Sixth Circuit’s Decision in Jones v. Dirty World Entertainment Recordings LLC Repairs Damage to Communications Decency Act

In a key federal appellate court opinion construing the Communications Decency Act (CDA), the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in Jones v. Dirty World Entertainment Recordings LLC reversed several decisions by the District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky suggesting that the operators of TheDirty.com may be treated as the publishers of defamatory statements posted by others on their website merely because they “encouraged” such statements through the use of a controversial web address and posted nondefamatory comments “ratifying” such statements.