[WikiEN-l] Libel law

Fri Dec 9 20:11:23 UTC 2005

Steve Block wrote:

> I mean, taking it a step further, although Wikimedia may be exempt from
> a writ in the UK courts, if one was to aimed at Wikimedia from the UK
> courts with editors named on the suit, the best recourse from my reading
> of the law is that courts allow a full apology, retraction and some sort
> of small financial settlement rather than have a lawsuit.  Would
> Wikimedia be happy to comply with that even though it is likely exempt
> from the suit itself? 

Apologies and retractions from whom?  If I make an alegedly libellous 
statement Wikimedia the mechanisms are certainly there to remove such 
statements from the site, but that doesn't mean that I have personally 
apologized or retracted or agreed to an out of court financial 
settlement.  It can only speak on behalf of the organization as a whole.

> Basically, I am asking whether the policy is shoot libel on sight. 

That's an over-generalization. It may not be clear that a particular 
statement is libelous.

Ec