"For now," though, seems to be the phrase on which everything teeters. Amendments could be added on the Senate floor, and both could be vetoed by the President, who has promised to do so.

It hasn’t been all party-line, like one might imagine. Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-Cal.) voted in favor of immunity, while Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX) argued the telephone companies "deserve our thanks" for spying on us and breaking the law.

Senator Alen Specter (R-PA) offered a "compromise" at one point that would substitute the government for the telecoms in court.  But these actions to rob the American people of their ability to hold companies and their government accountable are rather moot.

For now.

Whether or not one agrees the wiretapping and intercepting of Internet traffic was justified (or even legal), the people should not be robbed of their right to sue and have this settled in court.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation, the organization heading up one of a dozen class action suits waiting to heard, cheered the representatives that held up the rights of the public. 

"We are pleased that the House and a majority of the Judiciary Committee’s members have signaled that they want Americans to have their day in court," said EFF Staff Attorney Kevin Bankston.

"The fight isn’t over yet, however. We look forward to working with Senators Leahy, Specter, and Feingold and other lawmakers in both chambers of Congress to make sure that the bill eventually sent to the president allows the people’s lawsuits to go forward."

This means that if you post malicious or defaming information or write something of that nature about someone online that you can not be sued for it. Only the source of the defaming information can be at fault. For example, if someone in my comments posts something bad about George Bush I won’t get in trouble but the source could be tracked down and sued for defamation. Granted, that is an extreme case.

This move will help help to protect the freedom of speech online as well as ensure that companies like Amazon, AOL and Yahoo don’t get sued for libel for pointless things that they have no control over. It also protects blogger who reposts information that they received from a source or information they obtained by other means. They can’t directly be sued unless they are the direct source of the malicious information.

The decision was made in California Supreme Court and decided in the case of Rosenthal who was being sued for posting a piece to two newsgroups about a doctor and the defamation of his character through supposed health frauds. The lawsuit accuses Rosenthal of republishing the information after being warned it was untrue and defamatory. In reversing an appellate court’s decision, the state Supreme Court ruled that the Communications Decency Act of 1996 provides broad immunity from defamation lawsuits for people who publish information on the Internet that was gathered from another source.

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Dustin Brewer is a web and graphic designer with a passionate interest
in everything that is technology. He currently is the webmaster and
editor for tech filter, a technology news web site, as well as a writer
for Gadgetell– a similar web site about technology news with a strong
focus on new gadgets.