Parish president wants names*

The interim president of Jefferson Parish in New Orleans has sued to force the Times-Picayune to turn over the names of 11 people who posted comment anonymously on the paper's website. The comments seem pretty tame, but interim president Steve Theriot says they were were "made with malice, and a blatant, intentional disregard for the truth, and with the intent that such statements damage plaintiffs."

The full story is here.

*UPDATE: Turns out Theriot isn't trying to intimidate anyone - he just wants to help! From the T-P:

Jefferson Parish interim President Steve Theriot told the Parish Council today that the lawsuit he filed against anonymous users of www.NOLA.com is aimed at addressing the concerns they raise -- not to block criticism of the government.

"This is in no way to shut up anyone regarding their concerns about the operation of the government," Theriot said.

Judge sues papers after her anonymous postings are revealed

From NPR:

The judge presiding over a high-profile serial killer case in Cleveland is now herself under scrutiny after her e-mail address was linked to dozens of comments on the Cleveland Plain Dealer's Web site.

Some comments were about ongoing cases she's hearing, including that of Anthony Sowell, who's suspected of killing 11 women. Now, Judge Shirley Strickland Saffold is suing the newspaper for $50 million, saying it violated her privacy.

Read the story here.

Tune in, turn off or drop out?

Not since roll up windows came to the automobile has pent up rage had a better release valve than news sites allowed reader comments. Rather than scream uselessly at the television or stab at the newspaper with a butter knife, the enraged and repressed can adopt anonymous handles and type out all manner of obscenity and epithet. Ask any reporter who's covered illegal immigration or gay marriage and they'll you how quickly, and predictably, the trolls descend.

This leaves news sites with a few choices - turn off comments on stories that raise sensitive issues (and shut out thoughtful commentary in the process), shut down comments altogether, or make some effort to manage comments.

Patrick Thornton at Poynter recently asked various publishers what they do. First he defined the problem:

Stories that elicit hateful and racist speech -- those dealing with immigrants, homosexuality and crime, particularly sexual assault -- are the first to go. "What makes crime comment threads go sour?" Publish2's Ryan Sholin asked on Twitter, and then answered: "Racism, hate, dislike of the police, and racism, I'd say. Also, racism." ...

Melissa Coulter, community editor of the Quad-City Times in Davenport, Iowa, and Brianne Pruitt, Web editor at The Wenatchee World in Washington, both said on Twitter that their news sites do not allow comments on sexual assault stories because of the risk of someone posting the victim's name. ...

Stephanie Romanski, Web editor of The Grand Island Independent's site, said on Twitter that her news org removed all commenting from the site and now has a "tweet this" link that enables users to take the discourse to Twitter. In a blog post in May, she explained why her news org decided to turn off commenting:

"We are also sending away the headaches that go with it and the drivel that can sometimes negate the integrity of the journalism. The latter is something our publisher has always pointed out regarding comments -- the ones who post rumors, the ones who post incorrect facts, the ones who tread the fine line between personal attack and playing by the rules -- those kinds of comments, he feels, can drag down a story and therefore our reputation."

-snip-

Not everyone, however, agrees with limiting comments even on controversial stories. Mathew Ingram, communities editor at The Globe and Mail in Toronto, said in an e-mail that his paper usually only closes comments on stories involving legal issues around contempt of court or libel. Ingram believes that a lot of important discourse is lost by limiting comments to only uncontroversial stories.

In another post, Thornton argues more active engagement is needed to prevent the threads from turning into "comment ghettos." That may be true, but it strikes me as impractical and unwise to ask reporters to get involved with defending a story, or responding to anonymous posters bent on suckering the writer into a rabbit hole.

Four in the morning

1. Scribd is a new service that lets authors publish online - and set their own price - and lets readers peruse books a chapter or two at at time. LAT

2. What can California's political leaders learn from baseball - besides having a better lineup? Arbitration, the hardball way. Calbuzz

3. A judge has ordered the Alton Telegraph to reveal the identities of two people who posted anonymous comments about a murder investigation on the paper's website. St. Louis Post-Dispatch

4. The misconduct that led a trial judge to dismiss charges against Sen. Ted Stevens - namely, the prosecution's failure to turn over key pieces of evidence to the defense - is becoming more common in the American justice system. WaPo

Whole Foods CEO broke no laws

John Mackey, CEO of the Austin, Texas-based Whole Foods, has come out clean on the other side of an SEC investigation into a tidal wave of anonymous postings he made on Yahoo Finance praising his own company while denigrating his chief competition, the Wall Street Journal reports. Whole Foods later bought the object of Mackey's derision, Wild Oats, prompting the inquiry.

The 11-month investigation looked at whether Mackey's "1,400-odd anonymous messages under the screen name 'Rahodeb' had broken any laws, but concluded no action needed to be taken against the CEO or the company.

"As a result, Mr. Mackey has returned to the Web with a vengeance, posting a 2,037 word piece on Whole Foods' Web site in which he says he is sorry the investigation put a negative spotlight on the company."

-snip-

"I don't wish to apologize for being highly competitive, because much of my drive and creativity come from this competitiveness," he said. "I don't believe that I ever crossed the line of fair but vigorous debate in these postings."

Mackey added that he's relieved to get back to his blog.