Thank you for this robust answer - I was just gearing up to write something similar when I came upon your retort.

As a Swede and a University of London LL.B. finalist, having followed this discussion for some time now, I have seriously questioned why people seem to think that Sweden would be more likely than the UK (a United States war ally) to extradite to the US. It is an absurd assumption.

There are areas of the law where there is presumed consent. They are 'desirable' activities so to speak. These include sports (particularly contact sports), the fact that you may get jostled on the underground in the morning on your way to work, etc.

Well, kind of. The actors wouldn't be off the hook if they did something that the photographers and other present would be liable for since you cannot consent to sex akin to BDSM (you cannot consent to bodily harm that isn't desirable ie contact sports/surgery): R v Brown (the Spanner Case): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R_v_Brown (this was a 1993 case in which homosexual men consentually engaged in BDSM were all sentenced).

In law school the above case is taught alongside (well it was at mine anyway) a 1996 case (after R v Brown), R v Wilson, in which a man used an iron poke to brand his wifes ass. The act was considered to be akin to tattoo and consent was a defence. The man was not held liable because it could not be established that this was 'undesirable' activity, and contrasted to R v Brown where in fact none of the men were 'hurt' per se. In R v Slingsby (1995) a man who fisted his wife whilst wearing a ring tore her vagina and she developed a blood infection and eventually died. Because this sexual act gave 'pleasure' and was consentual this was held to be a defence. (???)

There is a terrible discrepency in how the law is applied to heterosexual couples and how it is applied to homosexuals engaged in seemingly LESS culpable acts. There were demonstrations at Russell Square in London in the 90s when these cases were coming about.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Spanner
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consent_(criminal_law)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R_v_Brown

Wish I had mod points to mod you up. What is going on in this country?!

The reason for this is that it would have been too costly and time-consuming to bring an action against every last ISP in the UK. It sufficed to go after the six main ones because they hold 94% of the UK internet users, which I assume they felt was 'good enough'.

From the first line of the judgement:

Dramatico Entertainment Ltd v British Sky Broadcasting Ltd [2012] EWHC 268 (Ch)

Judgment

Arnold J.:
Introduction

1 The claimants are record companies claiming on their own behalf and in a representative capacity on behalf of the other members of BPI (British Recorded Music Industry) Ltd (“BPI”) and Phonographic Performance Ltd (“PPL”). The Defendants are the six main retail internet service providers (“ISPs”). Between them they have a fixed line market share of some 94 per cent of UK internet users. By this claim the claimants seek an injunction against the defendants pursuant to s.97A of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 (“the 1988 Act”), which implements art.8(3) of European Parliament and Council Directive 2001/29/EC of 22 May 2001 on the harmonisation of certain aspects of copyright and related rights in the information society (“the Information Societ

Rick Deckard will be relieved to discover that people seem to have forgotten that his sheep wasn't real!

Either full independence, or atleast lets introduce a federal system here. The current system where Westminster has devolved powers to the Scottish Parliament (and the Welsh Assembly and the NI Assembly) is unmanageable for several reasons.

I think the most important one must be that Westminster can at will take back all of those powers (and has! Northern Ireland (Emergency Provisions) Act 1978 and then again in 1991. I think they only got back to full devolution in May of 2007). Another is the Westlothian question where there has become an assymetry of polities due to the assymetrical nature of the UK devolution. English MPs cannot vote in the Scottish Parliament on matters regarding Scotland (which makes perfect sense), but Welsh, Irish and Scottish MPs can vote on matters which affect only England in Westminster. Since creating an English Parliament would be overly costly (and where are we going to get a new cohort of politicians, and how will we mobilise an already lack-lustre voting population to vote in yet another election?), I think writing a constitution and creating a federal system somewhere along the lines of the American system would be a good idea. And introduce a constitutional court perhaps! And start a serious investigation into the problems facing us for a future codification of laws.

I'm not an IP lawyer, but I think this judgment makes sense.
To use an analogy, they cannot be any more guilty than the post-office is when somebody posts scheduled substances in the mail.
Legally (and again this isn't my area), usually when a third party (like the post office, or an ISP) transports something, for the duration of time that they are in possession they are 'merely custodians' or bailiffs. They have no responsibility themselves for the contents.

It would also be, as the BBC article points out, terribly unjust to impose upon them such liability when their only recourse is to terminate the contract with the end user. Courts like business (almost as much as they like consumers). They wouldn't uphold that and certainly wouldn't set such precedent.

I don't know about the US, but not in the UK. I would assume not in the US.
On the other hand, if you and I were to talk about visiting those sites, that would be conspiracy, and that would be a crime!

It's a funny one.

Last week we had an American guy come in and give us a two hour lecture on the topic of Tort. I was surprised when he said that in the US you don't have a tutorial system (true?).

The way undergraduate uni is taught here (UK) is that you get issued about 2-3 hours of reading for the lecture, and then you attend it. Then you get issued more reading + questions and a week later you meet in your allocated tutorial group (10-15 students + lecturer/someone from the dept that is in charge of taking the tutorials for that course) for an hour and discuss the questions. So there are essentially three stages to it. I think it works quite well. I have found that particularly having done reading before the lecture makes you able to take in a lot more since you already have an idea of what is going on, and then the tutorials solidify the material and gives you a deeper understanding. Another pro is that I really don't take very much notes during the lectures since a) i already have notes from my readings, so i just scribble additions to those where necessary and b) i'll have to write more notes for the tutorial, so its more helpful to have paid attention in the lecture than to have tried to take notes furiously for two hours.

I think that the main point of his argument was not to offend anyone but to establish the defenses to copyright infringement, as evidence by his concluding statement: "It is a complete defense in the US though, to prove you never saw the original.". There will be a legal test to determine whether or not you are guilty and never having seen it accomplishes that, hence a complete defense.

I couldn't find a case concerning Monopoly in general but here is one by Hasbro on copyright infringement for Play-Doh that is good law (precedent), on which the facts seem similar enough to apply.

Status: Positive or Neutral Judicial Treatment Positive or Neutral Judicial Treatment
*474 Hasbro Inc, Hasbro SA and Hasbro UK Ltd v 123 Nahrmittel GmbH and Marketing & Promotional Services Ltd

High Court of Justice, Chancery Division (England and Wales)

11 February 2011
[2011] EWHC 199 (Ch)
[2011] E.T.M.R. 25

Floyd J. :

February 11, 2011

Confusion; Declarations of invalidity; Descriptive names; Honest practices; Infringement; Passing off; Revocation; Trade marks

H1 Community and national trade marks—PLAY-DOH (Classes 16, 25, 28—toys and modelling compositions)—Use by competitor of strap line “The edible play dough”—Action for trade mark infringement and passing off—Counterclaim for declaration of invalidity and revocation—Mark held validly registered—Counterclaims rejected—Infringement found—Whether defence of honest commercial use—Defence dismissed.

H2 The claimant companies, which made and sold among other products a children’s pre-mixed modelling composition, marketed that product under the trade mark PLAY-DOH for which the first claimant was the registered proprietor of one Community trade mark in Classes 16, 25 and 28 and two United Kingdom trade marks, dating back to 1970 and 1986 respectively, for goods in Class 16. The first defendant manufactured abroad, and sold in the United Kingdom, a powdered dough mix under the name YUMMY DOUGH. The YUMMY DOUGH product was promoted in the United Kingdom as “The edible play dough”, these words being printed in a single strap line across the bottom of the packet (illustrated in the judgment). In addition to the strap line, the words “PLAY DOUGH MIX” appeared in the top left-hand corner of the YUMMY DOUGH packet and the words “COLOURED EDIBLE PLAY DOUGH MIX” appeared in a smaller type size than that of the strap line on the side of the packet.

H3 Alleging that the defendants’ importation and sale of its YUMMY DOUGH in packaging that alluded to their own PLAY-DOH trade mark constituted an infringement of the rights in their mark, the claimants commenced infringement proceedings against the defendant. Following an application for interim injunctive relief a consent order was made in which each of the defendants gave temporary undertakings “not to undertake any material re-brand prior to judgment or further order in this action ”. The undertakings were very wide and, if they were to be made permanent at trial, their effect would be to freeze the defendants’ marketing of YUMMY DOUGH within very tight constraints in perpetuity. *475

H4 At trial, the claimants’ case rested on two separate bases: (i) infringement of each of their registered trade marks; (ii) passing off, this claim being based on the goodwill which the claimants maintained that they had acquired through use of the PLAY-DOH mark in the United Kingdom. The defendants counterclaimed for: (i) a declaration that the claimants’ registered trade marks had been invalidly registered because they lacked distinctiveness or were descriptive, and (ii) revocation of the claimants’ registered trade marks on the basis that the words “play dough” had become a common term in the trade for the products in question or on account of the claimants’ inactivity. The defendants also raised a defence to the action for trade mark infringement that their use of the signs complained of was an indication of the kind of goods they sold and that such use was in accordance with honest practices in industrial commercial matters under art.6 of the Trade Mark Directive .

H5 Held , by the High Court, that the claimants’ trade marks were valid and that they had been infringed.

I would have to disagree with you and agree with eln, the only pre-requisite as far as how many times it has happened to amount to a tortious claim in harassment is that it has happened more than once one more than one occasion. To give you an example, if your girlfriend dumps you and you call her all afternoon, that does not constitute harassment: you would have to do it again the next day.

You would have no recourse in the criminal law, the calls would have to amount to a battery arising from an immediate apprehension of fear of physical violence (subjective). Civil litigation would be the way to go and the test is set out for you above.

Just to set you straight on point 3, in the United Kingdom self-defense is a complete defense (even to homicide) as long as it's (subjectively) proportionate. There is no such thing as a 'requirement to retreat from an altercation' - that being said though if you choose not to walk away from something and wind up hurting the other person without a justificatory defense you will risk engaging the criminal law, just as anyone else would in any other situation.

Also.. your premise assumes that all law abiding citizens have been 'dis-armed' and that all criminals are armed. It is possible that some heavy criminals have guns but not the ones that would bother with putting a private citizen in a position that he would need to defend himself (robbers etc).