Idea Lab

Revisiting Foreign Libel Law's Pernicious Impact on First Amendment Speech

by David Ardia
2007 Knight News Challenge Winner

Back in April, I blogged over at the Citizen Media Law Project about New York's Libel Terrorism Protection Act, which bars the enforcement of foreign defamation judgments unless a New York court has found that the foreign court proceeding provided at least as much protection for freedom of speech and press in that case as would be provided by both the United States and New York Constitutions. "Libel terrorism" (a term I am not a big fan of) describes the practice of libel plaintiffs who pursue claims against American publishers in foreign courts that offer few, if any, of...

• July 15, 2008
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Exactly What We Dreamed Of

by Geoff Dougherty
2007 Knight News Challenge Winner

When I first began thinking of launching a website that published the work of citizen journalists, one of the most alluring potential benefits was the idea of putting more eyes on the street. If we ran a typical local news operation that had a dozen reporters or so, we'd have a dozen people out and about who might see some news. But with grassroots journalism, the possibilities are vastly expanded. We got an illustration of how important that is on Friday, when citizen journalist Kimberly Michaels called to say that an acquaintance had witnessed an instance of apparent police brutality...

• November 7, 2007
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