Australian High Court To Decide Net Defamation Case

natslovR writes: "In a World first for a 'final' court, the defamation case against Dow Jones by an Australia businessman will go before Australia's High Court, allowing it to determine whether defamation laws apply across the Internet irrespective of geography. The businessman claimed he was defamed by an article that Dow Jones published in a US based online magazine. Australia's High Court will now determine if a lower court erred when it ruled that the article was published in Melbourne, Australia and so defamation proceedings could be brought against Dow Jones under Victoria's strong anti-defamation laws, despite the webserver on which it was 'published' residing in the U.S, the writer residing there too, and the online magazine's primary audience being U.S. based."

Comments

You don't seem to get it

[OeLeWaPpErKe]

Anything you do within the "sovereignty" of a country is governed over by the laws of a country. Since you americans have apparently decided that you fully control the DNS space, and thus the visible part of the internet, you should really not be surprised that antother country does the same

Europe does not want anything racist on it's wires, doesn't it have jurisdiction over those wires ? Certainly it does. How do you stop people from transmitting racist things ? Simple, you sue them. Is that legal ? Ofcourse because they willingly transmitted illegal stuff over Europe's wires. Are they going to get convicted ? Defineately.

In america you can say "Black people are the dumbest, most stupid assholes I've ever seen", but you cannot say "encryption X works like so ...". I really don't get the principles you live by. Then again, as the last round of elections proved, neither do you. "Have a nice day".

International Tribunal

[cliffy2000]

Is a tribunal necessary in order to determine the outcome of these international cases? International law is fickle, especially when it comes to the Internet...
Perhaps a court may cause more trouble than it fixes.
Some sort of greater arbiter should analyze such cases. It is the only true possible solution to such dilemmas. The question is: how?

Arrogant perhaps, but not totally fools

[Max Hyre]

I pray they can't touch Dow-Jones's assets here, though I'm not too sure, given the treaties the U.S. has been pushing/signing lately. They could also make it very hard for any DJ execs to take a nice vacation in Sydney.

The real problem, though, comes up should DJ have any significant assets in Oz. Those are definitely at risk, just as the U.S. freezes or takes the local assets of foreign organizations it doesn't like. I suspect an operation like DJ prints an Australian edition, and has local staff for reports on the Aussie stock market(s?), in which case they've definitely got something to lose.

We can only hope the Supreme Court can see what the country, and society, have to lose if they let this stand.