Forum Moderators: phranque
The latest in the on going war for jurisdiction heated up again last week with the Australian supreme court ruling that Dow Jones was liable in Australia for content accessible on the web from Australia.
[pcworld.com...]
The ruling from Australia's highest court on Tuesday, that content created in one country can be subject to the laws of another country...
I can write a subscription newsletter that attacks, vilifies and slanders prominent Americans who hold views I disagree with. Perhaps I succeed in holding them to ridicule, causing personal embarassment, loss of income and opportunity, loss of credibility with their peers etc etc. In effect, damage is inflicted.
Now because I write this newsletter in my Australian garage and host it with the Vladivostok office of a Romainian hosting company, aahhh... well that's OK then, the targeted American's have no legal recourse to use their courts to protect their rights of citizenship. I'm just exercising my right to free speeh and besides, its on the internet.
Geez.... stop insulting our intelligence with this nonsense.
The act of libel happened in Victoria, not in New Jersey where the servers are. Dow Jones has an Australian registered corporate office, therefore they are present. Also DJW has specific subscribtion requirements which clearly discloses who is located in which jurasdiction. The only leg they had to stand on to move it to the US, was financial hardship, but that was broken too since they have a very large office in Australia. This case is not that Internet specific as you might all think...
On the other hand, what does become a problem is when a web site, that is intended for the general public, such as WebmasterWorld, is sued in Australia for libel.
Lets move aside who holds the copyright, who is responsible for the content, how it is managed, etc. let's presume it's only a brochure site, therefore no other parties are involved. If WebmasterWorld libels someone in Australia, they still can be sued for it, in Australia, where the libel occurs. (Note that the libel occurs at the moment and place when the site is read, not when the web pages are made or stored on the servers.)
The question is - does US have extradition agreements with Australia in libel cases, and does WebmasterWorld have interests in Australia, which can be taken in lieu of compensation.
Here is the whole story if you want to read it (surprisingly clear English verses Lawyerese!)
[austlii.edu.au...]
I am not a lawyer, I just play one on my web site.
One for levity --
Make these the new laws:
* Every time a new lawyer graduates, the two oldest lawyers have to retire, and give up their licenses.
* Every non-constitutional law must have an expiration date.
* Every time a new non-constitutional law is passed, two other non-constitutional laws must be dropped. (I figure we have about 500 years in the US before we can repeal this last one.)
A new chapter perhaps?
Political Decision Maybe?
Capitalism Rules OK?
Shanz
If I am reading some of these posts correctly ...
I don't think you are.
Try to think outside the box for a moment. Slander and libel are "perceptions" of the allegedly injured party.
If I perceive that you (wherever you are from) have slandered, libeled or otherwise villified me ... and I live in ... oooh, let's say Afghanistan, and if it becomes standard practice to bring suit in the allegedly injured party's country, then I could force you to defend yourself against my charges ... and you would have to stand trial in Afghanistan, and under Afghani law. It matters little where you are from, what laws you abide by or what you feel is within the limitations of free speech.
In Afghanistan, women have been stoned to death for revealing their faces in public. Forget Australia for the sake of this argument and imagine what the laws of other lands might be. People have been shot, hung, tortured or run over with tanks in some countries for speaking out against their government. Remember Tiananmen Square in 1989.
Just think about the possibilities. My perception of what may be a perfectly acceptable comment where I come from, may be entirely different from that of someone living in any other country in the world. Being subject to laws which you neither understand or have the foggiest notion about is a very frightening thing.
This one case is nothing in real terms ... it is what this case may lead to which scares the c**p out of me!
Being subject to laws which you neither understand or have the foggiest notion about is a very frightening thing.
Certainly is. But to continue on your extreme example of Afghanistan, they can prosecute you until they are blue in the face in Afghanistan, but what are they going to do about it? Nothing. They will tell you if you set foot in their country that they will get you, but do *you* have any plans to go there anytime soon?
Now for the real life example- you are joe merchant selling widgets out of the US- Someone in Australia gets pissed at you for saying something about them in a weblog entry you wrote, suddenly you have a court case pending against you in Australia.
The repercussions of you being found guilty are-
1- You could be sentenced to jail time or a fine.
2- If you choose not to FLY to australia to serve the jail time, or mail the $$$ in for the fine, then you may not be able to do business with Australians. If you set foot in australia, you may be arrested
Your choices are:
A) Hire defense and spend big bucks to defend yourself in another country so that your ability to sell widgets to australians is not put in jeopardy
or
B) Make a mental note of the case, flip the finger to the plaintiff and the australian courts and lose some customers-- there is no way you are going to recoup the costs of launching an international defense through keeping the international customers you might have had.
4eyes already made a post about this-- any country is free to make up any law they want and prosecute the hell out of you-- but chances are your homeland doesn't give a rats-a$$ about prosecutions against you in other countries, unless its murder or rape or some very very large $$$ scam.
If you are an international company with assets in every country in the world, then perhaps you should worry about being sued in countries you do business in- but if you don't do business in country X then why the heck would you care about Country X suing you? Make a mental note, don't ever visit the country and you can do whatever the heck you want thats legal in your own country. Bah.
For someone to have a libel case it must meet three basic requirements:
* The writer must publish untruth about an other person or entity such as a corporation, in a way that makes others believe it is the truth (therefore satire does not count!),
* the libel must show damage to the person or entity to whatever the words were written to. This is a bit twisted, but in essence it has to do with claiming damages for the right reasons,i.e. misinformation that is essentially harmless is also not considered to be defamatory.
* and finaly the publication must be in some form of permanent impression. Unlogged IM chat would be hard to use as the base for libel.
Once these met then you have to look at three more things -Is the subject private or a public figure? Publisher show a reckless disregard for the truth? Does the author maliciously intend to do harm to the subject if it's a public figure, or was reasonable care taken ,with a private party.
There is an excellent article on this, and I have quoted several sections and paraphrased it from here : [gigalaw.com...]
Libel laws vary from country to country. The Gigalaw.com article is decidedly "U.S.-centric."
To turn the tables for a moment, since it's (at this point) Australia person / USA corporation - what if a USA person gets upset by an Australian corporation? (emphasis added)
This is also currently an issue. The technology behind KaZaA is owned by an Australian company (Sherman Enterprises, I believe), which quite a few heavyweights in the US music biz are trying to get their hands on.
Pete
Which is different with Kazaa. I do not believe KaZaA has a US presence, as most small web operators would not in a foreign country.
europeforvisitors, indeed it is, but both the US and Australian libel laws are originated from the "The Law of Libel" around early to mid 1600 in England, which leads me to believe that the gist of the major points are still valid in both countries. Indeed the US libel laws lay the responsibility of proof on the suing party, which is not the case in the English courts. This flipped in the US around 1960s with a case involving the NY Times. Bet then of course, I could be way off...
I can write a subscription newsletter that attacks, vilifies and slanders prominent Americans who hold views I disagree with. Perhaps I succeed in holding them to ridicule, causing personal embarassment, loss of income and opportunity, loss of credibility with their peers etc etc. In effect, damage is inflicted.Now because I write this newsletter in my Australian garage and host it with the Vladivostok office of a Romainian hosting company, aahhh... well that's OK then, the targeted American's have no legal recourse to use their courts to protect their rights of citizenship. I'm just exercising my right to free speeh and besides, its on the internet.
You have a very good point there. Its the "Why do they hate us?" question, in another form.
