v. CompuServe Inc. that CompuServe "was a distributor for the purposes of defamation liability," Zeran contended that AOL was a distributor of information, not a publisher, and because §230(c)(1) of the CDA spoke specifically to publishers, Zeran alleged that there was not a conflict between the two statutes. The court found, however, that distributors are a subset of publishers, and that as a result the CDA conflicted with the state defamation law, thus preempting it. In their analysis of the third theory of state and federal conflict, the court stated that, Congress' clear objective in passing §230 of the CDA was to encourage the development of technologies, procedures and techniques by which objectionable material could be blocked or deleted. Since distributor liability would have the effect of disincentivizing the filtering of content by third parties, the court found that such laws were in conflict with the "purpose and objectives of congress," and were thus preempted. Retroactive application of the CDA Zeran's final claim was that even if the state laws are preempted by the CDA, it should not provide immunity to AOL in this case because the messages were posted on the AOL bulletin board before the CDA's enactment. In analyzing this claim, the court used the Landgraf test, which states that "a court must ... determine whether Congress has clearly expressed [a] statute's intended temporal reach." To this question, the court pointed out that in §230(d)(3) of the CDA, Congress clearly stated that "no cause of action may be brought and no liability may be imposed under any State or local law that is inconsistent with this section." It reasons that since "no cause of action may be brought," the timing of the posting of the message is immaterial, and the CDA must apply retroactively. Appeals court ruling After reviewing the proceedings of the lower court, the Fourth Circuit again granted judgment in favor of AOL. In this proceeding, Zeran again claimed a distinction between distributors and publishers, citing Cubby, Inc. v. CompuServe Inc. and Stratton Oakmont, Inc. v. Prodigy Services Co. In those cases, such a distinction was made, however the court held that Zeran "misapprehends... the significance of that distinction for the legal issue we consider here." In the opinion of the court, distributors are a subset of publishers, and are thus protected under §230 of the CDA. The second claim Zeran made on appeal was again