Scientology loses hyperlinks case

Hyperlinks to copyrighted material legal

[jbinbpt]

Goes to show you that big bucks doesn't always win. In an article on MSNBC [msnbc.com], the Court of Appeal in The Hague, Netherlands, denied the Scientologists’ latest appeal in an online copyright dispute that dates back to 1995.

“After all, a hyperlink is merely a road marker on the Internet, and it can therefore never be unlawful,” the company (ISP) said in a statement. Scientologists have taken a heavy-handed approach to squelching critical Web sites, pressuring site operators, ISPs and even Internet heavyweights such as Google into removing links to Web pages. In 1999, Amazon.com removed but later restored links to a book critical of Scientology.

[webwoman]

Yes, this is an interesting one, particularly I find it interesting that they tried to go after the ISP, rather than (or in addition to) the website owner.