Clear and present danger

[merlyn]

I respectfully disagree, once again.

Having the DeCSS code posted on this site, when it has clearly been the source of large legal bills and site shutdowns, is a clear and present danger to the monestary.

Those of you who do not understand the phrase large legal bills resulting from innocent behavior have not seen the site about my ongoing criminal case. Please do so.

vroom cannot afford this. I barely was able to, and it's taken every cent I've made from every book I've published, and working 60 hour weeks on top of it.

I think the right action was taken. Immediately remove the node that could have caused serious damage to vroom's wallet, and possibly a fatal blow to the monestary. And if after reviewing the risks, vroom wants it back, he can put it back.

When you see a child with a hand on a hot stove, you remove it immediately. It doesn't matter that you're not the parent or the babysitter. You know that the action invites danger.

-- Randal L. Schwartz, Perl hacker

[tye]

No, the clear and present danger only comes after the cease-and-desist letter arrives and vroom decides to ignore it. Taking pre-emptive action just increases "our" "exposure".

        - tye (but my friends call me "Tye")

[strredwolf]

I must agree with tye here, not only with his opinion but in addition to what I've seen with many cases posted in the Usenet group news.admin.net-abuse.email (NANAE). Not until it's noticed by the other party should it be removed/censored/etc. (And I have to use legal terms here, folks, apologies about that.) A proactive, preventive stance can equally damage the monestary, by ruining it's perception with the public.

Besides, when the (proper) paper cease and decist comes in, the monestary can gather more support by subsituting it for the questionable node (This looks to be the current trend). Also, the paper document is much more authentic than a possibly spoofed e-mail. Anyone reading NANAE knows this, save for the dumb kooks.

While I sympathize with your legal difficuties, legal threats are just that: threats. The courts haven't recognized e-mail as a reliable transport of legal documents; only served documents and US Postal Mail (afaik) are authentic.

--
$Stalag99{"URL"}="http://stalag99.keenspace.com";

[sierrathedog04]

Merlyn is absolutely right, and those other folks are wrong.

MPAA is presumably going to argue copyright infringement. You do NOT have a right to violate someone else's copyright up until the time they notice it and ask you to stop. Indeed, by the time they notice it you could be liable for damages. Even if you take the offending text down immediately.

The benefits to posting controversial code in this instance are minimal. We all know where to find this code if we want to. Indeed, we can post it on our own web sites. If we don't post the code ourselves then there is no reason to demand that Vroom do so.