LAW5162: Cyberlaw

Examination with optional assignment

So. Much. Content. This subject is HUGE - easily one of the biggest subjects I have done content wise. The subject covers the following topics: theories of internet governance, the domain name system, establishing jurisdiction, e-contracting, content regulation and classification, privacy and spam, trademarks and passing off, intermediary liability for copyright infringement, internet defamation and cyber-bullying and sexting (this last topic was cut my semester because of time constraints). Each topic has 100+ slides. Should give you an indication just ow huge this course is.

It helps (but is not strictly necessary) to have done/be doing the following subjects when doing this subject: Contracts, Equity, Civil Procedure, Media Law, IP I and II. It also helps if you have some basic understanding of computers and how the internet works (this is covered in the introductory lectures but it can be very technical if you don't know much about IT).

IMO this subject tries to squeeze too much in and as a consequence, lectures move ridiculously fast and I found it very hard to follow along in some topics. Topics range from the more philosophical (internet regulation), to understanding extremely complicated statutory schemes (content regulation), to understanding technical/political aspects of the internet (DNS Governance) and you will also learn a bit of comparative law (for instance, you learn a bit of US law here and there). The mix between content and policy is reflected in the exam, which has a 40% policy component if you don't do the optional assignment. I found these policy questions to be quite specific and challenging.

That said, some topics are really interesting, particularly intermediary liability which deals with issues such as whether ISPs should be liable for copyright infringement by their customers. You will learn about pretty recent cases such as the iiNet case and the Google Adwords case.
Overall a difficult subject but some parts near the end are quite interesting.

David Lindsay

Yes (roughly 2-3 available)

3/5

Yes with video capture

No prescribed textbook. The reading guide lists Internet and E-Commerce Law by Fitzgerald but I never used it all semester.

3 hours of lectures per week.

2013 sem 1