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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."
Perhaps this ruling might threaten the US' part of that thar intarweb, but I don't think the rest of the world's 'free speech' on the web will be too affected.
The newspaper moved to have the case dismissed and argued that if it were allowed to proceed in Ontario, any news organization could be sued anywhere over material posted on its website.
Their defense doesn't appear to be "What we posted that got him fired was truthful", but rather that if you allow the lawsuit to proceed that you could hold anyone responsible for what they post on the Internet anywhere in the world.
On the one hand, how do you protect true speech if someone who posts it can be sued everywhere in the world, but on the other hand how do you protect everyone in the world from people posting false speech?
I'm a big tall mofo.
I think this is ridiculous. I just can't see how they can try and use internet access as an excuse to make more money out of a court case.
If this were the case, Paris Hilton could sue for every province that her video was accessible from the internet. In fact, all celebrities could sue someone on these same grounds.br>
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The problem is, it starts at $7,500.00 and continues to get worse. Eventually, no one says anything about anyone or anything for fear of getting hit for millions in damages.
One of the things that I wonder about, not being a lawyer, is how this would actually impact the individual. Let us say that you live in Europe and the Washington Post issued a story on their website (viewed in Europe) that was incorrect, and you wanted to sue for libel. Should you then have to file in the United States - and have to pay charges to go there, legal fees in the US, etc?
I'm not saying one is better than another, because I can see some benefits to the 'consumer' in both instances. I'm just curious what the law is now, for a newspaper. If the newspaper was sent to Europe and someone sued for libel - do they have to file in the US?
I guess my concern would be that internet companies based in countries with different laws or other sort of barriers to suing for libel would make it so that they could print anything - or is that already the case?
I'm just not sure how companies standing up to defend themselves against being sued in a foreign country for publishing rumors and innuendo is a 'free speech' issue. It sounds like they just want to make anyone suing them have to do so in the country where they are hosted.
because it's an American company being sued by a former UN official, just remember who has the largest arsenal of lawyers in the world.
If this decision is upheld on appeal, watch conservative groups target "liberal" newspapers when they print bad things about Bush and company.
The post didn't malliciously lie about this guy. They didn't decide to go after this man by destroyin his reputation(like the McCarthy trials). There was, at the time, some proof that he was involved in illegal activities and the post reported on it. By your exact logic, President Bush could sue almost every media outlet in the world(especially those that post online) because of those false documents about his military record or OJ simpson suing every news outlet that called him a murderer.
People shouldn't have their hands tied from reporting based on the facts available. Its why we call them reporters and not detectives. I hope this gets struck down simply because if we want to have a society where we are kept up to date we have to allow for these people to report based on bad information once in a while. As long as it wasn't meant to crush the man's reputation out of spite, its fair game(ie. they had a good reason to believe at the time of reporting that this is true).
Now I will say it would be the responsibility of the Post to probably directly link to that article another article about how he was found not guilty of the crime. But I won't say they need to actually be 100% certain every time they report something that every fact is accurate.
UN workers are at the forefront of child care in the Congo.
Consider also the swift and effective response of the UN regarding the non-problems in Darfur.
I, for one, feel safer because of the UN.
They publish an uncomfortable truth, and it's read online in a country where that particular truth is illegal to express?
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It would be much easier to know whom to side with after reading what the newspaper wrote.
People shouldn't have their hands tied from reporting based on the facts available.
(Ob. Simpson quote): "Facts, schmacks! Facts can be used to prove anything even remotely true."
I hope you see the absurdity in your statement. Of course "reports" should be held accountable for what they report. Yes, by all means, they should only report the facts, or clearly note when they are editorializing. Haven't you ever noticed that news outlets are incredibly diligent about always referring to someone as the "alleged driver of the car," or "the individual suspected of ordering the shooting?"
And for the record, OJ actually does threaten legal action when media outlets publish/broadcast stories referring to him as a "murderer." That's why none of them do it. They always say he was "accused" of murdering his wife, or found "civilly responsible" in civil court. But they never call him a "murderer" outright. They know he could/would sue them.
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IIRC, libel is where whatever is being sued-over is untrue. So what's the big deal here? Most newspaper web sites carry stories from their print versions. Just because something is stored on a web server does not mean that it can be a lie. Or have I misunderstood?
Smokey, this is not 'Nam, this is bowling. There are rules.
This is a question about the limits of local laws have over content available from sources outside of their domain.
Yes the post maligned this guy. They may have even lied about it. It does look like they reported what they had without researching it completely. This type of stuff happens all the time.
The key issue here is that this guy is sueing in Ontario, where he did not live at the time the article was created. Worse he is sueing because the article is still available through archives.
Bad reporting should be identified but it should never be removed from the public's access. The slippery slope is that if you start to curtail the availability to erroneous documents because they damage someone how long before truthful stuff gets edited or restricted in distribution?
The only way to prevent offense to people in this persons situation would be to expunge the story from all sources accessible from the net. That is not a solution that I even believe is possible.
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... that our laws stop at our borders.
I totally agree that journalists should be exempt from libel lawsuits without a showing of malice.
But that doesn't mean the rest of the world has to agree with us. They are free to set their own laws and to ignore ours.
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
And to play devil's advocate: how long until big corporation put their headquarters in a friendly (as in bought) country. I'd hate to see them lie and libell on the Web in impunity because they choose the battleground.
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This ruling does not say that you can be sued in Canada for posting something on your website in New York. It says that the Washington Post can be sued in Canada... because they do business there!
If your company does business in a country, it should be suable in that country. Freedom of the Press should provide protection under the substantive law of a country... but it just goes way too far to give complete protection from any jurisdiction.
Basically, the Washington Post wants a sort of diplomatic immunity for the press... which is absurd.
keep in mind one part of the suit is that they didn't post a retraction and kept the same story up on their website with no mention of the outcome of the case(which is what I mean by a retraction).
This might or might not be a reason to sue for libel because it was an archived story. Part of the value of the internet is being able to keep records of everything that has happened(in sum total, in specific instances everyone can keep as much of a record as they please).
The reason I don't like this suit is it could very well mean that archiving stories could become illegal simply becasue they discussed any instance that has been ruled on. Think about the implications of any person who ever had this type of story written about them and then being cleared in a court of law. Every person ever accused of murder who had statements like this put out against them(namely, saying they were accused of murder and maybe have a bad record of being accused constantly) can go back and sue newpapers for having an archive of the original story.
It's almost like trying to change history to suit your needs now.
In Griffis v. Luban, 646 N.W.2d 527 (July 11, 2002), the Minnesota Supreme Court ruled that Katherine Griffis could not enforce a default judgement from Alabama on a libel suit filed against Mariane Luban, a resident of Minnesota, for Luban's allegedly libelous comments about Griffis on Usenet News, because Ms. Luban has no presence in, and does not do business, in Alabama and the mere publication on the Internet did not give the courts in Alabama jurisdiction over her. The U.S. Supreme Court denied certiorari on appeal, so the case represents the law as it stands now in the U.S. From the syllabus (summary) of the case:
This is further bolstered by other cases, of which someone posted a list, include Barrett v. Catacombs Press, 44 F. Supp.2d 717 (E.D. Pa.1999); English Sports Betting, Inc. v. Tostigan, 2002 WL 461592 (E. D. Pa. March 15, 2002); Young v. New Haven Advocate, 315 F. 3d 256(4th Cir. 2002); Pavlovich v. Superior Court of Santa Clara County, 58 P. 3d 2 (Cal. 2002).
This goes along with the general rule that a person should only be expect to be subject to suit where they maintain some presence. To provide otherwise would be manifest insanity as you couldn't defend yourself from thousands of lawsuits filed in courts all over the country where you have no involvement and no reason to expect to be sued. Now this would, of course, be a big problem if you're in an accident in your home town and the guy who hit you lives 1,000 miles away; you might not be able to afford to sue them for damages if it's minor. But they solved that one. When you operate an automobile, and you are involved in an accident, under the Drivers' License Compact, you agree to allow the administrator of the Department of Motor Vehicles or equivalent agency of the state where the accident occurred to accept service on your behalf if you are not a resident of that state. Thus if you are involved in an accident, you may be sued in the state where you reside or in the state where the accident occurred, but you can't be sued in the state where the plaintiff lives or anyplace else because there is no jurisdiction.
The Washington Post does not do business in the Province of Ontario, has no contacts with it, and its article wasn't targeting Ontario specifically, thus under U.S. Law there is no grounds for them to be sued in Ontario for what they wrote in a newspaper and a website which are published in the District of Columbia. Even if the plaintiff wins, they can't get a judgement enforced here because of lack of jurisdiction, so it's a pyrrihic victory if they can even prove it to be libelous.
The lessons of history teach us - if they teach us anything - that nobody learns the lessons that history teaches us.
Anything posted on the net is basically said everywhere.
No, it is said where it originated from, it can be *transmitted* everywhere. I am from Canada, if I call you while you're in the US and say something my words are still being said in Canada while you hear them in the US. This is different from me flying to your location in the US and saying the same words.
If they were concerned about not breaking Canadian laws, they should have blocked Canada from accessing their web site.
I only agree with you on one case. The article in question only seems to be accessable if you pay the post to see it and they admit in TFA that they do have Ontario residents who pay to see their articles. In this case I agree with you. It's rediculously easy to not allow members of a certain country to access subscription based services, don't take their currency! If you want to take their currency you must respect their laws.
On the other hand, if the article were publicly accessable without subscription then no, your view on how the internet should work is rediculous. Almost everything posted to the internet violates some law somewhere on the planet be it Chinas, Irans, North Koreas, etc. In this case the internet would be devoid of any information whatsoever! If governments don't want citizens accessing certain sites it's their responsibility to block them, not yours. Just because a website may be internationally visible doesn't mean other people are compelled to view it.
1. The ruling on the case seems to be correct. This was a libel case and the evidence seems to clearly support libel. He was accussed of some nasty things by the Washington Post and an investigation proven them to be baseless. No problem here.
2. As to the jurisdiction, the ruling on the forum clearly shows the reasoning. There are only two potentially relevant forums for this case. There are a variety of considerations for the correct forum. It was in D.C. that the story was actually written and the authour resides. However, it was in Ontario that the damage was done to the plaintiff's reputation. The plaintiff has no reputation in Washington (never lived there, no job, no family, etc.). Furthermore, though written in Washington, the Post is available world-wide and especially through the internet where this set of articles was published. As far as witnesses, they're in several places but no more in Washington than Ontario. Case law states that if no better forum can be found then the plaintiff's choice of forum should be left undisturbed. There was no argument to show that D.C. was better than Ontario, so it was left in Ontario.
While the plaintiff did not permanently live in Ontario at the time of the first posting of this article, he was moving around a lot and spent much of his time in Ontario. Plus the libel continued for years including the time since he's become a permanent resident of Ontario. Put another way, there's no other forum that would be more appropriate for which damage was done to his reputation.
In short, the court made a fairly solid argument for keeping it in Ontario. It also noted, with references, that the chosen forum rarely affects the outcome of the case. Even if this had been heard in D.C. it should have come out with a similar ruling. This all seems well researched, documented, and argued. I'd appreciate it if someone could find a flaw in the reasoning (after reading the whole thing, since Slashdotters are known to make arguments against things they've never actually read). I'm always open to hear good objective debate on these things, so if his reasoning is flawed I'd like to see where.
3. The claim that this is harmful to free speech seems baseless, and almost propaganda. The Washington Post did break the law, whether Canada or the U.S. The result would be the same regardless. Libel isn't free speech and this ruling doesn't affect free speech. There are also many cases prior this where a person breaks the laws of one country from outside its borders. There's a whole field in international law. In fact, the plaintiff had a doctorate in international law. This is not new.
In short, this is blown way out of proportion. The Post did something wrong and got spanked for it. End of story. No new law, no bizarre rulings, despite the wild claims of the media (who have an obvious bias in this case, in additional to their natural tendancy to sensationalize things). Move along, nothing to see here.