But I wouldn't blame the providers. I'd blame the enraged woman who made the posts.

That was the big concern in the Demon case - that they would be found guilty of publishing the post in question. That would be like suing the phone company for allowing another person to make a slanderous phone call. That, at least, didn't happen.

Re US v UK systems - it's funny, but we tend to think that the guarantees on freedom of expression in the US make for better libel law because it prevents people with wounded egos (or more money than morals) from suing someone who makes the slightest derogatory remark about them.

There'a another interesting topic current in the UK at the moment. A newspaper published a story about two footballers (that's soccer players for those in the US) being involved in some kind of gay orgy. The paper didn't identify the players involved, but for some reason another player (who says he isn't one of them) has been named and a lot of rumours are apparently circulating on the internet. This player has now sued the paper but has also asked Google to explain why, when you type his name into their search engine, it comes up with links to (player's name) + 'gay'. Just shows how sensitive people are becoming to what appears about them on the net. Nobody cared when it was just a few geeks logging on!

Steve