1 KIEFEL CJ, KEANE AND GLEESON JJ. The appellants, Fairfax Media Publications Pty Ltd, Nationwide News Pty Limited and Australian News Channel Pty Ltd, publish newspapers which circulate in New South Wales or operate television stations, or both. They each maintain a public Facebook page on which they post content relating to news stories and provide hyperlinks to those stories on their website. They invite comment on the posted content from members of the public who are Facebook users. Comments which are made appear on the Facebook page and are available to be seen by other Facebook users. 2 In each of the three proceedings brought in the Supreme Court of New South Wales, the respondent claimed that following the appellants posting about particular news stories referring to him, including posts concerning his incarceration in a juvenile justice detention centre in the Northern Territory, a number of third-party Facebook users responded with comments that were defamatory of him. He alleged that the appellants were liable as the publishers of those comments. 3 The parties agreed to the terms of a question concerning the issue of publication. The Supreme Court ordered that the question be decided separately from the balance of the proceedings1. The question was whether the respondent, the plaintiff in the proceedings, "has established the publication element of the cause of action of defamation against the defendant[s] in respect of each of the Facebook comments by third-party users". The appellants took the view that a negative answer to the separate question would result in dismissal of the proceedings. 4 The primary judge (Rothman J) answered the separate question in the affirmative2. Each of the appeals from that decision was dismissed3. Background facts 5 The appellants each maintain a public Facebook page on terms of use agreed with Facebook. The page is used by each appellant to share content and connect with Facebook users. The page is publicly accessible to users, who are able to view and comment on content posted to that page. 1 Uniform Civil Procedure Rules 2005 (NSW), r 28.2. 2 Voller v Nationwide News Pty Ltd [2019] NSWSC 766. 3 Fairfax Media Publications Pty Ltd v Voller (2020) 380 ALR 700.

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