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"Looks like we've been out of the loop on this MySpace story that's all over the news (see video above): just over a year ago, depressed 13-year-old Megan Meier started receiving flirtatious MySpace messages from a 16-year old called \"Josh Evans\" on MySpace.  They struck up a virtual relationship.  \nExcept that \"Josh\" was actually Lori Drew, a neighbor in Meier's hometown of O\u2019Fallon, MO.  Drew was the mother of an ex-friend of Megan's, and claims her family wanted to find out exactly what Megan thought about her daughter.  After laying the bait for some time, Lori Drew skewed Meier, telling her, \"Everybody in O\u2019Fallon knows how you are. You are a bad person and everybody hates you. Have a shitty rest of your life. The world would be a better place without you.\u201D  20 minutes later, Megan's parents discovered that she had committed suicide by hanging herself in her closet.\nUnfortunately, the police found that no law had been broken, so no action could be taken against the Drews.  Bloggers and the local community have started to hand out justice instead: protests have been held in front of the Drew family's porch,and a hoax 911 call claiming that someone had been shot in the Drew's house led police to storm the building (see Wikipedia for more background).\nThis week comes a partial answer for those who don't think Internet regulation is a slippery slope: on Wednesday, the city of Dardenne Prairie, Missouri, passed a law that makes internet harassment a crime punishable by a fine of up to $500 and a 90 day jail sentence.  The Drews are unlikely to be punished since the law can't be applied retroactively, although the case is under review.  Meanwhile, the blogosphere lynching continues in full swing."^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://mashable.com/2007/11/22/megan-meier-myspace/>