`  == Unsourced material ==  Below material was tagged for needing sources for several months. Feel free to reinsert the below material with appropriate references.     {  class=``navbox collapsible `` style=``text-align: left; border: 1px solid silver; margin-top: 0.2em;`` - ! style=``background-color: #CFC;``  Impact     -  style=``border: solid 1px silver; padding: 8px; background-color: white; ``  Following the decision, online service providers were much less likely to screen content created by users given the court's holding that exercising editorial control could create liability for the content of those posts. In effect, the ruling discouraged family-oriented (or any) sites from screening for offensive content. The decision left service providers with difficult choices between simply accepting the legal liability for content they didn't themselves create or solicit, restricting the speech of their customers (such as filtering messages before making them visible to others), or refraining from moderating even grossly inappropriate content (which the Stratton court thought constituted editorial control).  In 1996, Congress effectively reversed this opinion via Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act.  The legislative history specifically says the law was intended to overrule Stratton Oakmont ``and any other similar decisions which have treated providers and users as publishers or speakers of content that is not their own because they have restricted access to objectionable material.`` |}`