This is the first editorial I’ve seen so far about the libel suit from
Down Under re: global
jurisdiction. Arguments here are well written and not surprising. It seems that relying on phrases such
as “To an American” are going to be either unfortunate code words or deep wells
of illusion as we continue the path of global commerce, exchange of ideas and
information via the Web. It will be interesting to read what international editorials say. What has been said elsewhere? What do you think so far? Karen Washington
Post Editorial: Libel Down Under Monday, December 16,
2002 LET'S SAY you live in
Australia and believe you've been libeled by an American newspaper - but an
American newspaper easily accessible on the Internet in Australia. Where do you sue? That's the question
that the High Court of Australia considered last week. It came up with the
wrong answer in the view of many free-speech advocates and in our view as
well. But we don't pretend the
question is easy. The penetration
of the Internet has cast many old questions of national sovereignty vs. freedom
of speech in a new light, and nations are just beginning to figure out how to
respond. The Australian court
allowed a libel suit to go forward in Australia against Dow Jones & Co.
concerning an article published in Barron's magazine and placed on the Wall
Street Journal's Web site. Like other Commonwealth countries,
Australia has far harsher libel laws than does the United States, where the First Amendment sets a high
burden of proof. The Post - along
with other media organizations - filed a brief supporting Dow Jones's
case. If Australian courts can
hear a case involving American speech merely because an Australian could read
the article on the Internet in Australia, much domestic speech suddenly becomes
hostage to norms in Australia and other countries. Australia and England make libel suits easy; in the
Netherlands, offending the royal family is illegal, and several countries
prosecute Holocaust denial. In the
nondemocratic world, writing the truth is often considered a crime. To avoid liability, newspapers and others with assets or
personnel abroad would either have to block access to their content in many
countries or would have to censor themselves. Both options are repugnant to anyone whose business is
disseminating information and ideas.
Fixing this problem won't be easy.
Americans rightly resist the idea that other countries might serve as safe
harbors from which the Internet could be used to subvert American domestic
law. The government does not
regard Internet gambling aimed at Americans as beyond the reach of prosecutors
just because the Web sites might be housed on servers in Caribbean
islands. But if a gambling Web
site accessible here is subject to American law, why shouldn't Australia be
able to apply its libel laws to a site accessible in Australia? To an American, the answer to this question is simple: Speech
is different from crime or other punishable behavior. The rule ought to be that libel suits for Web-based material
proceed under the laws of the country in which the offending statements were
written and where they were placed on the Internet. That's the course indicated by an opinion Friday by the U.S.
Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit in Richmond, which held that two
Connecticut newspapers could not be sued for libel in Virginia by a prison
warden merely because their content was accessible there. If the newspapers "did not
manifest an intent to aim their websites or the posted articles at a Virginia
audience," the proper venue is Connecticut, the judges wrote. The same principle
ought to apply internationally. In
the long run, the principle would serve all democratic countries by preventing
their domestic speech from being limited by the laws of less-open societies. Speech deserves better than a race to
the bottom. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A59773-2002Dec15.html Outgoing Mail Scanned by NAV 2002 |
- RE: [Futurework] FW: Growing pains of the Web Karen Watters Cole
- RE: [Futurework] FW: Growing pains of the Web Cordell . Arthur