  stratton oakmont, inc. v. prodigy services co., 1995 wl 323710 (n.y. sup. ct. 1995), is a 1995 u.s. new york supreme courtin most states and in the u.s. federal court system, "supreme court" is the name of the highest court in the state. however, the new york supreme court is primarily a trial court, roughly equivalent to the "district courts", "superior courts," or "circuit courts" of other states. the highest court in new york state is called the "court of appeals." see new york supreme court. decision which held that online service providers could be held liable for the speech of their users. ==facts== in october 1994, an unidentified user of prodigy's money talk bulletin board created a post which claimed that stratton oakmont, inc, a long island securities investment banking firm, and its president danny porush, committed criminal and fraudulent acts in connection with the initial public offering of stock of solomon-page, ltd. stratton oakmont sued prodigy and the unidentified poster for defamation.citizen media law project, stratton oakmont, inc. v. prodigy services co. (retrieved march 26, 2009). ==court ruling== the plaintiffs argued that prodigy should be considered a publisher of the defamatory material and were therefore liable for the postings under the common-law definition of defamation. prodigy asked to be dismissed from the case on the grounds that they could not be held liable for the content of postings created by its users, relying on a 1991 case cubby, inc. v. compuserve inc., which had found compuserve, an online service provider, not liable as a publisher for user-generated content.cubby, inc. v. compuserve inc., 776 f. supp. 135 (s.d.n.y. 1991). the stratton court held that prodigy was liable as the publisher of the content created by its users because it exercised editorial control over the messages on their bulletin boards in three ways: 1) by posting content guidelines for users, 2) by enforcing those guidelines with "board leaders", and 3) by utilizing screening software designed to remove offensive language.stratton oakmont, inc. v. prodigy services co., no. 31063/94, 1995 wl 323710, 1995 n.y. misc. lexis 229 (n.y. sup. ct. 1995). the court's general argument for holding prodigy liable, in the face of the compuserve case, was that "prodigy's conscious choice, to gain the benefits of editorial control, has opened it up to a greater liability to comp
1995_in_New_York 1995_in_United_States_case_law AT&T_litigation Case_law_by_party New_York_state_case_law Trials_with_corporate_defendants United_States_Free_Speech_Clause_case_law United_States_Internet_case_law