A personal reputation infringement lawsuit targeting China's
biggest blog website is to be heard in court next month, according
to Nanjing Intermediate People's Court in east China's
Jiangsu Province.
Associate professor Chen Tangfa, from the School of Journalism
at Nanjing University, found a blog diary full of insults directed
towards him on the website www.Blogcn.com, as he randomly searched
the Web last June.
Chen called Blogcn's customer service department and asked them
to remove K007's blog diary.
But staff rejected his request, saying they had no right to
delete their users' blogs.
"We have posted a notice on our website warning our users that
several kinds of things are forbidden, including reactionary and
humiliating notices, but it all depends on those bloggers'
self-discipline," according to a worker with Blogcn surnamed
Sun.
The case will be heard at Nanjing Intermediate People's Court
next month, according to Gong Da, a member of staff at the
court.
Chen's case, reported by some media as the country's first
lawsuit against a blog website, has provoked both approval and
criticism among the public and experts.
Hu Jingnan, from Nanjing, who won a reputation infringement
lawsuit last December over a blogger who insulted him, said he
would support Chen in his case.
But Liu Yuanyuan, a blog user in Nanjing University, does not
support the lawsuit.
"Cyberspace should be the place for us to freely express
ourselves. If Chen disagrees with K007's blog diary, he could write
one to explain himself in his own blog. It is offensive to let the
staff of a website censor our notices," said Liu.
According to Wu Xiangyi, a researcher from Beijing-based China
Internet Research Centre, related regulations require websites to
censor inappropriate notices posted by its users, but many websites
in China were unable to do that due to a shortage of funds and
staff.
According to Chen, by taking Blogcn to court, he hopes to bring
order and discipline to cyberspace.
Now boasting 16 million bloggers, China now has 52 percent of
its office workers writing blogs, according to a recent survey.
(China Daily February 23, 2006)