"Dow Jones & Company Inc v Gutnick [2002] HCA 56: Negotiating American legal hegemony in the transnational world of cyberspace"

Abstract

[This case note provides an overview of the High Court’s landmark decision in Gutnick, concerning defamation on, and jurisdiction over, the Internet. As well as providing a detailed analysis of the judgments and their impact on defamation law and cyberlaw, the case note considers the dominant role of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution in cyberspace. It calls for a negotiation of this dominance by American legal principle in cyberspace and argues for conceptualising a constitutionalism for transnational society implemented by national courts. While seeing the Gutnick decision as inevitable, the case note highlights the limitations enunciated by the High Court and explains how the decision will provide the platform for legal regulation that will allow the distributed nature of the Internet to prosper.]