After reviewing the proceedings of the lower court, the Fourth Circuit again granted judgment in favor of AOL. In this case, 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 opines that " 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.