Archive
Category: Free Speech
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Gator isn’t Spyware. No, Really.
Several weeks after Gator Corp filed an action in defamation against PC Pitstop, a prominent anti-spyware software provider, the parties settled out of court. Gator alleged that the defendant misrepresented their advertising plugin software for Internet Explorer as a form of malicious spyware. Instead, Gator claims that its software is “adware”, and PC Pitstop was… Read more →
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State Censorship and Cyber Autonomy
A recent report published by Privacy International suggests that internet censorship is at an all time high. In addition to extensive regulation by non-democratic states, the study points to the heightened sensitivity of many Western governments in response to a perceived terrorist threat. However, it is noted that an active censorship poses an even greater… Read more →
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Ban ‘Offensive and Menacing Behaviour’, Alston Argues
Australia’s Minister for Communications, Richard Alston, has proposed to ban the use of the internet for offensive and menacing behaviour, with offenders to face up to two-years in prison, according to a press release issued by the Department of Communications, yesterday. People using the Internet to advocate or facilitate violent protests, for example by spreading… Read more →
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Equality and Law
I stumbled upon an interesting idea in one of my law lectures today: substantive equality is impossible. I say substantive (as opposed to formal) equality in the sense that measures are taken to reduce pre-existing negative social offset by actively promoting disadvantaged persons or sectors of the community. It is not possible because we cannot… Read more →
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Internet Defamation Trial Date Set
In what promises to be a landmark case for internet publishers, Gutnick v Dow Jones will be heard in Melbourne on 3 October, 2003. This case concerns the appeal of one Joe Gutnick, a miner who claims he was defamed by the Wall Street Journal, in which [edit to avoid innocent repetition: certain defamatory imputations… Read more →