Depending on who you ask, there’s either one really good thing or one really bad thing about blogs. Bloggers can pretty much say whatever the heck they want. And they get away with it.

But maybe not for long.

A number of people who have been attacked online by bloggers are firing back by filing libel lawsuits. And some of them are winning. In the past two years, more than 50 lawsuits stemming from blog postings and website message boards have been filed across the country.

Recently, a client in Georgia blogged about his attorney after firing him over a dispute about how to defend him during on a drunken-driving charge. The lawyer wouldn’t refund his fee so the client took his anger out online. The attorney took him to court and his client-turned-blogger became the first blogger to ever lose a libel suit. He was ordered to pay $50,000.

Robert Cox, founder and president of the Media Bloggers Association suggests that bloggers best become aware of libel law. “It hasn't happened yet, but soon, there will be a blogger who is successfully sued and who loses his home,” he told USA Today. “That will be the shot heard round the blogosphere.”

The repercussions

Some people – most notably bloggers – are livid. The whole point of blogging and message boards, they point out, is the freedom of speech. But there has to be some control over those soapboxes. Look at other stories in the news.

At DontDateHimGirl.com, a site where women are free to bash old boyfriends – whether or not what they write is actually the truth – several men claim blatantly false information has been spread about their character and sexual health. At least one is suing. At similar sites, bloggers and posters are invited to bash everyone from restaurant patrons to friends. Somewhere, certainly people are bashing doctors and ruining reputations of other professionals with or without merit.

Perhaps these libel suits will offer some checks and balances. The Internet, of course, needs to remain unregulated. That is its appeal and that is its place. But it also has to have some responsibility. It has to have basic legal parameters since so much of it is basically unedited.

With the threat and ramifications of these lawsuits hovering, maybe bloggers will think before they post.