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Media Organizations Join Forces to Fight Canadian Ruling
csaila writes "Some of the world's big media outlets (including CBC, CNN, Guardian, The Globe and Mail, The New York Times, Reuters, and -- as well as Amazon, AOL, Google and Yahoo) are appealing a Canadian court ruling threatening both free speech and the Net. The ruling stems from a former UN employee who successfully sued the Washington Post in Ontario for libel, arguing that because the Post's Web site carried the story. his reputation had been "damaged" in that province."
Washington Post in Ontario for libel, arguing that because the Post's Web site carried the story. his reputation had been "damaged" in that province.
Talk about poor journalism. Isn't that supposed to be a comma after story?
Just goes to prove, when it comes to court rulings, we can be just as brain-dead as our beloved American cousins!
If VISTA is the answer, you didn't understand the question
I'm a Canadian, so this partially affects me. I think it's good that we have corporations and organizations at our back defending our right to say what we want to say on the Net.
Even though they don't really give a rat's ass about us personally (they probably somehow see this is as potential harm to their revenue) I'm glad they're stepping in and doing something about it.
Mr. Bangoura said, "I have total confidence in our system of justice." So do I.
the lawyer named Roach. That's priceless.
No, the UK court can't put him in prison because libel is a civil and not a criminal matter.
As for damages, you'd be surprised what reciprocal enforcement proceedings can do. I'm not sure of the US-UK position for libel but it's quite common, where a judgment is obtained against a foreign person, to go off to the foreign courts and ask them to enforce that judgment. It depends what treaties are in force. Plus of course if the person you're suing has any assets in the UK - or in any other country where there are reciprocal enforcement arrangements - then you can enforce the judgment against them.
As for UK citizens libelling US citizens, skylarov is irrelevant because that was a criminal matter and as I said, libel is civil. Sure they could be sued in the US, but enforcement would again be subject to whatever reciprocal enforcement agreements were in force. You can't extradite someone for libel, or arrest them/prevent them leaving the country if they happen to be in the US.
Sigh... I wonder if there's a website where lawyers can spend their time making ill-informed comments about tech issues.
The author of this post asserts his moral rights.