Court affirms bloggers have same rights as traditional media

A Jan. 17 ruling by a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has reaffirmed that the First Amendment's guarantee of press freedom applies to bloggers on the Internet and not just professional journalists employed by the institutional media. In the case of Obsidian Finance Group v. Cox, the court ruled that a financial services firm suing a blogger had to meet the same standard of proof of actual malice and negligence as would be necessary if they were suing a traditional news organization.