Ornoth

On Friday, the judge hearing our VA case issued a preliminary injunction preventing the state from enforcing Virginia's SB 854 against any Netchoice member (which means us!) while the lawsuit proceeds. Judge Giles's ruling is a little technical in places and covers a number of legal issues that I keep meaning to get around to explaining someday so folks can have a better grasp on the kind of things they'll see argued in cases like these, like strict scrutiny and associational standing, but the end result is still pretty clear, I think: the judge agrees Netchoice has made a strong enough showing right from the start that the law is unconstitutional to block the state from doing anything to enforce it until the full case can be heard.

This is only the beginning of that particular fight and we still have a ways to go, but it's great news for us, for all our users from Virginia, and for the internet as a whole. Three cheers for the Netchoice team and the outside litigation counsel, who are Clement & Murphy for this one! The full docket in RECAP: NetChoice v. Jason S. Miyares, 1:25-cv-02067, (E.D. Va.).

Now recruiting: DW users who would be interested in the possibility of helping us out in one of these legal challenges, now or future!

If you would be open to the idea of potentially filing something with a court talking about the ways that the restrictions that Dreamwidth would have to impose to comply with a specific state's law (commonly, obligations like age verification via document scan or biometric verification, treating users as though they're underage until/unless they age-verify, etc) would have a chilling effect on your online activity and speech, and especially​ if you're a parent who would also be willing to explain to a court all the ways in which a specific state's law would interfere with or burden your parenting decisions: we're looking to assemble a list of people we can contact in the future if necessary.

If this sounds like you, please leave a comment with what state you currently live in. (Also, commenting is not a commitment, just you saying that you would be okay with us reaching out to you and seeing whether you were available/able to help.) I'm currently most interested in hearing from people from South Carolina, but the ubiquity of these laws being proposed means any state could be the next. All comments are screened so nobody but us can see them.

(Obligatory risk considerations: you would have to file under your wallet/government name, and there's a chance of having to associate your wallet name with your DW username to at least the court and to the state, if not publicly. If this could be a problem for you, don't risk it! But if you're willing and able, us being able to show the court a sworn statement from one of our users about the effects the mandated changes would have on you could be very helpful.)

EDIT: Also I forgot to explicitly specify, this is for US folks! We do not unfortunately have the ability to get involved with anything outside the US.