What Is a 1996 Interactive Computer Service according to Careful Grammatical and Syntactic Analysis?

Here is § 230 (f) Definitions (2).

Interactive computer service
The term “interactive computer service” means any information service, system, or access software provider that provides or enables computer access by multiple users to a computer server, including specifically a service or system that provides access to the Internet and such systems operated or services offered by libraries or educational institutions.

The comma between server and including means the text should be constructed to be equivalent to the following.

The term “interactive computer service” means any information service, system, or access software provider
1. that provides or enables computer access by multiple users to a computer server and
2. that includes specifically either a service or system that provides access to the Internet and to such systems operated or services offered by libraries or educational institutions.

So what do the two restrictive relative clauses modify? The first occurrence of system is so general that the two restrictive relative clauses must modify it. If the two restrictive relative clauses modify both “access software provider” and also system, the same two restrictive relative clauses must modify the phrase “information service”. The above text must be constructed to the following by expanding any elliptic phrase to the only possible complete equivalent.
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After Stratton Oakmont, it made sense to immunize a 1996 Internet portal like AOL, Compuserve, or Prodigy because these Internet On-Ramps,
1. were wholly private entities,
2. were outside the Internet,
3. were not state-supported, and
4. had no control over the Internet content that they made available to their users.

Even if one takes into account the development of technology, a 2022 social medium platform like Twitter
1. is an Internet service, wholly within the Internet, which is a massively state-supporter facility, establishment, or (possibly functional) place of public accommodation for resource shoring,
2. is therefore itself a place of public accommodation under Title II of the 1964 CRA, and
3. is not a portal to the Internet as the image list items (a-c) all indicate a 1996 ICS must be.

The user of a 1996 ICS must be coming from outside the Internet as no user does today with today’s technology.

It is:
1. un-Constitutional federal judicial legislating and
2. federal judicial enablement of a statutory Title II violation

for the Courts to interpret — incorrectly by denial of the antecedent — a statute, which is directed to a 1996 ICS/Internet On-Ramp, to apply to 2022 social medium platform,
1. which is in the Internet,
2. which provides no Internet portal for today’s Internet user, who connects directly to the Internet, and
3. which is prohibited from discriminating against a protected group under 42 U.S. Code § 2000a.

Even if § 230 survives Constitutional challenge — something which I doubt, SCOTUS is likely
1. to pay close attention to the grammar and syntax of a statute and
2. to find this statute inapplicable to a 2022 social medium platform.

Congress had to make a statutory change in 1991 to remove a lacuna in 42 U.S. Code § 1981 – Equal rights under the law. See Patterson v. McLean Credit Union, 491 U.S. 164, 109 S. Ct. 2363 (1989).

I doubt that Congress will make a similar fix to § 230, which deserves unceremonious and contemptuous burial as quickly as possible.

So what is a 1996 Interactive Computer Service (ICS)?

47 U.S. Code § 230 defines an ICS in clause (f) Definitions (2). Some other 1996 statutes like 47 U.S. Code § 223 and like 18 U.S. Code § 2261A refer to an ICS but to understand clause § 230 (f)(2) the definition of Access Software Provider of § 230 Definitions (4) must first be comprehended.

So what is a 1996 Access Software Provider?

My company consulted for AOL in 1996. At the time AOL was an Interactive Computer Service because it was a dial-up Internet On-Ramp. At the time Compuserve and Prodigy were also Interactive Computer Services. We also consulted for Aurora Technologies, which manufactured Access Software and licensed the software to a system integrator that worked with an Internet On-Ramp for a library or for a school.

The System Integrator/Access Software Provider set up a (usually headless) server at the school or library. The server was connected to the Internet On-Ramp either by dial-up or by leased line. The client software was installed on a number of PCs that connected to the server by serial lines, by Ethernet, by Token Ring, or by Arcnet.

47 U.S. Code § 223 (e) Defenses (6) indicates that Congress put a user of an ICS or a user of an Access Software Provider, at least in some situations into the category of a user of a dial-up phone line.

To a 1996 user of an ICS or of Access Software Provider, the definitions of these two entities are perfectly clear. A Court struggles with the definitions in 2022 because the technology is obsolete, and everyone has forgotten what these definitions mean.

Here is § 230 (f) Definitions (2).

Interactive computer service
The term “interactive computer service” means any information service, system, or access software provider that provides or enables computer access by multiple users to a computer server, including specifically a service or system that provides access to the Internet and such systems operated or services offered by libraries or educational institutions.

Here is § 230 (f) Definitions (4).

Access software provider
The term “access software provider” means a provider of software (including client or server software), or enabling tools that do any one or more of the following:
(A) filter, screen, allow, or disallow content;
(B) pick, choose, analyze, or digest content; or
(C) transmit, receive, display, forward, cache, search, subset, organize, reorganize, or translate content.

47 U.S. Code § 223 does not directly refer to an Access Software Provider except indirectly through ICS.

47 U.S. Code § 223 (e) Defenses (6) tells us that to Congress an ICS could be a dial-up service.

For the purpose of a legal defense, the ICS must not be considered a common carrier.

The following clause of 47 U.S.C. § 223 (e) does not indicate how to treat an ICS outside of a legal defense to an accusation under § 223.

(6) The Commission may describe measures which are reasonable, effective, and appropriate to restrict access to prohibited communications under subsection (d). Nothing in this section authorizes the Commission to enforce, or is intended to provide the Commission with the authority to approve, sanction, or permit, the use of such measures. The Commission shall have no enforcement authority over the failure to utilize such measures. The Commission shall not endorse specific products relating to such measures. The use of such measures shall be admitted as evidence of good faith efforts for purposes of paragraph (5) in any action arising under subsection (d). Nothing in this section shall be construed to treat interactive computer services as common carriers or telecommunications carriers.

47 U.S.C. § 223 (h) Definitions (3) (a-c) defines “Access Software” and is consistent with 47 U.S.C. § 230 (f) Definitions (4) Access Software Provider (A-C). § 223 (e) Defenses (1) refers to “Access Software”.

So how does active curating lead to defamation?

The patent lawyers were clear.

1. Crowd A on a social medium posts, tweets, or comments an attack on a target.

2. Crowd B on a social medium posts, tweets, or comments a defense of the target.

3 The social medium platform removes the defense of the target under § 230 (c)(2)(A) and then defends itself against a charge of libel by means of § 230 (c)(1).

The patent lawyers considered this scenario
1. to show the fundamental un-Constitutionality of § 230 and
2. to demonstrate the need for state regulation of a social medium platform à la S.B. 7072 or HB20 when the FCC declines to exercise its regulatory authority over the social medium platform.

When Congress discussed the bill, which included § 230, the potential for defamation by active curating was never addressed.

When my Original Complaint is rewritten into a class action Amended or New Complaint, we will include a count of defamation by active curating in the rewritten complaint, and we will address the obvious un-Constitutionality of § 230 — at least according to the patent lawyers.

The rewritten complaint will point out the following.

Zionists organize on a social medium platform

1. in order to defame Palestinians and pro-Palestine users and

2. in order to pressure the social medium platform to apply active curating to remove a pro-Palestine user and his content.

There is little evidence that it took much pressure to compel a social medium to apply such defamatory and discriminatory active curating.

A jury verdict of defamation of a whole plaintiff class by a social medium platform will almost certainly bankrupt the social medium platform. Such bankruptcy will be something good for the US political system. The bankrupt social medium platform can be put under the control of a state owned enterprise as a bankrupt railroad corporation was during the 1970s. The abusive management can be fired, and a serious danger to the US political system can be neutralized.

The opinions of patent lawyers are interesting because many understand the technology, which underlies the Internet/WWW. I pointed out that § 230 caselaw is based on the logical fallacy, which is called denial of the antecedent and which the Zeran Court used to reach its ruling.

§ 230 tells us the following.

If a 1996 Interactive Computer Service is a defendant in a legal proceeding, it “shall [not] be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.”

I tried to demonstrate by means of formal logic that the Zeran Court violated Article 1 Section 1 of the US Constitution when it used denial of the antecedent to derive the following.

If a 1996 Interactive Computer Service is not a defendant in a legal proceeding, it is a publisher with unfettered editorial discretion.

Unfortunately, Vulcan-style logical argument was ineffective. Then I tried to explain the problem of denial of the antecedent as I explained it to my daughter when she was in sixth grade.
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The above explanation of the problem with § 230 caselaw was more effective than the argument by formal logic.

The patent professionals focused on another problem and generally agreed that § 230 gave a 2022 social medium platform an unconstitutional license to defame because active curating of content is a mechanism of defamation as a 2020 social medium platform uses it according to § 230 (c)(2)(A) along with the limited immunity § 230 (c)(1).

On account of Stratton Oakmont I consider it to have been important for Congress to enact § 230 to protect a 1996 ICS because § 230 asserted that a 1996 ICS had no more liability than a bookstore or newspaper stand. Nothing in § 230 gives a 2022 social medium platform the unfettered editorial discretion of a publisher.

When I make a post or a comment on a Web site, I transmit a text message from my computing device to a backend server via an HTTP POST or via an HTTP PUT request. This text message is stored in secondary storage on a server.

Later when another user does an HTTP GET request to tell the backend server to transmit to his computing device the web page, with which the text message has been associated, the software on the server creates a formatted document, which is transmitted to the user. The user’s browser receives the formatted document and places the document on the user’s screen according to the software directives , which the server inserted into the document.

The operations above are automatic and not under human control at the backend where the server resides. Yet the operations have a strong similarity to the actions of a newspaper publisher or of a book publisher.

Congress was trying by means of § 230 to tell the Courts
1. that the 1996 Interactive Computer Service was to considered in the class of a newspaper stand or in the class of a bookstore and
2. that the 1996 ICS does not bear publisher liability for automatic operations that have similarity to traditional publisher operations.

Unfortunately, racist pro-discrimination advocates have distorted § 230 into a license for discrimination and for defamation. We have evidence that four Justices have some discomfort with § 230. It will only take one more Justice to kill § 230.

I hope that my litigation drives the stake through the heart of the vampire monster that § 230 has become.

My case has gone to a panel of the Court of Appeals for the First Circuit.
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While most of the Defendants declined to participate, A Medium Corp was well represented by a top Boston litigator.

Even if I do not prevail, I will file an new class action complaint in District Court. In addition to my experience before the District Court, before the Appeals Court, and before SCOTUS, the counsel, whom I am considering, and I, have learned a lot from the ongoing litigation in the 5th Circuit, the 11th Circuit, and in the Ohio state court system.

My litigation focuses on:
1. public accommodation discrimination (42 U.S. Code § 2000a),
2. civil rights discrimination (42 U.S. Code § 1981, § 1982, & § 1981), and
3. common carriage discrimination according to Commonwealth common law.

If those arguments are not sufficient to end the abomination of § 230 and its caselaw, the new or amended class action complaint will point out that a 2022 social medium platform clearly does not fit the definition of a 1996 ICS as ICS is defined in described in § 230 and § 223.

§ 230 is one of the more obscure statutes in the U.S. Code. It is hardly surprising that the evil of § 230 is misreported.