In 2021, Michael published this piece in the Communications Law Bulletin. The relevant law has since changed in several Australian jurisdictions but not in WA. So has the identity of ‘Twitter’.

Abstract

A person defamed on the internet has choices. They can ignore it. They can throw flames back at their antagonist. Or they can go the legal route andconsider defamation litigation.

In that event, the defamed person may have a choice of who to sue. In many cases, they will be able to sue a person—human or corporate—other than the original author of the defamatory content. They might sue the individual author and the company the individual authorworks for; this is what happens in many cases where a defamed person sues both a journalist and the mediaorganisation that published the journalist’s content. This article focuses on defamationon the internet and suing the entities behind the digital platforms that have become essential to our lives. By ‘digital platforms’, I mean the likes of Google, Facebook, Twitter and so on…

Read more: Michael Douglas, ‘Suing Google, Facebook or Twitter for Defamation’ (2021) 40(2) Communications Law Bulletin 53