Sony sued over free speech

[Timekeeper]

JIRO!
You are doing an assignment on internet lawsuits are you not?
Are you using this material???

[Madame Adequate]

Except, of course, that it's quite common for contracts to be challenged in court even after having been signed because they might not be legal. Whether that should be possible or not isn't relevant because right now it is possible, so simply writing it off as "But he signed the ToU" doesn't cut it (regardless of whether one thinks it should).

It'll be interesting to see whether Pruneyard influences the outcome of this case. The California constitution has been understood by the courts to mean that free speech is protected even in private shopping malls (A decision so radical that the European Court of Human Rights rejected an equivalent case coming from the UK!) I'm not familiar with whether it extends to other private establishments though.

[Raistlin]

There's a difference between political speech, which is incredibly well-defended, and simply profanity. You do not have any protection from just swearing at someone in someone else's property (or via someone else's property in this case). I don't see this guy having any chance at all with his lawsuit. The government even regulates profanity over TV.

[ChaosWolf]

If this guy wins I think he deserves it. He is only trying to milk Sony by taking advantage of his first amendment rights. People get sued over the dumbest crap these days.

[Skyblade]

Technically speaking, the First Amendment only protects your speech from being stamped out by the government. Sony can put whatever restrictions it wants to on content crossing its own servers.