Aliases Subject of Internet Libel Case "There are a lot of areas in law where the offline and online worlds are treated similarly," he said. "Libel is
one of those. If you libel someone anonymously and your ID is discovered, the law of libel is going to apply.
It's that way on the Net and that way off the Net."

Nor is anonymous speech, uttered on a wild and woolly online message board, subject to lesser standards of
care than anonymous speech published in a newspaper…
There's one big difference between defamatory speech in the online and offline worlds, however, said Professor
Lidsky of the University of Florida. On the Internet, the ordinary person is a publisher, and thus the
possibility that a small fry can become a defamation defendant is magnified.

After all, if the Internet didn't exist, the defendant in the Graham case may have simply talked around a water
cooler and no suit would have been brought…
http://www.nytimes.com/2000/12/14/technology/15CYBERLAW.htm