Making defamatory statements in a newspaper can get a person sued for libel.
Making them on JuicyCampus.com, however, is risk-free.
The Web site's message boards allow users to post gossip. Nearly 60 campuses have a section on the site, and UF students started making posts in January.
It has been a source of controversy, with both students and faculty around the country criticizing it for its malicious content, according to a recent Associated Press article.
According to the web site's privacy policy, no personal information is collected directly from the user. Anonymity is guaranteed because the site lacks any registration requirements to post messages.
Justin Brown, a professor who teaches courses in telecommunication law, said this isn't the first site to bring up the controversy surrounding Internet anonymity.
Web sites have been protected from the potentially libelous comments of their users since the Communications Decency Act was passed in 1996, Brown said.
The act establishes that providers of online services cannot be treated as the publisher or speaker of information provided by an outside source, such as a user comment.
"Hopefully we can come to understand that information isn't coming from a credible source," he said.
