doth he mean 'head'? or doth he mean 'heed'? (p'raps he dreameth of more of the former)

arrgh and begorrah . . . . . . what hast the old coot been on this time?

(for all dat .. . . and all dat . .. . . . . damn spot on vital topic cap'n.)

Some honest answers
Blood Sucking Lawyers - The Law Firm

Hey tailwheel, not to labour a point, but as it was explained to me...you need to go to the effort of accessing the VPN via a public wifi access point eg a public hotspot etc rather than using your own ISP.
Even then that public access point does record some details of your mobile device, but it's a relatively easy process to think ahead and cloak or disguise it.
With respect to email address, well again it is a simple process to create numerous identities all accessed in the process I spoke about earlier.
Ultimately it's a lot of effort to go to so that you can post or blog information that the powers that be, lawyers, or private individuals don't want out in the public domain and please don't think I'm advocating this behaviour, I am merely providing the information that was given to me.
The individual who provided me with this "how to guide" could be described as someone who does advocate the free flow of ideas and opinions online, so far I'm pretty certain he hasn't had any issues:}

A question of style.
 

Have mate who is into the serious end of the security and protection gig. His wise words to me were fairly simple "the best system only buys the best time". What he was saying is that the best of the best only buys time before the inevitable. So it must apply to the "net". I think if "they" wanted to "get in", they could, just a matter of resources, time and money, i.e. the game must be worth the candle.

The other issue is that of "style", not just in the way a thing is constructed or even in the phrasing. Some folk can be 'picked' at about 10 words, perhaps not the actual identity but certainly the last name traded under. For example:-

Brutus: And since the quarrel
Will bear no color for the thing he is,
Fashion it thus: that what he is, augmented,
Would run to these and these extremities;
And therefore think him as a serpent's egg,
Which, hatch'd, would as his kind grow mischievous,
And kill him in the shell.
JC act 2, scene1.

Who else could it be?. :D

The answer is yes. If they are by any means identified then you may have well spelt out their name.

Many years ago, a writer published a story about a "John Smith" who was described in words that would cause offence.

A random John Smith stepped forward and claimed that the story impugned his good character and successfully sued for defamation. The story was not about this particular John Smith yet won his legal action and he collected damages.

Some years ago, an entire Year 12 at a Sydney high school took out a successful class action against a teacher and a newspaper who stated in print that they were a "bunch of hopeless losers" or words to that effect.

Beware even if you use somebody's initials! For example: If I said AZ from Burning Airlines was a #$%^& who *&^%$# gerbils and once did $%^&* with a melon and an Altar Boy, I could find myself in deep %^&* ! :E

Yeah OK - but
 

Just read an email with a series of hilarious “Larry Pickering” cartoons which were not at all flattering to several government ministers. There have been several recent articles which were damming of the same. Almost every (serious) editorial names and, sometimes shames 'public' officers, the department and even describes why this is so.

Perhaps it's just that pollies are so immune to the opinions of the public, it just doesn't penetrate through the thick, outer layer of hide. Then again, perhaps as in GD s' philosophy, the trough music simply deafens them to the cries of outrage, poverty, sickness and frustration. ????.

So I guess this means I am going to hell!

On the bright side a lot of good people are potentially coming with me and hopefully there will be a bar. Seriously people with a point of view which is different to the powers that be should not be intimidated to express their views politely. The nazi s wanted to shut up everyone who disagreed with them also. Some organisations may employ full time staff to monitor what is said on social media. However "engagement" is encouraged. No one should ever be afraid to express an opinion.

I have no legal background. Please send legal aid if required!

Okay, everyone woken up sober this morning? ;) [edit: including Tailwheel, but the look of it, this page just got a lot shorter... :E]

Agreed :ok:. I guess the important thing is that when expressing an opinion, it's important to make sure it's not defamatory and can be backed up with facts if necessary. Golden rule; Never publish anything on the internet that you wouldn't be prepared to defend in court.

I assume that stuff like "IMO this is a rotten decision by XYZ airlines because pax don't want to fly to LHR via Laos" is okay if you have reason to believe this is correct, whereas something like "Everyone knows the CEO of XYZ airlines is a goat:mad:er and a pervert" is probably a little borderline unless you have very good photographic evidence that this is so. :ooh:

And I guess the possibly would always exist that a airline employees wife or errant teenage child logged onto their computer while they were out in the garden and typed away to their hearts content, unbeknownst to the employee. I am imagining that could maybe provide a reason of doubt. Defamation is extremely difficult to prove. Not that I think we should defame anyone, of course.

Yes, it's all well and good "being in the right" and "having evidence to back it up", but the question you have to ask yourself is "do I have a spare xx thousand dollars to argue the matter in court?"

Inevitably, the aggrieved person is usually a publicly known figure (read: cashed up) and most likely has a little more cash than you lying around. They almost always have pretty sharp litigation lawyers on hand to deal with such matters.

The difficulty (or otherwise) of proving defamation is not relevant. The potential cost of venting your spleen in the public domain IS. :eek:

Of course this all falls apart when the antagonist doesn't have anything left to loose, perhaps because he/she, has lost it all to the aggrieved. The whole thing then reverts to "Sods Law" of which I have written some papers and amendments.

A question: (Something I have no intent to act on). If somebody has details of your identity that was obtained via any source that can be proved, and that person then makes defamatory comment to your PPRune identity, is that a basis for action against them?

Now Frank...your not planning on taking someones house,kicking their dog and screwing their wife perchance??? or vice versa, depending what the wife looks like!!

Lisa, the computer is seized as evidence and the time/date establishes who was home at the time? Is the computer password protected? There are lots of ways that forensic IT can show who was on the keyboard at the time.

Even gossip can bring you unstuck in defamation matters- spead a rumour about someones sex life, professional competance or moral standing and you could be gone big time.

Damages awarded against you could be as high as $250k with costs of $100k+ for each side. Do you have $500k to throw away by saying that some body is, say, soliciting prostitutes on overnights?

If you say some thing, the onus is on the utterer to prove truth of the utterance. There is no burden on the defamed to prove their innocence.

Intriguing.
 

This is what started a heated debate (Baroom Barristers Association) . Creampuff supplied the pertinent clues, it is worth a read.
It's a favourite wriggle hole for likes of 'Officials' who use their assumed legal power, contrary to all other things prescribed; with full knowledge that 'they' won't be touched. (gutless). They can be of course; but it's about half a decade and a new house to get the thing up in a court. By then of course - see TPB above.

Time for a quick Lawyer joke.
 

Q. What's the difference between an attorney and a pit bull?
A. Jewelry.

Careful you don't get sued by the Pit Bull Association! They're probably pretty upset about your inference...:\:}
National American Pit Bull Terrier Association

I don't think anyone exercising a modicum of self restraint here should be worried. Free speech is an accepted given. Unless we get a bit too carried away after the 3rd or 5th vino. In which case the edit button used surepticiosly the next day could be a good option. Fear and complacency are the enemy, not the collective power of people who care about right and wrong. And we do have power, even if sometimes it feels like we don't.

We do not live under a Stalin or nazi regime. And we are not living in north Korea . With common sense express what you want to say. If people living in Tunisia, Egypt and Syria can have the courage of their convictions then surely we can as well. Remember "Time" magazine person of the year is us.

Lofty sentiment LHLisa vis-a-vis Stalin and North Korea, this is the Act:

http://www.legislation.qld.gov.au/Bi...tionB05Exp.pdf

read for yourself.

Some examples of The Act in action:

Paper to make record payout to defamed cop - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

School principal wins $80k defamation payout - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

Footy Show defamation payout to Western Bulldogs director Susan Alberti | Sam Newman

Publishers aghast at payout in Cleary case

By all means, express what you want tempered by common sense. However, this does not give people a licence to impune a persons reputation.

If you say some thing that lowers a persons' standing, then you have no right to say it unless you can prove it to be true. This is why we have laws and a system that includes the concept of torts.

Many capitalism based companies and governments reap great advantage from laws which work to stifle free speech and small groups interested in having a voice. For example in Melbourne a group formed to Save our Bay some years ago. They were concerned with the environmental and health impacts of dredging up 150 years worth of toxic heavy metals from the mouth of the yarra and placing them in an open bund 6kms of Mordiallic beach, among other issues. Captain of the road transport industry Lindsay Fox even said it was a waste of government money, stating the dredging was pointless in addressing melbournes sea and road transport issues, and a port in Hastings was a better solution.

The community group was legally threatened with having to pay the legal costs p
Of both parties if they lost. This worked quite well to shut them up , and sensor their right to free speech.

A few years on iconic Portsea bay beach does not have a beach anymore , as a result of dredging . Eating bay caught fish could be considered an extreme sport- do I want dioxin in my mussels or fresh flathead. And the big corporation got what they wanted.

I think the wide spread corporate bullying going on, supported by laws enabled by both sides of parliament , is part of the reason a record 1,700,000 Australians voted for the greens at last election. The greens genuinely do support free speech - not slander - there is a difference .

__________________

The late Justice Frederick ('Funnelweb') Myers of the Supreme Court of NSW was wont to muse that '"Most litigants aren't in my court looking for justice. They're there to get even."





Captain Adolphous Hippolyte Spriggs, employed by a certain Australian international airline, a man with multiple shady connections,
a self-confessed pimp, userer and person of dike-rat propensities, had on his 'books' so many professionals in so many cities, he'd boast that were the whole of the Foreign Legion queued up, they'd just have to wait their turn.