## Facts

- Dirty World Entertainment Recordings, LLC operated TheDirty.com, a gossip website that displayed user-submitted stories, photographs, and videos.
- Users submitted content to the site; the site’s operator and staff decided which submissions to publish and generally did not alter the submissions’ factual content.
- An anonymous user submitted a post titled “Nasty Church Girl” that identified S.C., displayed her photograph, and made disparaging claims about her sexual conduct, including calling her a “slut” and alleging she had sex with the poster’s boyfriend.
- Nik Richie, the site’s founder and editor-in-chief, approved publication of the user submission and added a brief negative remark about S.C.’s appearance beneath the post.
- S.C., who worked for and was active in a church community, alleged the post’s statements were false and caused reputational and emotional harm.

## Issues

1. Whether TheDirty.com and Richie were immune under 47 U.S.C. § 230(c)(1) from state-law tort claims arising from user-submitted content posted on the site.
2. Whether selecting a user submission for publication and adding a brief comment made the defendants “information content providers” responsible for creation or development of the challenged content.

## Decision

- The court granted defendants’ dispositive motion based on Communications Decency Act § 230 immunity.
- The court held TheDirty.com qualified as an “interactive computer service” and the anonymous user was the relevant “information content provider” for the challenged statements.
- The court concluded defendants did not become “information content providers” of the allegedly unlawful statements by choosing to publish the submission or by appending a short, non-defamatory comment.
- The court dismissed S.C.’s claims for defamation, invasion of privacy (including false light/public disclosure theories), and intentional infliction of emotional distress.

## Legal Principles

- Under 47 U.S.C. § 230(c)(1), a provider or user of an interactive computer service may not be treated as the publisher or speaker of information provided by another information content provider.
- A site’s “traditional editorial functions” (e.g., selecting submissions, deciding whether to publish, and making limited edits for presentation) do not, without more, strip § 230 immunity.
- A defendant loses § 230 protection only if it is responsible, in whole or in part, for the creation or development of the specific unlawful aspect of the third-party content (often framed as intentional development or material contribution).
- State-law tort claims that depend on treating the website operator as the publisher of third-party content are barred by § 230 when the operator did not materially develop the unlawful content.

## Conclusion

The court held that § 230 immunized TheDirty.com and its editor from liability for a user’s defamatory and privacy-invading post because the defendants merely hosted and selected the third-party content and did not materially contribute to the content’s allegedly unlawful substance.


S.C. v. Dirty World Ent. Recordings, LLC, No. 11-00033-CV-W-ODS, 2012 WL 3335284 (W.D. Mo. Mar. 12, 2012)