-47had not been enacted into domestic law in the United Kingdom. At p.551-F Lord Keith of Kinkel agreed with Lord Goff of Chieveley in A-G v Guardian Newspapers (No.2) [1990] 1 AC 109 at 283-4 that, in the field of freedom of speech, there was no difference in principle between English law on the subject and Article 10 of the European Convention. 117. It is accordingly to the common law that I turn for the resolution of this appeal. It is here that the balance between freedom of expression on the one hand and the protection of individual reputations on the other has to be struck102. 118. The medium for the dissemination of opinions thoughts and expressions, and their means of distribution, fall within a wide spectrum: From the words carved on stonework in somebody’s house (the example given by Greene LJ in Byrne v Deane [1937] 1 KB 818 at 838) at one end of the spectrum to articles on the first page of a leading newspaper at the other; from the stone mason who wielded the mallet to the street-side news-vendor. For liability for libel, the question is always this: At what point does the law seek to pin responsibility for such dissemination? For the author of the article on the first page of the newspaper and for its editor the answer is obvious. But what about the owner of the house in Greene LJ’s example, or the proprietors of the golf-club in Byrne v Deane who would not normally have expected defamatory statements to be pinned on their notice-board? 119. In this regard, labels such as “main publisher” “subordinate distributor” “mere disseminator”, as appearing in the books, are simply labels. They seek to do nothing more than to define, in an imprecise way, the position of the defendant within the wide spectrum. 102 See Panday v Gordon [2006] 1 AC 427 at 436-E per Lord Nicholls of Birkenhead: “The purpose of the law of defamation is to hold a balance between freedom of speech and the right to reputation. The basic position at which the common law holds this balance is to impose strict liability for defamatory statements in the absence of justification.”