In the case, brought by ComputerXpress, a company selling computer related products, the court found that it was in the public interest to have the messages displayed. ComputerXpress had alleged that several individuals had made “numerous false and disparaging statements” about the company on the internet. According to the court, the messages merely amounted to the opinions of shareholders. The court found that, “their tone and content identified them as statements of opinion and not of fact,” and they were not the words of a competitor.
Crucially, the court distinguished the content of the messages from those that are defamatory. In this case, the messages were deemed by the court to be acceptable because they were merely “disparaging,” not defamatory.