[WikiEN-l] RE: Corrected

Sat May 14 23:22:53 UTC 2005

Delirium said:
> Tony Sidaway wrote:
>
>>geni said:
>>
>>
>>>On 5/14/05, Tony Sidaway <minorityreport at bluebottle.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>>Ray Saintonge said:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>>should review the four criteria
>>>>>for fair use found in U.S. law.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>Why?  I live outside the USA and Wikipedia publishes worldwide.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>The servers are in florida as such we are subject to the law of that
>>>state and the laws of the US federal goverment.
>>>
>>>
>>
>>Not surprisingly, the UK courts do not take that view, and reciprocal
>>legal arrangements between the US and the UK make it possible to pursue
>>non-payment of UK judgements in US courts.
>>
>>
> Not surprisingly, you are misinformed on this point.

Please do not make insults on this mailing list.

>  UK courts take
> the  view that they do not have jurisdiction over US publications.  For
>  example, were the Atlanta Journal-Constitution to defame a Briton,
> they  would not be able to sue in UK courts.

As far as websites are concerned, that is flatly incorrect.  Australia,
Canada and the UK have all accepted cases against US websites, and the UK
case Godfrey versus Hallam, for instance, demonstrates that a private US
citizen who publishes using the internet can be sued in the British
courts.
An Australian businessmen sued WSJ online after it claimed he was involved
in money laundering.  The Australian court ruled that he was allowed to
bring the case in Australia where his reputation was damaged by the
article.  Coincidentally, WSJ was also sued in the UK courts over a
separate case.  In both cases the content was published on a US website
primarily for a US readership, but a foreign court accepted jurisdiction.
The Canadian case involved an Ontario citizen suing the Washington Post in
the Ontario courts. What is interesting about this case is that, at the
time of the damage was done, the plaintiff was not in Canada, and was not
a Canadian citizen.  He was a UN employee stationed in an African country.
 Later he moved to Canada and petitioned the courts.  The Ontario court
reasoned that the harm would follow him wherever he went, so they accepted
jurisdiction.