douglasgresham.co.uk

A SLAPP – or a Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation – is a lawsuit filed not to be won, or often even contested, but rather to cause the defendant to capitulate to the plaintiff’s demands due to fear, legal costs, or other inability or unwillingness to contest the suit.  Usually, when discussing SLAPPs, we’re talking about suits used to suppress criticism of one sort or another.  They’re most often associated with libel – the most famous UK example being McLibel – but can include a variety of other laws, such as trademark law (particularly with gripes sites).  This doesn’t only affect those directly involved, either, as it creates a chilling effect on legitimate criticism and dissent, which as a believer in free speech I find to be a serious problem.

Continue Reading

Libel reform has been something of a hot topic of late; even the terminally inward-looking Labour government are looking at reform.  There have been a number of episodes that have shown that British libel law is being used to suppress criticism, both at home and increasingly from abroad (the nature of the global internet allowing people to claim that any website available in the UK is published in the UK).  It’s a serious threat to freedom of speech.  This much has been picked over at length – the question is, what would I actually do about it?

Continue Reading

I always find it difficult to explain my political position.  This is probably because I try to practice evidence-based opinion forming, whereas those in Westminster – and I include every politician and mainstream hack in this – form policy based on ideology, popular appeal and headline-grabbing catchiness.  I also find the traditional definitions of Left vs Right far too simplistic.  In an attempt to actually explain my positions on the issues that matter most to me, I’m going to be writing a series of posts under the heading of When I Come To Power – think of it as the manifesto for The Doug Party, although clearly I’d never be put in charge in a democracy – they’re far too sensible to let me anywhere near anything resembling power.

I’ll keep a full list of posts here, along with a summary of the changes I’d make.

Continue Reading

agnosticism alternative medicine Atheism bbc belief bible business change Coding copyright deconversion DRM EA education entrepreneurship games Gaming google google reader homeopathy innovation Intellectual Property media music news newspapers ofquack patents pc php piracy print ps3 royalties rss Skepticism Spore steam techdirt Technology tiscali twitter wii wikipedia xbox