Apparently, threatened libel proceedings have not occurred against Guido after the allegation he made at the beginning of July. A spectacularly called bluff on Guido's part it seems.
I wouldn't be surprised if the Govt is looking to see if Guido and Iain sail too close to the wind, if there is any way they can close down their sites because they are too damned good and write stuff they would prefer was not in the public domain. They know they cannot be silenced.
If defamatory remarks had been made and legal action was planned, I'm sure Guido would have had a letter by now.
Private Eye has an old favourite they haul out every once in a while. Way back lost in the mists of time a law firm sent them a letter threatening a lawsuit which they answered with two words, the second of which was 'off'. Anyway, they will occasionaly write something along the lines of 'we refer your attention to our response to X v Pressdram'.
Much though I would not wish Mr Fawkes to be sued, defamation suits being hideously expensive, part of me also thinks that a suit over a blog post would do much to clarify existing law, hopefully for the better. Then there's the whole business of jurisdiction - Order-order is incorporated in St Kitts, Blogger's servers reside in the US, Guido lives in the Republic of Ireland, the 'defamed' live here but the site is accessible anywhere.
I think the whole of British defamation law needs to be overhauled and made moer like the US model where malice has to be shown, along with it being untruthful and defamatory.
Apologies for rambling legalistic post - defamation was one of the few areas of my law studies I actually enjoyed....
2 comments:
I wouldn't be surprised if the Govt is looking to see if Guido and Iain sail too close to the wind, if there is any way they can close down their sites because they are too damned good and write stuff they would prefer was not in the public domain. They know they cannot be silenced.
If defamatory remarks had been made and legal action was planned, I'm sure Guido would have had a letter by now.
Private Eye has an old favourite they haul out every once in a while. Way back lost in the mists of time a law firm sent them a letter threatening a lawsuit which they answered with two words, the second of which was 'off'. Anyway, they will occasionaly write something along the lines of 'we refer your attention to our response to X v Pressdram'.
Much though I would not wish Mr Fawkes to be sued, defamation suits being hideously expensive, part of me also thinks that a suit over a blog post would do much to clarify existing law, hopefully for the better. Then there's the whole business of jurisdiction - Order-order is incorporated in St Kitts, Blogger's servers reside in the US, Guido lives in the Republic of Ireland, the 'defamed' live here but the site is accessible anywhere.
I think the whole of British defamation law needs to be overhauled and made moer like the US model where malice has to be shown, along with it being untruthful and defamatory.
Apologies for rambling legalistic post - defamation was one of the few areas of my law studies I actually enjoyed....
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