Form letter, new email addresses for protesting arbitrary blog comment censorship

To help increase responses, I am providing a form letter here. Of course, a protest in your own words is best, but this form letter is far better than nothing. Please send me a copy at LarryFarma@aol.com to help me gauge the support for this protest. For background info on this protest, see this post.

Do not underestimate the power of your email. I knew a dissident engineer who was getting nowhere in trying to get an invitation to testify before a Senate committee -- then 50 of his supporters sent in form letters and he was invited immediately.

I have also provided some new email addresses for this protest. Most of these new email addresses are for bloggers on the Volokh Conspiracy and Balkinization blogs. I selected these two blogs because (1) both have high numbers of citations by law journal articles -- 62 citations and 32 citations respectively according to a fairly recent study -- and (2) I have seen these two blogs frequently cited on the Internet. These long lists of email addresses are necessary -- it would be a tremendous help if just one of these bloggers were persuaded to post an article on this subject. I have also combined the new email address list and the old email address list to form a single list that is ready for insertion into your email. I can't make it any easier for you.

Suggested subject line: Protest of authoritative referencing of arbitrarily censoring blogs

Suggested text:

By arbitrary censorship, I mean that comments and/or commenters are censored for the sole reason that the bloggers disagree with the opinions and/or arguments of the comments or the commenters. Bloggers who arbitrarily censor comments have shown an intention to present just one side of controversial issues and the blogs of these bloggers should therefore not be quoted, cited, or listed for authoritative purposes -- e.g., by court opinions, scholarly journals, and scientific databases. Citation of blogs by law journal articles is already widespread and citation of blogs by court opinions has begun -- see

http://3lepiphany.typepad.com/3l_epiphany/2006/08/law_review_arti.html

-- and --

http://3lepiphany.typepad.com/3l_epiphany/2006/08/cases_citing_le.html

Arbitrary censorship on blogs can include IP address blocking, which is disreputable and irresponsible as well as often being ineffective. IP address blocking can block comments from large numbers of Internet users who share the same ISP proxy IP address.

IMO, a blog that is cited by a court opinion becomes like an official governmental public hearing that must accept all comments.

For more information, see --

http://im-from-missouri.blogspot.com/2007/04/protest-of-authoritative-referencing-of.html

Sincerely,

- - - - - - - - - -

===========================================
(end of proposed letter)

Additional email addresses:

Bloggers on the Volokh Conspiracy blog:

dalecarp@umn.edu,
dbernste@gmu.edu,
David.Post@temple.edu,
jaffe@esjpc.com,
volokh@law.ucla.edu,
isomin@gmu.edu,
jlindgren@law.northwestern.edu,
jha5@case.edu,
choset@gmail.com,
okerr@law.gwu.edu,
paul.ohm@colorado.edu,
rbarnett@gmail.com,
korobkin@law.ucla.edu,
volokh@post.harvard.edu,
benjamin@law.duke.edu,
tzywick2@gmu.edu,
tcowen@gmu.edu

Bloggers on the Balkinization blog:

jackbalkin@yahoo.com,
ian.ayres@yale.edu,
lee-epstein@northwestern.edu,
mgraber@law.umaryland.edu,
sgriffin@tulane.edu,
shorto@law.columbia.edu,
akoppelman@law.northwestern.edu,
marty.lederman@comcast.net,
slevinson@law.utexas.edu,
david.luban@gmail.com,
kimlane@princeton.edu,
dsolove@law.gwu.edu,
tamanahb@stjohns.edu,
mtushnet@law.harvard.edu


Webcontent.gov -- Guide to Managing U.S. Government Websites, General Services Admin.:

Sheila.campbell@gsa.gov,
webcontenttoolkit@gsa.gov,
webmanageruniversity@gsa.gov

Additional Thomson-Scientific:

jane.reeves@thomson.com,
ts.current.web.contents@thomson.com,
GeneralInfo@Thomson.com

==============================================

Combined email list -- this post's email addresses plus the email addresses from the previous list here.
(Reminder -- please send me a copy at LarryFarma@aol.com to help me gauge the support for this protest)

allison.hagan@thomson.com,
kathleen.odonnell@thomson.com,
marylou.warwick@thomson.com,
jane.reeves@thomson.com,
ts.cts.amer@thomson.com,
service@techstreet.com,
rs.info@thomson.com,
rs.sales@thomson.com,
foundation-press@thomson.com,
west_lawschool@thomson.com,
support@westacademic.com,
paul.caron@uc.edu,
berman.43@osu.edu,
nancy.soonpaa@ttu.edu,
faigmand@uchastings.edu,
David.Kaye@asu.edu,
Michael.Saks@asu.edu,
JSanders@central.UH.edu,
edward.cheng@brooklaw.edu,
mgiangra@depaul.edu,
ianbest@sbcglobal.net,
joe.hodnicki@gmail.com,
JONESRE@UCMAIL.UC.EDU,
jaywex@bu.edu,
quarter@wulaw.wustl.edu,
rosenhjd@jmu.edu,
nmsrdave@swcp.com,
abottaro@pandasthumb.org,
ed@pandasthumb.org,
brauer@pandasthumb.org,
reed@pandasthumb.org,
welsberr@pandasthumb.org,
rbh@pandasthumb.org,
garyhurd@pandasthumb.org,
minlay@pandasthumb.org,
jkrebs@pandasthumb.org,
jml@pandasthumb.org,
ianfmusgrave@pandasthumb.org,
pz@pandasthumb.org,
tara@pandasthumb.org,
wilkins@pandasthumb.org,
webmaster@seedmediagroup.com,
newblogger@seedmediagroup.com,
advertising@seedmediagroup.com,
dalecarp@umn.edu,
dbernste@gmu.edu,
David.Post@temple.edu,
jaffe@esjpc.com,
volokh@law.ucla.edu,
isomin@gmu.edu,
jlindgren@law.northwestern.edu,
jha5@case.edu,
choset@gmail.com,
okerr@law.gwu.edu,
paul.ohm@colorado.edu,
rbarnett@gmail.com,
korobkin@law.ucla.edu,
volokh@post.harvard.edu,
benjamin@law.duke.edu,
tzywick2@gmu.edu,
tcowen@gmu.edu,
jackbalkin@yahoo.com,
ian.ayres@yale.edu,
lee-epstein@northwestern.edu,
mgraber@law.umaryland.edu,
sgriffin@tulane.edu,
shorto@law.columbia.edu,
akoppelman@law.northwestern.edu,
marty.lederman@comcast.net,
slevinson@law.utexas.edu,
david.luban@gmail.com,
kimlane@princeton.edu,
dsolove@law.gwu.edu,
tamanahb@stjohns.edu,
mtushnet@law.harvard.edu,
Sheila.campbell@gsa.gov,
webcontenttoolkit@gsa.gov,
webmanageruniversity@gsa.gov,
ts.current.web.contents@thomson.com,
GeneralInfo@Thomson.com
.