THE ROBING ROOM

In January of 2012, Judge Jackson issued a summary judgement in a case regarding the protection status of 'liking' of Facebook, saying ‘liking’ did not rise to the level of protected speech saying that Daniel Ray Carter Jr needed to have made actual statements to make such a claim. The ruling grew out of a lawsuit brought by Hampton sheriff’s deputies, one of whom claimed Carter was fired for liking the campaign page of his boss’s opponent, who said the dismissal violated his First Amendment rights in the 2011 suit. On September 18th, 2013, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond rejected Jackson's opinion that clicking the ubiquitous “thumbs up” icon was not “actual speech,” an opinion that would have had wide-ranging implications for millions of Facebook users and other new forms of expression on the web if it had stood. Facebook and the ACLU filed friend of the court briefs in the case, saying Jackson’s ruling would erode free speech rights.