Business Formation

This is the first in a series of posts calling attention to some of the topics covered in the recently launched Citizen Media Law Project Legal Guide. The first topic we'll take up is choosing a business form for online publishing activities. There is increasing awareness that, especially if you publish content in collaboration with others, it may not be smart to simply leave the relationship "natural" or informal. But this realization raises other questions: What are my options? What are the benefits of legal formality? Will it be expensive to obtain these benefits? Will I have to sacrifice control?

Below is an excerpt from the legal guide giving a brief introduction to some of the most commonly adopted business structures and pointing out some of their most salient advantages and disadvantages. This page in the guide is just a jumping-off point for in-depth discussions on each of the business forms that you can find in the guide. In the end, the choice between business forms is a personal one. Our hope is that the legal guide will help you understand the issues and make a better-informed decision.   read more »

Welcome to the first episode of the Citizen Media Law Podcast, providing practical knowledge and tools for citizen journalists. This week, David Ardia responds to the federal shield bill passed in the U.S. House of Representatives, Colin Rhinesmith talks about legal threats to co-bloggers, and Sam Bayard reflects on the Phoenix New Times arrests.

Download the MP3 (time: 7:00)

Music used in this podcast was sampled and remixed from a track titled "Jazz House" by the Wicked Allstars, available on Magnatune.

To subscribe to the Citizen Media Law Podcast, visit our Subscriptions page or go directly to the podcast feed.

The Center for Citizen Media is in the midst of a series of posts exploring possible business models for citizen journalism and the processes surrounding the creation of a website. The series is primarily the work of Ryan McGrady, a new media graduate student at Emerson College, who was an intern here at the CMLP this past summer.

The series, which the Center for Citizen Media plans to turn into a comprehensive online guide, began with an introduction on September 24, but has now progressed to cover the following topics:

General Business Issues
Affiliate Programs
Memberships and Subscriptions 

It's an excellent series and well worth following.

(Note: Dan Gillmor, who is the director of the Center for Citizen Media, is also a founder of the CMLP.)

Mike Madison published a thoughtful and thought-provoking post the other day on his madisonian.net blog about the effect that a cease-and-desist letter can have on a collaborative blogging (or "co-blogging") relationship. Madison publishes on a number of blogs, one of which is Blog-Lebo, which covers matters of local interest in Mt. Lebanon, Pennsylvania. Madison used to co-run the blog with two other bloggers, but when they got a cease-and-desist letter from a local lawyer, things went slightly pear-shaped. Here's a rough version of the story:

Several weeks ago, Madison posted about a neighborhood dispute that arose when a local homeowner re-landscaped his backyard and blocked (or threatened to block) a stone path that was popularly understood to be protected by a recorded easement. Many readers commented on the post. One commenter identified the homeowner by name and another (apparently one of Madison's co-bloggers) commented that the owner, who is a lawyer, should have known better than to buy real estate without checking the record for easements.

Days later, Madison and his co-bloggers received a letter from the lawyer/homeowner demanding that they remove the post or face a lawsuit for defamation. Madison, a lawyer and law professor experienced in Internet law, was understandably peeved but willing to stand up against what he saw as legally and factually baseless claims. His co-bloggers had a different reaction altogether -- one wanted to take the post down immediately, and the other withdrew from the blog. (It looks like the second co-blogger also withdrew at some point later.) Madison sums up the dilemma he faced as follows:   read more »