Many news organizations’ websites encourage readers to post comments. Should persons who post anonymously receive the benefit of state “Shield Laws” designed to protect journalists’ confidential sources? Several courts have now addressed this issue, which arises when a poster’s comment triggers a lawsuit (alleging defamation by the poster, for example) and the plaintiff in the suit, using court process, requests the poster’s identity from the news organization. Some news organizations, resisting the requests, have responded by invoking a shield law and, in effect, characterizing the nameless poster as an anonymous source.
The Citizen Media Law Project has a helpful and discussion of these cases, here:
http://www.citmedialaw.org/taxonomy/term/83/blog
–PS