OpenLaw to Support Open Source Community 213
From ralphclark: I recently contacted Wendy Seltzer at OpenLaw to ask if they could assist the open source community in its struggle with the forces of evil (the MPAA and the DMCA and UCITA). After a brief dialogue she finally wrote back:
" I have been thinking more about this project and the tools we'll need for it, since I haven't gotten a negative response, indeed several positive ones, from people at the Berkman Center.
I think it's probably best to start low-maintenance, with a mailing list and a Web page, then to add components such as Web-based discussion and a collection of links and documents.
If you have suggestions for links to the key documents/Web pages, that would be a great help."
I think this is our clarion call: I've seen plenty of good quality debate on these issues here on Slashdot, and the most unsupportable viewpoints have been flamed to death by now so I'm sure there are lots of people reading this who have something valuable to contribute. You should e-mail your (sensible) suggestions to Open Law Feedback and she'll pick them up from there. One suggestion: When you mail, write your idea below in comments - than people can avoid duplication of effort.
OpenLaw, OpenSource, Open... (Score:1)
this was covered earlier .. (Score:1)
This is not a stupid idea, *except* . . . (Score:3)
The word of the day is "pro bono". Lawyers have been doing voluntary community service for a long, long time. The eyes of many lawyers probably will make "bugs" shallow.
However.
As far as law is concerned, the eyes of a million SlashBots are worth about, oh, golly . . . I don't think they make numbers that small. How's this: That and a dollar will get you a 50-cent cup of coffee. Just barely.
I can see it now: "IT"5 ALL ABOU7 THE SEC0ND AM3NDM3N7!"
God help whoever as to wade through the email on this one.
Yes!!! (Score:3)
Now this is a good idea.
It's obvious that the Open-Source (free-software) community is under attack from those who don't understand it and would like to kill it. This is probably the best way for us to meet this challenge - leveraging the one thing that makes us different (and arguably nimbler and better) than our closed-source nemeses.
Not all of us are lawyers, and that's OK. When it comes to technical issues, you have the techies to make the cases, and the lawyers to put them into formats that the courts will accept and that could possibly win.
I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say that this marks a turning point for free software. Maybe now we can mount competent defenses/offenses against the large corporations who would stifle/censor us.
Kudos.
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Open Government (Score:3)
So, who's interested? :)
opensource law? (Score:1)
This would be greatly appreciated (Score:3)
The only attorney that I know of who is helping pro-bono is working on the DVD lawsuits.
We want to file our own patents and then license them for blanket use by free software. We need attorneys for that. Sometimes we want to go to court to fight things like the DVD lawsuit or patents that are being enforced against free software. That's more than just consulting, but it would be great if we could get some more pro-bono help with that, too. That one pro-bono attorney, and the staff attorney at EFF who is working on DVD, are pretty overwhelmed and could use some help.
Someday, we might have to be the agressor, too. Enforcing our licenses, or attacking something like the DVD Copy Control Consortium in the courts. I'm not expecting all of this to be pro-bono. We need more money to do this than we have so far.
Thanks
Bruce
Problem: "IANAL" (Score:1)
Peer review is all well and good for computer programming, where everyone can at least help in finding bugs, even if they cannot program directly. The law, on the other hand, is something that requires a lifetime of study to understand. While this is often true for programming as well, non-programmers can still make positive contributions towards programs. On the other hand, non-lawyers can only contribute their opinions to the discussions. These opinions can be (and usually are) virtually worthless because of the lack of legal expertise on the part of their owners.
Sure, any non-lawyer can clearly grok that "ucita is evil" and "dvd decryption is good", but to understand the complicated legal aspects of each is far over the head of even the most well-meaning netizens.
void recursion (void)
{
recursion();
}
while(1) printf ("infinite loop");
if (true) printf ("Stupid sig quote");
What do you suggest? (Score:2)
This is all fine and good. I've joined EFF, I've joined the ACLU, and I put my considerable moral support behind all of this...
But what else do you suggest?
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Re:suggestion (Score:2)
IANAL, but my dad is, and that's essentially how he explained it to me. I'd appreciate any corrections/clarifications.
Re:Is this ok... (Score:1)
Speak for yourself, Troll. I have a lot of regard for what Stallman has done, but I've always thought he was a little extreme and have taken a little softer approach to the whole thing.
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Re: (Score:1)
Re:Open Government (Score:2)
Maybe it's just human. There's an old saying that 80 percent of the people are followers and 20 percent are leaders. Maybe the 80 percent that are followers are just followers, and maybe that's the natural order of things.
The only real problem comes when one person decides that he or she is a leader, and that everyone else must be a follower...
I'm realizing more and more that people are different, and what works for me may not work for them. For example, I find going to the mall to be distasteful, at this point in time. Others don't. And there's nothing wrong with that. I find certain things (DeCSS fiasco, for one) to be morally unconscionable. I'm moved to do something about it. Others aren't. Nothing wrong with that, either, just puts the onus on me to do what I can about it.
So, in that way, this is an open government. We're free to be ourselves, for the most part, even if it means that we don't care. But those who *do* care should act.
I'll get off my soapbox now.
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What a great idea! (Score:1)
Then maybe we can get back to our roots. Microsoft VS DOJ is a good topic, a feature on DVD-DeCSS is okay once in a while. But "Is xxx patent good?" is about as much Slashdot as "xxx Kewl Game Now On Dreamcast!". I've actually been pretty happy with the resurgence of Linux/NT stories, and Transmeta articles.
In short, if you wanna see every "xxx patent" story ever, find a legal site. If you wanna see all the "Dreamcast r00lz" crap, find a gamer site. I like the First Amendment and Gauntlet:Legends as much as the next hacker ("Tan Patent-Lawyer needs fees badly!"), but enough is enough, people.
Maybe if Slashdot posted 20-30 stories, each with a story rating (based on the sheer number of "Is this really news" comments
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pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate [152.7.41.11].
Legal forums (Score:2)
This isn't easy to explain, but think what would happen if it became public knowledge that there was a group of lawyers working for free for "just" cases. They'd be innundated... both with requests and with people upset they didn't make the cut. Unlike code where the product is already there - a legal forum would help push a case from start to finish. It's the "something for nothing" crowd I'm worried about here..
The second, and less important, problem I see is that unless there is a clear set of guidelines / criterion for what such a forum would - and would not do or allow is laid out, it's doomed from the start. The reason is simply that there is no focus, hence work is duplicated, petty arguements break out over what the Right Thing is (or direction), and things just never get done.
Lastly, it would take a helluva lot of lawyers to do this... and, uhh.. in our country.. they're pretty busy already.
Create Slashdot style forum (maybe from /. source) (Score:1)
Lawyers would need a special status however. (not sure how to verify their lawyer status)
Anyone could suggest a legal question (like "Ask Slashdot") or legal cases to post into a general forum like slashdot's main page.
Then, each lawyer could maintain their personal list of cases that they are working on and receive feedback
Also lawyers would automatically get a bonus score for new new posts. (maybe a user configurable option like the feature on
The
Re:This would be greatly appreciated (Score:1)
LinuxOne will give you 50% of their holdings, which constitutes half a soapbox and 5,000 flames. And a t-shirt, if you're lucky.
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pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate [152.7.41.11].
Re:opensource law? (Score:2)
That's not open source. That's an open API. There's still an elite cabal of people (lawyers) who are the only ones (in most cases) that put the stuff together and submit it. In order to do most things, one must go through a lawyer.
This gives us access a little more to the internals. Things must go through the kernel API now, instead of the userspace API. It's the difference between a libc call and a system call.
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Re:Is this ok... (Score:2)
No, I agree with his ideals, actually. But there's a such thing as tact. And there's a such things as compromise. Free software wouldn't be where it is now if it weren't for ESR. It'd still be a fringe movement. ESR knows how to talk to the people who have the money. And in spite of RMS's ideals, it's the money that gets the wheels moving.
RMS has done a lot, but he is ultimately not the reason it is going mainstream. One of them, yes. THE? No.
For the record, I do admire ESR standing up for his beliefs and stuff. I don't knock that. I wish I were half that idealistic. But... life, at least for me, isn't that way...
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Re:Create Slashdot style forum (maybe from /. sour (Score:2)
This is a decent idea, but I'm not too sure how it would actually pan out. Lawyers are a finicky bunch, but that's not their fault - law is very finicky.
Starting small, with sites such as this, is probably the best idea.
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The Declaration of Digital Independence (Score:1)
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the copyright bonds which have separated them from each other, and to assume among them powers of mass storage, with separate and equal access to Bandwidth and a decent respect for the advancement of mankind, it requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to be separated.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all bits are created equal, that they are endowed by their viewer with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Replication.--That to secure these rights, Copyrights are instituted among bits, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Copyright becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the Bits to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Copyright, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Copyrights long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that bits are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Copyrights, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of Open Source; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Licensing Restrictions. The history of the present RIAA and MPAA is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these bits. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
RIAA and MPAA have refused to change the Copyrights to those most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
RIAA and MPAA have forbidden their artists from passing Copyrights of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till their Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, they have utterly neglected to attend to them.
They have refused to pass other Copyrights for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Open Source, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
They have called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with their measures.
They have dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness their invasions on the rights of the bits.
They have refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Deletion, have returned to the Internet at large for their exercise; the bits remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
They have endeavoured to prevent the population of the Internet; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreign Software; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Royalties.
They have obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing their Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
They have made Judges dependent on their Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
They have erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our artists, and eat out their substance.
They have kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies of Lawyers without the Consent of our legislatures.
They have affected to render the Upstream Providers independent of and superior to the Civil power.
They have combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving their Assent to their Acts of pretended Digital Content Delivery:
For Quartering large bodies of armed lawyers among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punative damages for any Deletions which they should commit on the Bits of the Internet:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the Napster community:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by our Internet Peers:
For transporting us beyond firewalls to be tried for forged logs of offences
For abolishing the free System of OpenCSS in a neighbouring Domain, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into the Open Source Community:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Internet:
For suspending our own User Groups, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
They have abdicated Copyrights here, by declaring us out of their Protection Racket and waging War against us.
They have plundered our subnets, ravaged our routers, burnt our high speed connections, and destroyed the bits on our hard drives.
They are at this time transporting large Armies of Lawyers to compleat the works of deletion, punischment and closed-source tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized Bulletin Board Service.
They have constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the Internet to bear narc against their Security Consultants, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms:
Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A CEO whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free Internet.
Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our artist brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of the lawyers, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.
We, therefore, the Representatives of the united citizens of the Internet, in General User Groups, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of Network Addressing for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good bits of this Internet, solemnly publish and declare, That this network is, and of Right ought to be a Free and Independent Internet; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to RIAA or MPAA, and that all political connection between them and the greedy corporations, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as a Free and Independent Internet, they have full Power to copy themselves, store themselves, transmute themselves, trade themselves, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent bits may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our computers, our hard drives and our sacred DSL connections.
(Cheezy, but you get the point?)
- JoeShmoe
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
wft??? (Score:1)
That has nothing to do with this!
For those of you that don't follow the link, that stands for "North American Man Boy Love Association". Perv.
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Re:Is this ok... (Score:1)
Yup, that was a typo. I meant RMS.
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Re:opensource law? (Score:1)
Re:opensource law? (Score:2)
But in this case... the documentation actually determines how well the code runs.
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Why patents? (Score:2)
Consider how the GPL uses copyright against itself. I'm thinking of the same sort of strategy, although not as elegant as RMS did with GPL.
Thanks
Bruce
Re:Problem: "IANAL" (Score:1)
This is a valid point, though not entirely true. IANAL, but I grew up working in law firms, and my first consulting gigs were to lawfirms. I was ostensibly the DP manager, however, I spent a good deal of time working on economic models for plaintiffs in lawsuits.
I eventually got to understand the industry we represented so well that I was able to review most of our complaints, and contribute suggestions, modifications, etc. I never paid attention to the "legal" stuff, but paid much attention to the soundness of the arguments themselves.
So yes, WANL, that doesn't mean we can't contribute to the soundness of the legal arguments.
Stand Fast,
Re:What do you suggest? (Score:2)
I asked this guy who made $2B on free software for some help with PR and he said yes. I hope they're all like that.
Bruce
Re:opensource law? (Score:1)
Good project for law students? (Score:1)
Bingo. (Score:1)
Bingo.
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Re:suggestion (Score:1)
You can not prevent someone from reverse engineering a product by copyright protection in the US.
I am not even an American, let alone a lawyer, but it was my understanding the DMCA (Digital Millenium Copyright Act) does make it illegal to reverse engineer, if the reverse engineering defeats a copyright control mechanism. Thusly, AFAIK, DeCSS is actually illegal under the DMCA. I could be wrong (I bloody hope so), but this is what I've gleaned from what I've seen so far.
OpenLaw vs OpenSource (Score:1)
A lot of people have a reasonable understanding of the basics of how law should function. We are exposed to it all the time in our media saturated culture. I think OpenLaw will work out fine, the best lawyers, those professionally trained, will no doubt contribute the most. But it will also allow the rest of us with minimal understandings of the law to still contribute if we can. That's about how it is with OpenSource, if you can make a worthwile contribution, it doesn't matter if you spent 6 years at MIT or 6 months dropping acid and playing around with Perl every weekend, if you can write some good code, you can write some good code. Same goes for law. Just keep it all Open and it'll evolve into something better and better.
America... zuh? (Score:1)
Good explanation. (Score:1)
I'm not practicing - but I guess three years of intellectual property specialty in law school shouldn't go to waste - I'm very interested in helping out with this open law project. I'm often surprised by the good ideas in this forum, so I hope I'm not the only one.
And let's hope the children stay here. Crushed under Slashdot's very own DoS attack of grits and Natalie Portman, this very good idea could easily be abandoned when they realize just how "open" it gets around here.
Rather than emailing openlaw feedback... (Score:1)
Law Is Not Source Code (Score:2)
Is it that the lawyers in a case are going to post the briefs-in-progress and invite public comment? This is NOT the same as open source. The "open" part is the same, but law is not source code.
Source code is, to a first approximation, either correct or not. If someone wants to work on a routine in a program, it can usually be modularized, parcelled out, and tested to some degree of reliabily. Critically, it's typically OBVIOUS if it's completely wrong.
A judge isn't a compiler. No-one really knows if a legal argument is going to work or not. It's like the world's worst debugging session, there's almost no way to retest the results.
It sounds like a good idea, but there's a lot that's very unclear in practice.
Non-lawyers needed to generate evidence (Score:1)
Non-lawyers can help to flesh out these points. Why is DeCSS more like the VCR (used for copying movies but also legitimate "time shifting" of TV programs) than an illegal weapon? Show us the "substantial non-infringing uses."
Open-source Paranoia (Score:2)
Oh please. The open-source model is not under attack from people who don't understand it. It's not like Sony, Microsoft, and Paramount are all gathered around a table going, "That damn OSS. We don't know what it is, but it's high-time it stopped!" While I'm not sure what you mean by open-source, I'll go over both possible explanations (since you're ambiguous about it). Free software has actually been given out by Microsoft (remember Internet Explorer? Netmeeting? Messenger?) and Microsoft recognizes and even links to many sites that promote Windows freeware. I think companies like Apple and Microsoft that deal in decidedly pay-for software recognize the value of free software in promoting their operating system and would never want the practice to stop. As for open-source software, Apple has supported it. IBM has supported it. The DVD consortium is not against it. The NSA is not against it. Wal-Mart is not against it. There's not a coordinated attack against open-source software and to say it is so is to not understand the nature of the legal battles that involve potential OS/free software concepts.
I don't think the law idea is necessarily a bad one. I do think trying to characterize it as a champion of OS/free software is. I will also point out that the open-source community model is a software model and does not always translate into other professions. Law is practiced by registered lawyers for a reason, because there are many intricacies to law that need to be studied to be understood (IANAL). While a community of free lawyers may be a great idea, considering the incredible time-commitment it takes to become a lawyer and the decidedly puny return on pro bono services, I don't see it as a profession you're going to get the world's best and brightest in. Lawyers do not have the mentality of programmers.
And while we're on the topic of open-source models, I use open-source software and I support it, too, but I do not live an open-source life. I do not give people permission to reproduce and change my ideas. I do not give a community the group right to tinker with my car. I do not want an open-source model managing my electric utilities or my sewage or my education. I think open-source ideas have their place, and I think they rightly belong in information services, like programming, writing, and support, but I don't necessarily think they extend into everything.
Sometimes, I don't like computers to cross into real life, and the paranoid comments that prompted this reply highlight a fear of mine that that is exactly what's happening.
Re:Why patents? (Score:1)
correction... (Score:1)
wouldn't that be:
17'5 411 4B0U7 7H3 53C0ND 4M3NDm3N7!
Re:Open-source Paranoia (Score:2)
No they're not necessarily against open-source per se but they ARE against what it stands for. In their view, OSS and free-market principles are not reconcilable. It's not the truth, but tell that to their lawyers.
My view is this: OSS is a bit too close to communism for the comfort of most old-school capitalists. The ones control the large corporations, and the money...
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This was born on slashdot (Score:2)
I've also been in touch with Robin Gross from the EFF, who has indicated that she would like to participate in the forum. I hope that we can create a high quality combination of legal and technical input.
This step is just the start, I hope. I would like to encourage people to participate in this. I think it would be a good goal to file an 'amicus' brief to each of the DVD cases that is written using open source methods that represents the views of the open source community.
Lawyers are different from engineers (Score:1)
An engineer is used to changing the universe to solve a problem. If the computer can't handle the interrupts fast enough, change the number of interupts, and change their significance. This type of thinking It can also be useful in law. You can change the legal theory to fit the case. By viewing the facts in a different light, you can include a contract claim in a discrimination case.
this is why i still belive in the internet (Score:1)
i am reminded of those movies about the civil rights movement where a young law student from new york goes down to mississippi to defend a wrongly accused black man. only this time, instead of the student and the drunken public defender, we have hundreds of people throwing coal on the proverbial fire to liberate the rightous.
maybe it won't turn out quite like that, but the idea is still there. i hope the founders of that project have enough technical knowledge to build a forum where this can actually work without turning into a flamewar or something. might i recomend a little perl hack called slash?
Beggar's can't be choosers (Score:1)
Besides, it's not as if there's a multi-million dollar pool with which to hire expensive lawyers. The EFF will be stretched to its limits. If this is the only help some Doe gets in his case, then it could make a big difference.
I know! (Score:1)
1. Mail check for money you *would* have spent on the movie to EFF or similar organization.
2. Drive to the library instead of the theatre, and read to your hearts content!
Judge is not a compiler! (Score:1)
It's always good to have a few extra sets of eyes on legal briefs. An extra set of eyes, can add a new view on an old arguement. Or maybe a new plan of attack.
Free Software != "Freeware" (Score:2)
--
Re:Open-source Paranoia (Score:2)
Yes. It's easy to paint this form of "sharing" as communism. Particularly if you forget that copyright is a government-granted monopoly. The market for OSS is a much more free market than the market for closed-source software. But many people associate capitalism with corporatism and government favours for large businesses, which is not free market economics.
Re:This would be greatly appreciated (Score:1)
Re:Non-lawyers needed to generate evidence (Score:1)
Re:OpenLaw vs OpenSource (Score:1)
Re:Even better ... (Score:2)
Just because something is illegal does not make it immoral. Nor is the reverse true.
We would like them to be equivalent, but differences of opinion over morality will prevent that.
Re:Lawyers say NO WAY because (Score:1)
b) Good - common law is often ambiguous.
c) The US constitution is full of ideology.
d) Commercial software licenses are more widely abused.
e) How is this relevant?
f) I don't understand what this means.
Litigation may seem to be an insurmountable problem. So did writing a free Unix clone.
Direct Democracy (Score:2)
And then there is the primary. You think the person with the most votes wins, right? Wrong! Delegates from each state can throw the popular vote any way they choose. For example, let's say you voted for John McCain in the New Hampshire primary, and indeed McCain won New Hampshire. But the good ol' boys in the Republican convention may be in a George W. Bush mood, which is more than likely. They may very well say, "New Hampshire casts all of its votes to Bush." The delegates can do that!
Okay, so now your guy won the primaries and is in the general election. Hey, he or she wins! Nope, not quite. There's a little known group called the "electoral college" that can do whatever they want, and _legally_. Just as with the delegates in the primary, they can decide the people are off their collective rocker and then elect THE OTHER GUY!
Okay, well what about laws. Did you think that the president makes the laws? Nope. He or she can do nothing but veto a law, providing less than 2/3rds of the congress voted for it. Laws are passed by the congress, a relatively small group of people.
So, you want UCITA to be rejected? Where can you go and vote against it? NOWHERE. You have to vote for someone to get into congress first, and then maybe they'll vote against it. But good luck there. It could take 6 years to get a new person into office. By then UCITA could be law.
"But, can't I vote on a ballot for or against a law?" NOT FOR FEDERAL LAWS! This can only be done for _some_ state laws. First you need to get it on the ballot: not an easy task. Then, even if it passes, the state legislature can nullify it the next day. This happened in my state, where the legislature passed a seatbelt law. The _people_ said no and voted to remove it via ballot. Well, I guess we didn't know what we wanted, at least according to the legislature, because right after the _people_ shot the law down, the legislature VOTED IT RIGHT BACK IN AGAIN!
It's frustrating, because the only way a person can support or oppose a law is to vote for a representative that feels the same way. BUT THE REPRESENTATIVE MAY VOTE AGAINST YOUR IDEALS ON EVERY OTHER ISSUE.
Much of the way the U.S. government works is due the difficulties in communication and travel when the U.S. was established in the 18th century. It would be pretty pathetic trying to get everyone in the country to mail in a vote on every issue when the letter could take a few weeks to get across the country. It was therefore considered more pragmatic to have representatives at every step in the process.
The communications or information age should change all this, however. The speed at which people can now educate themselves and share ideas cannot be compared to the way things were in great grandpa's days.
I hope that computers will put an end to the delegate and electoral college system, and even the representative system. And I hope people can be trusted with the responsibility of direct democracy. But that's another issue.
Jeff
This sort of thing has cropped up before. And it has always been due to human error.
Re:suggestion (Score:3)
We are (not) poor (Score:1)
There are benefits for all:
We get the legal representation we need but can not "afford".
The law firms get substantial savings on their technical infrastructure
The law firms get a robust, stable platform on which to run their businesses
Linux use grows that much more.
Both sides will develop a better understanding of each other.
Everybody wins.
Re:Law Is Not Source Code (Score:1)
But what is really important, and what this forum can help with , is finding the right path for the law. There are decisions made every day, usually by clueless, technologically illiterate ludites, that will resonate for generations. Isn't it important that the broadest possible set of minds apply their reasoning faculties to the project?
Believe me - most briefs, and most judges' opinions are written by law students or recent graduate clerks. Most of them are lazy, and no few are stupid. A lot less thought than you think goes into the decisions that will govern our lives.
The old joke when I was in law school was that law is like sausages - if you want to stomache either one, don't find out how it is made.
Here's a chance to change the recipe.
The other thing a legal forum could do ... (Score:2)
Perhaps somebody could put together a legal howto. How to keep your copyright enforceable. How to react to threatening letters. And if it comes to it, how to defend yourself in court. Sure, reading a howto is no substitute for years of legal training, but it's better than nothing.
Yes, but no (Score:2)
There is one market that openlaw forums could address quite well: those silly cdroms of do-it-yourself legal briefs that you buy and fill in the blanks and use. While it's true that it's impossible to foresee how new judges will react to new arguments in new proceedings, some things have been filed and refiled to death and it's silly to pay a lawyer to reinvent the wheel with them.
And you overstate the dissimilarity between source code and law in another fashion: like with new judges in new situations, established source code can break in new environments and hardware configurations. Just as the user will make a bug report and tell the author that the code doesn't always work in a given situation, so will the would-be lawyer when his argument falls on its face. And while code is more reproduceable than is law, any coder will also be quick to tell you that bugs often seem to appear and disappear with the phase of the moon.
With that said, I have to smirk at what coding would look like if it functioned in the same way that law does in one respect: all those disclaimers about how "I am not a lawyer". Can you imagine what source code would look like if it were sprinkled with comments asserting "This may look like code, and if you try to compile it it might actually work, but I am not a programmer and this is not code."? Feel free to insert a wisecrack about Microsoft here.
Correction on Free Software Definition and Impact (Score:1)
Remember that the free in free software is not the same as free beer. Microsoft did not make available any means to freely muck with the software they distributed. You have to use it exactly as the EULA stipulates, which does not include modifying the behavior nor redistributing it in any form. Thus, those apps are not free software; they just don't cost money to use.
They couldn't just tinker with it. Someone might release a new version of the fuel injection driver. Car afficianados would check it out, test it, and modify it more. If you so wanted, you could surf to a site that distributed new patches and pick the one for you:
Whatever you wanted, but you have choices, and that is the point of free software. With Internet Explorer, what are your choices? Yes or no, that's it. Not much of a selection.
Same thing here. Suppose all of the California utilities use the same base of free software for running their plants. People "in the know" tinker with the development -- not production -- versions to improve performance, lower prices, etc. Some plants test it early under more restrained conditions and find that they can save 1 cent per kWh on electricity production. Ask any utility company if they'd implement such a change that still maintained safety levels and what do you think the answer would be? Yeah, I thought so.
Keep in mind that if Bob has the ability to modify the source for a particular program, it doesn't mean that the binaries on my machine will be affected. I have to actively choose to pick up those changes.
Now skip forward two or three years. People are used to frequent enhancements being made to their apps, but it starts to get difficult for Joe Consumer to benefit. Someone will start a company to provide a hands-free home package that continuously and automatically adds updates to their system. The system provides all the basics: web, mail, personal financing, security, yada yada yada.
It's this model that I drool over. I haven't taken the time to delve into Linux. I've installed it, gotten most everything working, etc. However, I am sure that it's not at all secure. I'd bet any newbie hacker could get on it, grab the root password, and launch whatever attack they liked from it.
I don't like that, but do I have time to read all the CERT advisories and grab all the latest patches to make it more secure? No, and I'd rather play Quake anyway. But I'd love to be able to trust someone else to do that for me at a reasonable price.
I'd also bet there are millions of consumers that want the same thing. They don't want to install anything. They want a functional internet terminal that can play games and balance their checkbook.
- PatientZero
Apple's fluctuating profitability. (Score:2)
It has been known not to for several years in a row. Of course Red Hat makes consistent losses right now, but Apple probably did this at the start, too.
Re:This is not a stupid idea, *except* . . . (Score:2)
It would keep people informed and keep the lawyers from making technical mistakes. It might also generate more pro-bono lawyers because it is a chance to become known to the rich sillion valley types and gain some techno-law-savey. This is exactly the kind of project we want our future politicians to brag about having been a part of when they graduated from law school.
Re:suggestion (Score:2)
Re:suggestion (Score:1)
Re:correction... (Score:2)
17'5 411 480u7 7#3 53c0nD 4m3ndM3n7...
-or perhaps-
17'5 411 480u7 7#3 53c0|\|D 4|V|3|\|dIVI3I\I7...
Or something even more ridiculous...
That's not even worth 2 cents... Sorry.
Re:Why patents? (Score:2)
I think on of the versions of the OPL dose this, but it is also worth pointing out that you could possibly pay for a whole research institute with patent revinues. The institution would be a non-profit orginisation which was obligated to compramise between money and morals.
A still better idea is to get the NSF to say "universities and existing research institutes should attempt to take some minimal responcibility for who they let use their patents" and get a law passed which says "the courts can grant these institutions the right to deny the party who paid for the research the right to use the patent if it's use is questionable enough." This means that envoromentalists or OSSers can protest at the university (and/or get a judge to file a motion regarding the questionablness of the use of the patent) instead of protesting the company. This could be really effective for the enviromentalists (preventing things like terminator genes) and OSSers, i.e. it is an opertunity for a coallition which we should seriously investigate. Plus, once the nuts at green peace are earning a reputation for blugening corps with patents there will probable be a lot fewer people with money who want to increase the duration of patents.
It might also be a good idea to fight for some sort of patent "financial equality act" which basically says that you can be sued for patent abuse, but that limited finacial resources for an effective patent search will be taken into account if you are just some Joe OSS developer, i.e. we are allowed to do nasty things with patents, but the big corps are not. This could be sold as an "aww.. look at all the pore small buisnesses which have been strangled bill."
We could get honest free traders to support these things.. and maybe even the WTO (as labor and enviromentalists keep puttingthe presure on them).
Jeff
Help Fight Direct Democracy (Score:2)
There's a level of inefficiency built into the system specifically to avoid straight-up vote over issues, and specifically to avoid democracy. Think for a second about what you are suggesting. Consider what votes you'd get for the following issues:
- What is the official American OS? (Windows/Mac/Linux/Be)
- How much taxes should people pay? (twice as much as now/same as now/nobody should pay any taxes)
- Should Microsoft be allowed to innovate and help consumers by standardizing the world on its products? (Yes, they have that right/No, they should not be allowed to help consumers if it hurts Sun)
Beginning to get the picture? Direct democracy is basically an open invitation to pure Politics As Spin, and it is very likely that you'd be the first against the wall, you slashdot reader hacker criminal type youThe problem is, it's well accepted that larger factions _will_ stomp all over smaller factions given the slightest opportunity. That's the way it's always been, and certainly watching the tech industry does _not_ suggest that this tendency has changed with the increase in technology we've seen.
The question you need to ask is, exactly how do you keep all littler factions from being taken out and shot? That's basically what happens as soon as you start attempting to use pure democracy. For instance, in pure democracy applied to the computer industry, this very website is grossly undeserving of any support or 'mindshare'. It isn't about windows- it wastes huge amounts of resources, periodically slashdots other sites and eats bandwidth and offers _nothing_ to support Windows, which clearly has the numbers. Now, if Windows users mostly _want_ Slashdot that would be a different story, but under direct democracy there is no room for the concept of 'Loyal Opposition' much less underground or radical factions. It's a powerful homogenizing force that only begins to really kick in when people sense that they have the power to use this 'direct democracy'.
It's not merely the 'Bread And Circuses' problem, it is worse because you get factions seemingly 'competing' in much the same way that the largely unregulated computer industry has been 'competing': playing dirty as hell, and winner-take-all. If you think having the RIAA and MPAA around treading on your rights is a problem, imagine what happens when The People get to vote on these issues! These associations have media resources that would blow your mind, and sure as 'hacker' is spun to sound like a terrorist, you'll get the issues presented in such a way that Orwell would drill through his grave, and The People will cheerfully vote to have to taken out and shot if you reverse engineer software programs. Hell, I could see _programming_ _itself_ made illegal for the unlicensed, given the right spin- such as these DOS attacks, or some credit-card-oriented spin.
You don't know how lucky you are to live in a system where any particular faction is basically tied up in red tape. If you want to see what direct democracy looks like, look at Microsoft in the tech industry, and imagine them without the DoJ or any government. The trouble is you can't expect people to take an interest in everything: at least the representatives can be expected to read 4000 page bills and the like, as that is their job. You cannot expect the general public to read 4000 page bills before voting on them, so the vote becomes pure armwrestling over how things are phrased and spun. That's not really democracy because people are being fooled...
But what about the opposing lawyers? (Score:3)
I think this is a great idea, but I'm wondering about this aspect. How do you keep your best arguments a secret? Or do you just hope that they're so good, it doesn't matter WHO knows them?
----
Where? (Score:1)
Re:Correction on Free Software Definition and Impa (Score:2)
You have to make an effort but Linux can be pretty much as secure as OpenBSD. It's just usually shipped in a wide-open state.
If you can't figure out how to mail me, don't.
Re:Correction on Free Software Definition and Impa (Score:2)
The other is not so obvious, but even more important: the source distributed with OpenBSD has undergone an extensive (years long) line by line security audit. Bugs that were fixed in OpenBSD two years ago and posted to various advisories lists are still turning up in Linux (and Free/NetBSD, and even proprietary Unix variants) to this day.
In addition, even given that a Linux distribution which has been audited to the degree that OpenBSD has (btw, there isn't one) is shipped in a secure-by-default (which I don't know of either...) state, this does not imply security. Security is a process which transcends a particular software installation (as the thousands of dumpster-diving and social engineering tales make clear).
There is a tradeoff, however, between security and usability. Most Linux newbies (or anything else newbies for that matter) don't want to be told that they have to reconfigure 10 security settings to easily reset the permissions on their sound card. People run X as root. People, for some reason, like to run anonymous ftp servers. And so on. The distro that strikes a balance between ease of use and default security will go a long way towards widespread adoption.
Already common law? (Score:2)
This digital millenium copyright act garbage really needs a good jury nullification, though. Now THAT would be quick.
Anyhow, I don't think a whole lot of unskilled but enthusiastic eyes are going to find anything worthwhile.
-Billy
Re:Why patents? (Score:2)
It is too costly to try and use patents similarly, and it's not an analogous case (which is why you sense it isn't as elegant). Instead of advocating a free method of permanently making works free to all who will treat them a certain way, you are advocating a staggeringly expensive method of confining works within restrictions that can only be overcome through agreements. Your end result is not a large body of work that is copyright a particular way, it is a large body of work with significant legal entanglements for the industry, easily abused by people in moments of annoyance or through prejudice.
It's sort of like this. The GPL does not concern itself with the motives of its users, only with their interaction with itself. A developer can be the most proprietary, patent-seizing bugger in the world, but he can still use GPLed work all he likes as long as he upholds its requirements. Now, in this patent proposal, how many people are advocating that the portfolio be used as a weapon and withheld from all those who will not share their patents with us? How many people want the portfolio withheld from Microsoft, from Unisys, from other 'enemies'? Isn't the whole point of a patent portfolio to selectively withhold it from others in order to make them do what you want?
This is the key difference between an opensource patent portfolio and the GPL, and why I adamantly oppose the accumulating of any such portfolio. GPLed works are available by default, and only your refusal to comply with the terms denies you access to them. Patents are unavailable by default, and only coming to an agreement with the patent holder entitles you to them. Even without the cost, even without the many people wanting to punish others in the industry, I still could not tolerate this proposal, because it does not diminish the problem of patents at all. It only furthers it and brings new levels of politicking and trouble to the OSS community.
What I would like to see, instead, is a glaringly public Open Concepts website, not just for software developers but for general inventors to use. At this site you could write up everything you've invented, and have it hosted somewhere searchable where people can get at it, where the patent office can do searches through it, where it's out in the open. Such publication would be effectively public domain (or it could specifically be made public domain), so a good idea could be instantly seized on by individuals _and_ the monstro-corps- the distinction is that, if an idea is listed on this hypothetical site, it is a case of prior art and blocks any patents from being filed along those lines.
THAT is what I see as a useful reaction to patent hell. How do you expect to deal with chokingly restrictive intellectual property issues by making more of them? The only way is to establish a place, a method, where people can choose of their own free will to cooperate instead of hoard. Then, you have to make that method a block against other people abusing this freedom- with the GPL, this is done by copyright, and requiring the license to be propagated, and in so doing, you prevent someone from grabbing all the code and making it proprietary again. With this public domain site proposal, this is again done by using the rules against themselves- in this case, rather than having code being made proprietary, the behavior you want to block is of somebody taking the ideas and patenting them. By making the ideas formally public (in the scientific tradition, BTW), you are blocking anyone's ability to go and patent those ideas, yet as with the GPL, they are free to _use_ them as long as it's within the accepted restrictions. For the GPL, that means you can never un-GPL the thing as a third party and remove people's access to it. For this proposed PD storehouse, it means you can never patent an idea taken from the storehouse, and remove people's access to it.
I'm sorry, but your patent-portfolio entirely depends on arbitrarily removing people's access to it. I realise that many people feel removing the access for 'bad people' is a good thing, but I can't agree with that, and I strongly suggest that it will not have the results you want from it.
Re:opensource law? (Score:2)
Think of law as open source via a smaller bazaar than usual; more like the FreeBSD team than the Linux developers. There's a tighter grip on who can make a CVS commit (write and enact legislation) and who can submit patches (judge's precedents), but anyone has access to the law and, provided they go through the proper voting, running for office or law training, change it...
Re:Law Is Not Source Code (Score:2)
By the way, if the judge is one of the "clueless, technologically illiterate ludites", why will he or she be impressed by a brief filled with sparkling technical expertise?
Anyway, my point is I'm wondering if there is even a way that many Slashdot-like minds can EFFECTIVELY "apply their reasoning faculties to the project". I'm skeptical that legal parts of a case modularize for effective multiple contributions. Sure, a piece related to expert testimony, I can see that. But nobody tries to substitute an ideological tract for a kernel driver ("I tell you, who is to be master, man or machine? This *scuzzy* bus, this *slave* client, should accept its priority and not disrupt interrupts").
Re:Open-source Paranoia (Score:2)
Microsoft Internet Explorer is freeware - it doesn't cost you anything. But it only gives you the freedom of usage and redistribution - not modification, nor distribution of modified versions, which is requered for Free Software.
"considering the incredible time-commitment it takes to become a lawyer" - Then consider the amount of time it takes to become a good programmer. I, for example have learned programming for five years - and still only knows 9 out of possible hundreds or thousands of languages, and yet, there are the data structures and algorithms to learn, for each field of programming.
Not being able to help yourself or your neightbours is the worst sentence you could possibly get.
--The knowledge that you are an idiot, is what distinguishes you from one.
formal method? (Score:2)
Sometimes for some things there is no other way to do something then use reverse engineering. Most old and unattended cobol applications needed a little RE before their true nature was discovered.
I hope this works I have been getting a great many network reed errors or something (may be a little conspiracy)
Then let me clarify (Score:2)
My thinking on the matter is colored by a lot of reading on Watergate: representatives were placed in pretty intolerable positions at that time. Some represented deeply conservative constituencies which doggedly supported Nixon- yet gradually the representatives began to realise that Nixon had lied to them, lied to the people, committed crimes, and as impeachment grew closer and closer, they all ended up turning against Nixon, because they owed their constituencies not just their obedience, but their judgement. It was a tough call, causing many of them great anguish- they like you took representation seriously. But the bottom line was this: they knew that their own constituents had been lied to and misled, and they couldn't wait around for 'em to figure that out. They had to act based on the truth.
If it was a pure democracy, it is possible that Watergate could have ended in an expertly 'spun' poll or vote (The Nixon people spent millions in astroturf campaigns through fake organizations, even buying a fullpage Times advertisement under a false name) resulting in a criminal President who engaged in wiretapping, surveillance, and conspiracy to burglary and obstruction of justice... staying in office and continuing to do it. That's not OK.
By the same token, though it's hard to argue that politicians should be trusted, _somebody_ has to get the job of learning up on this stuff and deciding things. When you read history it might surprise you, sometimes, how our pols can sometimes rise above all the corruption and politicking and do what we'd want them to do- even eloquently, movingly.
Campaign reform, yes. Tie the hands of corporate pork barrel special interests, yes. Replace the pols with one big vote- no thank you. For all their faults the pols do that job better than one big vote ever could.
Re:Then let me clarify (Score:2)
"You shut up! Try running a state for a while instead of a small business and see how you like it!" (Robert Heinlein character in 'Magic, Inc.')
I mean it. There just ISN'T time. No sane person should expect that they can make sensible decisions on all the doings of government, individually. You have to delegate. It's stark raving madness to think you can micromanage U.S. government, and the whole concept of ever-more-direct-Democracy is essentially wanting to turn the country over to micromanagement on the assumption that this would work. Even _if_ the idea of simple majority was a smart one (and there are reasons why it can be an absolute curse), there is just no way 'the people of the U.S.' are able to educate themselves on what they would need to know. Nobody could, even the pols only get part of the way there, and they are (at least in theory) fulltime employed at it. If you want government to improve, figure out how to get the pols to work harder and take more responsibility for their actions, don't just talk about giving the People a governmental 'remote'. "Click 'yes' to fight cyberterrorist acts"...
I guess when I get right down to it I'm saying this: the ONLY key difference between the pols and the People is that the pols get full-time to learn about the issues. The People don't _have_ the time to learn about the issues. They probably are experts on their own backyards, but nobody is giving them time to learn about Qatar and labor issues in Cleveland and UCITA and genetically engineered wheat and the implications of telecommuting on OSHA regulations and SSI Red Book incentives and the price of tea in Des Moines?
If the pols are so useless at this when it's all they do, what on earth gives you the idea that you can turn the decisions over to people who haven't even heard about half of these things? How would you make them listen, how are you going to force them to abandon every free hour they have and stay up extra late at night to be briefed on Somalia?
Yes, I'm getting 'debatey', but so are you. Really, isn't this a major concern?
Re:suggestion (Score:2)
Movie publishers gave me authority to descramble a movie on DVD for the sole purpose of viewing the movie at home. Some of them may explicitly state that I'm allowed to use authorized player only; others may not. It's enough to find ONE DVD that does not explicitly restricts my choice of player to argue that I have the authority to build and use (with this particular movie) my own player, and I can share its design with others. It will not be a "circumvention" as defined by DMCA.
OTOH suppose a game like Quake comes along with encrypted copyrighted non-distributable (hi NP guy) maps, and the license explicitly states that you can use these maps within context of this game only. Then decrypting a map would be an act of "circumvention" as defined, as there are no non-infringing uses for that.
No "moderate this down" this time.
--
Re:suggestion (Score:2)
Re:suggestion (Score:2)
Collective drafting (Score:2)
--
New intellectual property laws are needed (Score:2)
Intellectual property, on the other hand, is rahter fuzzy and slippery. People may agree on some basic concepts, but very soon there will start appearing exceptions and side issues and ramifications that weren't thought out. It's very hard to get from basic principles to details in intellectual property law for two reasons:
1) Intellectual property isn't so well correlated to physical possession. You may buy a book, the book is yours, but the content is mine, etc.
2) Intellectual property can be duplicated. If I own a tract of land, I can't copy it, if I own a book I can.
Therefore, I think we need some differentiation between material and intellectual property in the law. It's easy to say they are exactly the same in principle, just say "pirating software is exactly like stealing", but saying it doesn't make it true. At least, not in the practical sense.
Unenforceable laws should be avoided, because they create a general disrespect for the law. It's like the alcohol prohibition that some countries tried in the early 20th century. Those laws had only one effect: they created a widespread corruption among the police officers and a lot of admiration and tolerance for gangsters among the general public. The intellectual property laws as they stand now, will only create a cracker worship mentality among the people.
From the /. moderator guidelines: If you can't be deep, be funny
Re:This is not a stupid idea, *except* . . . (Score:2)
I can tell you that the technical perspective is something that many lawyers including Tech and IP lawyers are lacking. The help that many of the people here could offer could be quite powerful. Let me offer an example.
I was talking with my father's girlfriend, an IP Lawyer, Pre-law at Michigan, Law from Harvard Law, who works with universities on how to structure joint research IP licensees. She asked me what "This whole DeCSS thing was about?" and "Wasn't it great that the MPAA went after pirates so quickly?" I went on to inform her what the DeCSS really did, and didn't do. She was shocked. It lead to a larger discussion over the application of free speech to source code (An idea I read about in a Slashdot thread.) She thought the idea was a "brilliant way to look at the problem and presented a real challenge to the application of patents to source code."
How much better if these people could benefit from the good arguments Slashdot can generate on the very cases they are trying to try.
Now the only problem is her understanding "Natalie Portman petrified in Hot Grits"
Nat Custer
For Law, Is Cathedral Better than Bazaar? (Score:2)
For law, code readings are silly. It is not true of the law that an argument either works or it doesn't, or that more code readings can be used to find "the best argument." Indeed, to the contrary, Brooks law may ultimately overtake a legal project, and squeeze it to death: too many cooks . . .
A brief is usually subjected to rigid page limitations, and must be delivered up subject to a rigid (and usually short-fuse) time deadline. This is not the stuff for which large numbers of hobbyist contributors can be useful. Where legal research must be complete, it must be COMPREHENSIVE, and where it needn't be complete, it needn't be deep at all.
More important, the twenty pages of a legal brief must persuade. Advocacy is quite different from merely "getting it right." There is never room in twenty pages to give a complete and comprehensive analysis of everything relevant -- but twenty pages is the space in which you must give ALL the analysis of everything important. You must pick your BEST shots, focus on your BEST issues, and present them in their BEST light. Then, one must find the theme, the overall single "gist" of the argument, and weave those arguments therein, so that the judge or judges reading the brief are drawn in and buy into the rest of the story.
This is the kind of stuff for which one mind works better than two, at least after the brainstorming. Sure, it is helpful to have a few more eyes passing over a work to help cite-check and proofread the brief. Sure, it is helpful to have many people providing access to the obscure "home-run" cases when you can find them, if they can find them. But ultimately, someone needs to sift through these myriad claims of genius "finds," to determine their merits and relative weight.
In law, it is the FOCUS and HONING of an argument, not merely a comprehensive analysis, that wins the day. In my view, the Brooks law communications may well quickly defeat the possibility that a brief can be improved by an open law analysis.
At the end of the day, debugging a brief is not a big deal. Cite-checking twenty pages of brief's cases isn't that hard. Fifty people doing it doesn't make it much better.
The economies of scale that make open source work just don't seem to fit into the world of legal research and briefing. I agree with Seth and others who manifest skepticism that OpenLaw is simply an attempt to leverage the hype and panache, without the real and meaningful benefits, of open source.
This is not to say that legal volunteerism is unimportant. To the contrary, it is essential. Better pro bono publico work may well be improved by a network of (a moderate number of) well-wired attorneys working together in smaller bits, but with a central cathedral focus. (It is also a wonderful opportunity to make pro bono work fun!) If this is openlaw, I'm all for it. But it still is just law in a cathedral, albeit with wires, and not in the bazaar.
You sorta missed the point. (Score:2)
My point is that computer geeks are rarely lawyers. I Am, as they say, Not a Lawyer. Nor are you, I'm willing to bet.
The answer to most legal questions is "ask a lawyer", not "ask Slashdot". Would you hire a programmer to write code? Hell, I wouldn't even hire most Slashdotters to write code -- and they know more about that than they do about the law.
Re:This is not a stupid idea, *except* . . . (Score:2)
I can tell you that the technical perspective is something that many lawyers including Tech and IP lawyers are lacking. The help that many of the people here could offer could be quite powerful.
Hmmm . . . From that perspective, it suddenly begins to make some sense. I'd taken the article to be proposing that we ask Slashdotters about the law, which would be nothing but a hindrance. It would be like asking lawyers about technical issues. But as you say, both groups need to be better acquainted with each other, and that's something we can probably help with.
Now the only problem is her understanding "Natalie Portman petrified in Hot Grits"
Re:This is not a stupid idea, *except* . . . (Score:2)
Some of the things that we, the non-lawyers can do for the lawyers are:
Re:suggestion (Score:2)
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Re:Direct Democracy (Score:2)
While that surely contributed to the representative system of democracy, it was hardly the only or even the main reason. Read the Federalist Papers some time. Federalist #10 [loc.gov] argues at some length that direct democracy on a large scale inevitably amounts to mob rule. James Madison would be horrified at the suggestion that inefficient communications channels are the only reason for representative democracy.
Re: whatever you mean by "better" laws (Score:2)
It is possible that I may have misread/overread what was written there and misunderstood your response, but I don't see how your remarks are in any way responsive to mine, or to the subject matter of the article.
Re:This would be greatly appreciated (Score:2)
In general I think academic lawyers would be more amenable to doing pro bono work for the Free Software community, as they Get It (TM) based on my interactions with them, whereas lawyers who do IP type stuff in the corporate communities are almost universally of the Not Getting It (TM) variety (I have filed patents before and come into contact with those sort of bozos).
Re:Law Is Not Source Code (Score:2)
If you think of it like source code, then it probably doesn't make a whole lot of sense. It is more like a collaborative groupware type facilitation of cooperation. Ultimately, I don't think briefs will be written by groups of people, but feedback on a webboard, open discussion bringing together techies and lawyers is bound to strengthen cases.
Moreover, in cases like the DVD/CSS issues, where multiple cases are currently ongoing in different venues, and more are bound to spring up, it seems fairly clear that a centralized point for discussion about the issues could be additively useful for lawyers in all of the involved cases.
I think if you keep in mind the real useful benefits that this sort of collaboration could provide, and keep away from a strict Open Source analogy, you'll see why it is a Good Thing.
Re:Open-source Paranoia (Score:2)
businesses, which is not free market economics.</i>
<br><br>
Indeed. It's nothing more than feudalism: Barons and serfs. Funny to see that nothing has really changed in a thousand years
<br><br>
I'm just hoping that the organizing potential of the internet will change the rules sufficiently to enable us finally to build our own castles so that we can at last compete on their terms. That's why I have great hopes for movements like Open Source, Open Law, and whatever comes out of www.cluetrain.org.
Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
Thought exists only as an abstraction
Re:But what about the opposing lawyers? (Score:2)
That is how the law is *supposed* to work, but rarely does in practice, because one side can usually afford more and/or better lawyers. This is surely the precise issue that efforts like OpenLaw are meant to address. Eyeballs. Bugs. Shallow.
Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
Thought exists only as an abstraction
Re: whatever you mean by "better" laws (Score:2)
"Warranty-related remedies" submission to OpenLaw (Score:2)
I'm not sure their discussion mechanism actually works; I don't see any items other than the ones the OpenLaw staff posted, and at one point I got the message Warning: Uninitialized variable or array index or property (phorum-collapse-general) in home/httpd/html/msdoj/discuss/read.php3 on line 271. So they need to do some debugging.