8 upvotes, 1 direct replies (showing 1)
View submission: [Updated] Who runs /r/Holocaust? Each line represents a moderator overlap. [OC]
I'm fairly certain that a media website is under no obligation to hand over control of a particular page simply because someone holds the trademark on a word in the page title. Also fairly certain libel liability doesn't extend beyond the limits of editorial control to affect the host of a website with multi thousand unique visitors an hour.
And as far as the Germany/Nazi angle, unless they're hosting the site in Germany, German law doesn't apply.
Comment by zombiepiratefrspace at 23/07/2014 at 21:04 UTC
1 upvotes, 1 direct replies
WIPO disagrees. If trademarks are involved, they are subject to liability.
As for the Germany issue, if they specifically target a German audience (which they do in their current expansion effort), German courts will accept it as falling within their jurisdiction. Of course, being a US company, they could just ignore it. As long as they don't have any subsidiary in Germany.
It becomes more problematic for their *users*. Because the users of the German speaking part of reddit are most likely within Germany, they are very much subject to the Holocaustleugnungs-law. In that scenario, reddit might become a "Störer" as defined in German law, if they don't identify the user after a court order, thus making reddit also liable for the Holocaust denial charge (that's "Störerhaftung" and it causes so many problems).
Make no mistake, actual lawyers and courts are needed to check if what I said is true, but these issues most definitely cannot be dismissed as irrelevant or harmless to reddit. Sooner or later, there will be lawsuits.