There is, it turns out, something worse than being dragged through a messy divorce in court – being dragged through a messy divorce in cyberspace. A 52-year-old Englishwoman in Manhattan has been extending the frontiers of gossip ever since her wealthy husband, a titan of the arts establishment a quarter-century older than she is, decided he wanted a divorce. The woman has told reporters the press is stacked against her. Since April, she has posted three videos on YouTube about her marriage – with details of Viagra, condoms, pornography and someone she calls a “nasty evil stepdaughter” – and they have got 4m hits.

Most talk about internet privacy involves either government spying or hackers using “Trojan horses” to steal your credit card information. Stories such as the YouTube divorce show that the internet’s challenge to privacy is broader. You do not even need to own a computer to have your dirty laundry hung up in cyberspace.