It is said that the warning was issued with regards to the Malicious Communications Act 1988 (as amended).

Part of the Malicious Communications Act 1988 states:

Any person who sends to another person—
(a)a letter, electronic communication or article of any description which conveys—
(i)a message which is indecent or grossly offensive;
(ii)a threat; or
(iii)information which is false and known or believed to be false by the sender; or
(b)any article or electronic communication which is, in whole or part, of an indecent or grossly offensive nature,
is guilty of an offence if his purpose, or one of his purposes, in sending it is that it should, so far as falling within paragraph (a) or (b) above, cause distress or anxiety to the recipient or to any other person to whom he intends that it or its contents or nature should be communicated.

If we take “any article or electronic communication which is, in whole or part, of an indecent or grossly offensive nature”, it could be argued that the message was indecent (which is defined as – “Not conforming with generally accepted standards of behavior or propriety; obscene.” or “Not appropriate or fitting.”).

It’s good to see that its not been blown out of proportion but I think it does highlight the need to educate people regarding the use of social media / the Internet and the potential ’cause and effect’ of their actions online :).

Yes, I agree with your comments re: Twitter and similar sites, and I do think that on most occasions they get it right. Contrary to other reports, the ‘offenders’ account appears to be fully accessible and available on Twitter – I would surmise that Twitter probably suspended it temporarily while they investigated and decided to not terminate his account (although I’m only guessing obviously!).

I can see where you are coming from, but, say, take this example from real life. If you are out on the street with friends and shout 4 letter swear words (I’m sure we can all think of some! – f***, s***, for example). Assume that you mean no real harm to anyone and say its not even directed at anyone else (or maybe its just directed at your mates). You might not mind that language and your friends may not mind that language. However, if another member of the public walks past (including a Police Officer) and takes offence at that, you could still be arrested for a Public Order Offence if a complaint is made. So from that point of view, the original intention (as far as current UK law is concerned) is irrelevant if it has caused the other member of the public to be offended / alarmed / distressed etc by the comment.

A clearer example would be with racism. If someone makes a racist comment, but they don’t see it as racist, and they mean no harm by it, the law doesn’t really take that into account. It’s how the people around it may interpret it / be affected by it etc. The original intention of the person and the fact that they don’t regard the comment to be racist etc doesn’t help them.

I imagine if it was tweeted “XYZ is crap” or something similar, then nothing would have come of it, however action has probably been taken as it is borderline “abuse” in the eyes of the law I imagine.

For example, sending a direct tweet could be compared to a phone call. While saying “XYZ is …….” to family and friends wouldn’t cause a problem, picking up and telephoning the ‘XYZ’ person and saying ‘XYZ is ……..’ could, I imagine, be constituted as harassment / crossing the line.

As you’ve said, there’s likely to be many different opinions on the subject. I doubt that the matter will be taken to court (in my non legal opinion!), I imagine it will be dealt with by way of a warning or something similar :).

And obviously David, Twitter being a company they have the right to do whatever they want (under reasonable grounds) – suspend accounts, remove tweets, etc. etc. I actually do believe that there should be an element of responsibility with companies like Google, Twitter and Facebook as to when it goes a little too far with freedom of speech before it becomes fair enough to start slapping account terminations because of very offensive behaviour – realistically, no one likes that sort of behaviour.

I still do not understand how it is so damn offensive for someone to post a tweet like that. Yes, the way you THINK about it is offensive. But what did the person writing it think? What did they intend? Who knows. Unless we’re all perfect mind readers we won’t know unless this person says. And as much as you can believe this person intended xyz; unless you ask him, you could be wrong.

The primary concern I have, David, is that my belief is this person’s “insult” (to a fashion) should be protected under the freedom for one to reasonably express themselves. It’s really simple to ignore someone. In fact, you can EVEN REPLY to such an insulting person – it’s really easy. But is it fair to have a 17 year old arrested for a simple tweet that perhaps was upsetting to Tom? Sure, it’s a matter of opinion; and my answer to my question is no. I don’t think it is fair.

Without doubt everyone has a different opinion on this.

I’m sure everyone agrees the comment or tweet in question was completely unnecessary – and if they were going to say it, there was no need to directly tweet to Tom. After all, its not like they’re a family member or personal friend. And it is undoubtedly considered unacceptable by the vast majority of the public – after all, it’s not the kind of thing most people would say in real life at all – no matter if they actually thought it.

The reason cited for the tweet was Tom’s 4th place yesterday and tweet itself is quoted in our article above.

Obviously, Twitter is a private company, so how they choose to enforce their rules is naturally their prerogative.

The tweet itself caused quite a public outcry yesterday, so as a matter which interested many people and was very recent news, it was thus categorised as breaking news. 🙂

Hence, what’s your priority?

Yes, I understand why the person was arrested. Thomas’ father had passed away from cancer and this is why the tweet was offensive; but blowing it out of proportion is just as unacceptable and the press can be disproportional because there is a justification to do so.

I’m not going to be biased and derail the person making the message because I don’t know the person nor is it any better to say how unacceptable and “sickening” the message is without knowing the facts and the reason and context of the message and why it was tweeted.

Twitter suspending the account is another matter which I don’t like either. Not sure why Twitter suspends an account for saying something moderately offensive because the person who was tweeted to is well known to the public.

Why don’t we get over ourselves and enjoy the Olympics and perhaps smile for a bit? So much noise nowadays. It’s apparently breaking news that someone has been arrested for sending a stupid tweet. Meanwhile people crying over an offensive tweet, some random people would have been killed on our motorways in an accident and their family has to live with that – seeing as a lot of people want to moan.