Since 2004 Vancouver, BC-based business man Wayne Crookes has become publicly known for his libel  suits against individuals who have commented on his role in the Green Party, and the forums, websites, and technology companies that hosted the comments. Now he has arrived at the Supreme Court.

Mr. Crookes has sued sites including Wikipedia, Google, Yahoo and MySpace, as he felt that the postings on those sites were libellous. This was seen by many as an odd tactic: why sue the service providers, instead of the actual individuals who were making the statements?

Some of those lawsuits have been dropped, but Crookes went on to claim that there was libel in simply linking to a site that was potentially libellous.

One of those sued was the operator of P2Pnet.net, Jon Newton. Newton had simply linked to the stories in question without repeating what was written in them or offering any commentary.

Both the district court and the appeals court said that just linking was not defamatory, but that hasn’t settled the debate. Now the Canadian Supreme Court is about to take on the issue and respond to a host of submissions.

In Canada the law is less clear than in the United States, where Section 230 of the CDA protects website publishers in both cases.

If the Supreme Court rules in favour of Mr. Crookes, or does not come down with a clear judgment, the waters could get murky and add to “libel chill”, which many feel is already a problem in Canada. Should the courts rule that linking itself does not constitute defamation, the Canadian parliament could then add some safe harbour legislation, though the present Conservative government hasn’t shown much enthusiasm in this area.