Vol 7 No 1 - Roger Williams University School of Law

distributor, but rather as a participant in the publication of thirdparty content—an activity which is protected under Section 230.66The court even went so far as to hold that, upon notice of adefamatory posting, an ISP is “thrust into the role of a traditionalpublisher,” because the service provider must then determinewhether or not to publish, edit, or withdraw the posting.67 Thisrationale effectively prevents an ISP distributing third-partycontent from ever meeting the knowledge standard required forliability, because once knowledge is proven, the ISP would rise tothe federally protected realm of a publisher.68 In support of thisholding, the court argued that an interpretation of Section 230imposing liability on ISPs with knowledge of defamatory contentwould be contrary to Congress’ intent in passing the CDA, as itwould deter service providers from monitoring the content of theirsystems.69One year after Zeran, a similar decision was reached inBlumenthal v. Drudge70 regarding the CDA’s extreme limitationon the liability faced by an ISP for third-party content posted onits services. In Blumenthal, Sidney Blumenthal, an assistant toPresident Clinton, sued Matt Drudge, a gossip columnist, overcomments included in Drudge’s publication, “The Drudge Report,”suggesting that Blumenthal had a history of beating his wife.71Blumenthal also sued America Online, which had a contract withDrudge to make the Drudge Report available to all AOL membersfor the period of one year in exchange for a monthly royalty of$3,000.72 In the contract, America Online reserved the right toremove content from the Drudge Report that it reasonablydetermined violated AOL’s standard terms of provider service.73AOL had also vigorously promoted its distribution of the DrudgeReport, characterizing Matt Drudge as a “Runaway GossipSuccess.”74 After Drudge formally retracted his allegations aboutBlumenthal, America Online disabled access to the story on its66. See id. at 332.67. See id.68. See Goldstein, supra note 3.69. See Zeran, 129 F.3d at 333; see also Goldstein, supra note 3.70. 992 F. Supp. 44 (D.D.C. 1998).71. See id.72. See Blumenthal v. Drudge, 992 F. Supp. 44, 47 (D.D.C. 1998).73. See id.74. See id. at 51.