Evony Drops Libel Lawsuit Against Blogger

[Al_]

surprised they didn't go though the English courts- English libel law is very, very broken, and they could have cruised to an easy settlement, leaving Bruce financially broken. Hell if they'd pursued through the English* courts and lost, Bruce would still be broke.

*English, not British, in this case, as Scotland has a separate legal system.

 

[Arashiofordo3]

I find the whole concept of this to be utterly hilarious,

"I have an opinion!" Said the blogger
"What is it?" Said the company
"That your game is crap and I hate you" Replied the blogger
"Well as your a UK citizen... I'll see you in court! IN AUSTRALIA!!!"

"..."

"wait, what?"

What's sad is that everything he said has been said by fanboys against their rivals consoles. It's nothing new. However, its the level to which the company reacted is brilliant. Like they have ability to take criticism of a hot headed 12 year old on call of duty modern warfare 2 online mode while loosing constantly.

Good god I love it when stuff like this happens.

 

[AgentChunk]

Wow first they try to trick perverts into playing there crappy game and now they sue cause someone says it's crappy. This may be the evilest free game developer ever.

 

[pneuma08]

Can you say, petard hoist?

 

[Ilosia]

Sequel, I seem to remember hearing that it hadn't even actually left beta with the original.

Not particularly surprised to see they've dropped charges, they could only keep up this farce for so long.

 

[Sephychu]

You get 'em Brucey! Stop those bastards from putting boobs on their ads when there are no boobs to be found!

 

[008Zulu_v1legacy]

His first mistake was trying to get this through one of our courts. No wait, his first mistake was to make a web game cloned from Civ, his second mistake was using false advertising, third mistake was going through an Australian court.

 

[deth2munkies]

This lawsuit is utterly hilarious. Libel Tourism + Defamation suit for true information.

 

[WhiteTigerShiro]

I love it. Evony tries to sue someone in a shady manner over a stupid issue, then in the end they have to pay nearly $200,000 in damages to the people who's time they wasted when the case was dropped.

 

[Radelaide]

Wait, wait, wait... An American company held a lawsuit in an Australian court against a UK blogger?

Buh? Zuh? Wuh?

So this blogger calls them out on their bullshit game, they get upset, go through a bunch of legal avenues so THE LEGAL BIAS WILL BE WITH THEM then quit? Wow... Just... wow

 

[Starke]

How the FUCK can an USA-registered company sue an UK citizen in an Australian court?

That doesn't make sense!

I seriously don't get things like this, I wonder if anyone with knowledge of legal systems can shed some light on how this is possible. I don't understand how Australia feels it has the right to enforce judgment/laws on citizens of other countries. And this isn't a singular case of something like this happening. I remember Encyclopedia Dramatica got sued in Australia too. Correct me if I'm wrong but if I'm living in another country and I have never been to Australia, then Australia should have absolutely no jurisdiction over me in any way shape or form.
I personally think they shouldn't even have the right to give you a summons to court if you have never been to Australia. Hell if it were me and they convicted me of a crime saying that I broke X laws, was sentenced to Y years in jail, and had to pay Z fine I would tell them to blow me and hope that my country would laugh in their face.

Short answer: they don't.

Long Answer: There are two kinds of jurisdiction, personal and subject matter. Personal Jurisdiction means you are in the court (basically). Subject matter means they have a legitimate reason to be involved in the case (again, basically).

Australian law claims subject matter jurisdiction for any website viewable in Australia, which is, in legal parlance: kooky as shit.

That gives them (theoretically) subject matter jurisdiction in the ED case. Except they don't have personal jurisdiction, so legal advice to the ED editors was "don't go to Australia." They can say whatever they want, but they can't enforce their judicial decisions.

I can't remember where the subject matter jurisdiction for this case came from, something about Evony having some legal holdings there, for precisely this reason.

Normally Australia couldn't claim personal jurisdiction, which means that Everiss could have simply given them the finger and called it a day. But, there may be some treaty regarding civil litigation in place between Australia and the UK that I'm unaware of.