many newsgroup titles were directed at individual users and indicated them in a range of obscene and/or illegal acts, while others described specific acts of bestiality and child molestation in their titles.
On September 14, 1998, the alt.discuss.no-rules groups were deleted and the following message appeared in alt.discuss.config:
The alt.discuss.no-rules hierarchy has been removed. The alt.discuss.no-rules hierarchy has been deleted and the mechanism for creating new alt.discuss.no-rules newsgroups has been removed. This action was taken because newsgroups were being created whose existence was perceived as a potential legal liability for WebTV Networks. This action does not affect the rest of the alt.discuss hierarchy or the a.d newsgroup creation system in any way.
Prodigy, AOL and Congress
The alt.discuss newsgroups raise interesting questions regarding whether WebTV is a publisher of the content contained in them or merely the distributor. Internet service providers have claimed that they are common carriers, like the telephone company; they don't generate the content, they just pass it along to users from the outside. But WebTV's alt.discuss newsgroups are only available from within WebTV's firewall.
As more of the masses hop on the Internet through their televisions, this issue will become more difficult for on-line services like WebTV and AOL. So far, they have successfully lobbied congress for protection against liability.
It began with Prodigy. Prodigy was sued due to the actions of one of its users. That case held Prodigy liable as a publisher for defamatory content, and what made them a "publisher" as opposed to a "distributor" (who is not held liable until they are notified of the defamatory content) was that they were policing their forums. Prodigy was notorious for censoring their forums, but this message passed through their system.
Congress felt that self-regulation should be rewarded, not discouraged, so they passed a special exemption for on-line services that exempted them from publisher's liability.
Later, America Online was sued by a man named Zeran for defamation. In this case, an America Online user repeatedly posted ads for offensive T-shirts about the OK City bombing and gave Zeran's telephone number to call. The user continued to post his defamation, even after AOL had been notified (and had taken the initial post down). After several days, the AOL posting ended, but a radio station had picked up the story and talked about it on the air, and Zeran continued to be bombarded with calls and death threats.
In the Zeran case, the plaintiff tried to argue that even if AOL was exempt as a publisher, they still had the responsibility and liability of a distributor. The courts said, "No, Congress was exempting publishers from liability, period. Therefore, they are exempt from the distributor issue as well." This also has been applied to get AOL out of a case brought against Matt Drudge, despite the fact that AOL pays and promotes Drudge.
Congress probably didn't mean for it to have this effect, but that door has been opened and the big on-line services will continue to lobby Congress to be exempted from all liability. If this were to continue unchecked, anyone could say anything they like about anyone, with ZERO accountability because they can hide under "screen names" provided by these services, and the services can just claim "privacy policy" or "lose their records." Since the on-line service wouldn't be liable, they would have no vested interest in spending the time or resources to ensure their users' behavior matched the expectations of their Terms of Service.
Most certainly, in the case of WebTV, they are not exercising any publishing efforts in terms of responsibility for the content that they carry. Yet, if brought to court, it is likely they would try to hide under the publisher exemption and it's quite possible that they would succeed. They would point to removing posts with porno links from webtv.users and the fact that it's moderated. They would show that they removed the entire alt.discuss.no-rules hierarchy to eliminate obscene, defamatory, and thus illegal speech. This would likely allow them to claim "publisher" for the purposes of exemption. There would need a modification of the law to correct this situation.
WebTV and You: Our Editorial Opinion
WebTV's concern over legal liability is understandable, but their solution has not solved their problem. They've eliminated a way for misbehaving users to create nuisance newsgroups with obscene and defamatory names, but these users can still post obscene and defamatory nuisance messages in existing newsgroups, and do so with impunity.
A visit to alt.discuss.config (WebTV's main newsgroup about newsgroups) is often filled with obscene language, threats and other behaviors that are prohibited by WebTV's Terms of Service. The penalties mentioned for violating these rules is suspension and/or termination of service, yet historically, WebTV has been reluctant to follow through on these actions when they are directed "behind the firewall" by WebTV users against each other. The same users abuse others every day right under the nose of WebTV's newsgroup managers, yet no action is taken against them. It is WebTV's policy not to report the results of any investigation against a given user, or indeed, whether or not any such investigation is ever made.
WebTV cites its privacy policy, yet it states in its terms of service that actions taken by WebTV while investigating a violation of those terms of service do not constitute a violation of privacy.
WebTV's actions (and more importantly, its inaction) constitute a breach in their agreement with us, the users. We agree to behave, they agree to take action against those that don't. Most of us live up to our end of the bargain, but WebTV rarely does. They seem concerned only when their naughty users might embarrass them in front of the media. Certainly bad press can damage a company's growth, but so can neglecting its users. WebTV's attempts to manage its users virtually entirely through automation and with no human contact have failed and will continue to do so. Unhappy, uncared-for users will cause WebTV to die from the inside.
We are advocates of free speech. But with the right of free speech comes the duty of responsibility. Just as you cannot yell "Fire!" in a crowded theater, you also cannot say some of the things people are saying in the newsgroups and have a healthy community. It is time for WebTV to take responsibility and live up to its duties as the publisher and distributor of the alt.discuss newsgroups, and to recognize that its Terms of Service are a contract, and that a contract imposes obligations on both parties.
To find out more about WebTV's newsgroups, we recommend:
Penryn's newsgroup news and index at penCentral.
Paul Erickson's Page.
Robin-of-Lox's alt.discuss Info.
