Drilling in to the issue of moderation and liability I had a very useful discussion with Struan Roberts last week. He’s a technology lawyer with Pinsent Masons and Editor of OUT-LAW.

Looking at moving from a system of light moderation on IT Counts, where we allow registered users to post comments at their own risk, to one where we will pre-approve comments for guest users (pre-moderation is the jargon term) there remains the issue of how to handle liability.

Struan explained that in principle you can’t limit liability for users whose comments are moderated, though it helps to greatly remove the risk by dealing with any complaints promptly and use wording to encourage guest users to take care with their content.

He added that current registered users would not be a liability risk as their comments will continue to appear without moderation.

Very useful advice indeed.