Watch our; there’s lawyer about!

Everybody who blogs, twitters, or uses Facebook (or any other ‘social media’) would be wise to consider the recent case of Cairns v. Modi.

Chris Cairns is a cricketer; Lalit Modi is a former chairman of the IPL.

Modi tweeted (or twittered) that Cairns had been involved in match-fixing.

Cairns sued for defamation and won.

Lodi’s 24-word tweet is likely to cost him over £1 million.

This should make us think quite hard about what we publish on-line, because although we may have the illusion of anonymity and that we are merely addressing a few ‘friends’ or ‘followers’ we are in fact exposing ourselves in a very public way – and permanently, because what you put on the internet stays there. What’s more, the web-site can easily hand over your name and address.

You may be tempted to put things on the internet that you would not say to a person’s face from behind an imagined cloak of anonymity.

But a libel is a libel. If you blog something libellous a plaintiff might first go for the web-site, in which case it would most likely join you in the action.

When I was advising politicians about whether they should say or do something, I would tell them to ask themselves how it would look on the front page of the local newspaper.