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Which western countries are these? In all of Europe you can't be held responsible for someone else's child, although if you did contribute to their upbringing and only found out later you often can't recover that money either.

Do you have any stats for the causes of male suicide? Everything I can find that isn't an MRA blog only lists relationships as one of many causes, usually not the first in the unordered list, so I'm interested to know if this claim has any statistical basis.

If you read French, here is the statute. https://www.legifrance.gouv.fr...

https://www.ibdna.com/paternit... > I believe you told me before that you are too busy to red my citations, but here is the rationale.

"The reasons for which the Government said the ban should remain were related to the preservation of peace within French families. According to some online articles, Germany, has also banned (or plans to ban) paternity testing for similar reasons. French psychologists suggest that fatherhood is determined by society not by biology. For this reason, the President’s wife Carla Bruni describes her father as the man ‘from whom she takes her name’. She is friends with her biological dad too but she doesn’t refer to him, or think of him as, her father.

So the woman retains her money supply, the Child is raised by someone other than the father, and the guy who the wife fucked and got pregnant with is ruinning around, legally allowed to fuck any woman and father children that he never has to spend a cent for.

Who has the better deal? I don't know about you, but I don't think it is wise and proper to force men to pay for children their wives purposely have with other men? It is the law, enforceably by a year in priison if you don't raise your cuckhold children, so apparently a lot of people believe that.

Ah..... male privilege in it's highest form.

July 14 2016: "France will not extend the state of emergency imposed after last year's Islamist militant attacks in Paris in November beyond 26 July"

July 15 2016: "Terror attack kills scores in Nice, France"

July 16 2016: "France extends state of emergency"

'The declaration of a state of emergency empowers the prefect whose department is wholly or partly included in a constituency in Article 2:'

1. To prohibit the movement of people and vehicles in places and times fixed by decree;
2. To establish, by decree, areas of protection or security where the presence of individuals is regulated
3. To prohibit the stay in any part of the department to any person seeking to hinder in any way the action of the authorities

.. The Minister of the Interior may impose the house arrest, the place it determines, any person residing in the area set by the decree mentioned in Article 2 .. in any case, the arrest will have the effect of creating camps would be held the persons mentioned in the first paragraph

I. - The decree declaring or law extending the state of emergency may, by an express provision conferring on the administrative authorities mentioned in Article 8 the authority to order searches anywhere, including a home of day and night ..

II. - Minister of the Interior may take all measures to ensure the interruption of any online public communication service leading to the commission of acts of terrorism or glorifying.

.. The Minister of the Interior, for the entire territory is established the state of emergency, and the prefect, in the department may order the temporary closure of theaters, pubs and places of any meeting Nature in areas determined by the decree provided for in Article 2. ref google granslate

Chapter I of the French Intellectual Property Code, apparently. From a Google translation, it seems to state explicitly that the mere act of creation invokes copyright protection.

And in fact: http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/affichTexte.do?cidTexte=JORFTEXT000027678782

I don't know if he can write in English, but what is for sure, is that he can't read French. The decree only removes disconnection from people that didn't secure their lines, as per http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/affichCodeArticle.do;jsessionid=FCB2F144F0CB66EDF871AB7AD7F8932D.tpdjo14v_1?cidTexte=LEGITEXT000006069414&idArticle=LEGIARTI000022393991&dateTexte=29990101&categorieLien=cid though file-sharers still can be sentenced to be disconnected.

Let me quote from a blog post that paints an even darker picture than the original story I submitted on /.

DCRI summoned a Wikipedia volunteer in their offices on April 4th. This volunteer, which was one of those having access to the tools that allow the deletion of pages, was forced to delete the article while in the DCRI offices, on the understanding that he would have been held in custody and prosecuted if he did not comply. Under pressure, he had no other choice than to delete the article, despite explaining to the DCRI this is not how Wikipedia works. [...]

This volunteer had no link with that article, having never edited it and not even knowing of its existence before entering the DCRI offices. He was chosen and summoned because he was easily identifiable [...]

Can you imagine the pressure they put this volunteer through? Threatening him with five years of prison if he does not immediately comply and delete the article in the intelligence agency's offices? You think that doesn't matter?

So, why does France issue Driver's Licenses to people subject to epileptic seizures?

How are those people know that they are subject to this? Indeed, in its infinite wisdom, the French lawmakers preferred tio eliminate all items that may trigger such seizures in relatively safe environments.

I'd rather experience my first seizure in the comfort of my living room playing a video game, than in a car while driving along a tree lined-road with the sun flashing between those trees.

Copyright in France (which definitely is in the EU) is 70 years after death, 100 years is only for artists who died for France.
Source: http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/affichCode.do?idSectionTA=LEGISCTA000006161638&cidTexte=LEGITEXT000006069414&dateTexte=20120713

Well the US is not one of those places. People are pretty much free to quit one job and take another. Joining government might be harder.

In fact the only place I'm aware of an outright ban is France, where a three year waiting period must lapse before quitting government and joining the private sector. How one feeds himself and is family during this three years is not explained.

That's because the Wikipedia article provides an over-generalized incorrect summary (although, it does provide a direct link to the French law, so it was easy for me to find the problem -- so it's still better than most newspapers or traditional encyclopedias in that regard).

The 3-year ban only applies to the industry the government employee was supposed to be supervising/regulating, and even then, my own interpretation is incomplete, because it goes into much greater details than that, and provides for some caveats and exceptions.

AFAIK downloading (leech style) is not illegal in any western country

Well, I can't tell for other countries, but the law about that recently (2011-12-20) changed in France (if that's western enough for you).
For those interested and that can read French, it's article L122-5 of Code de la propriété intellectuelle, modified by law 2011-1898. There is no decree for that law yet.

Before, the author couldn't oppose "copies or reproductions strictly reserved for private use". Now, the author can't oppose "copies or reproductions made from a lawful source and strictly reserved for private use".

This happened shortly after (2011-10-04) the Court of Justice of the European Union reaffirmed that the receiver was not infringing in a case about satellite video streaming. (I have not the source from the CJEU, but from a law firm (in French)).

Aren't the citizens getting fined more than Corps?

Actually in France, fines for companies are 5 times bigger than fines for individuals.

Of course it's still unnoticeable for major companies (see : Total), but you have to take into account small businesses too.

The use of encryption in France has been free since the 2004 law for trust in the digital economy (ie, in IT, basically) per article 30 thereof, though it is not clear from the text whether or not downloading from a country other than France or making available for download such software as uses encryption for purposes other than authentification or verification of data integrity are freely allowed or not.

The Penal Code specifies that the punishment for refusing to provide or use a key requested by the authorities is three years in prison and €45,000, and that the punishment for refusing to do so "though providing or using the key could have avoided the commission of a crime or of a misdemeanour or limited the effects thereof" is five years in prison and €75,000 — which is even more scandalous, of course, since the judge could very rarely be entirely certain that gaining access to the encrypted data would have prevented the commission of a crime or of a misdemeanour when he doesn't know what that data is?

Does anyone know what became of those convicted in the UK under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act for not handing over their keys? Did they fight it all the way to the European Court of Human Rights? I reckon that the Court would likely declare punishment for non-provision of encryption keys requested by the authorities illegal in virtue of the right to maintain silent and not to incriminate oneself, which it upholds based on Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights (the right to a fair trial) in Heaney and McGuinness v. Ireland, 2000: "The Court, accordingly, finds that the security and public order concerns relied on by the Government cannot justify a provision which extinguishes the very essence of the applicants' rights to silence and against self-incrimination guaranteed by Article 6 1 of the Convention."

The use of encryption in France has been free since the 2004 law for trust in the digital economy (ie, in IT, basically) per article 30 thereof, though it is not clear from the text whether or not downloading from a country other than France or making available for download such software as uses encryption for purposes other than authentification or verification of data integrity are freely allowed or not.

The Penal Code specifies that the punishment for refusing to provide or use a key requested by the authorities is three years in prison and €45,000, and that the punishment for refusing to do so "though providing or using the key could have avoided the commission of a crime or of a misdemeanour or limited the effects thereof" is five years in prison and €75,000 — which is even more scandalous, of course, since the judge could very rarely be entirely certain that gaining access to the encrypted data would have prevented the commission of a crime or of a misdemeanour when he doesn't know what that data is?

Does anyone know what became of those convicted in the UK under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act for not handing over their keys? Did they fight it all the way to the European Court of Human Rights? I reckon that the Court would likely declare punishment for non-provision of encryption keys requested by the authorities illegal in virtue of the right to maintain silent and not to incriminate oneself, which it upholds based on Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights (the right to a fair trial) in Heaney and McGuinness v. Ireland, 2000: "The Court, accordingly, finds that the security and public order concerns relied on by the Government cannot justify a provision which extinguishes the very essence of the applicants' rights to silence and against self-incrimination guaranteed by Article 6 1 of the Convention."

Heh. The ARCEP (Autorité de régulation des communications électroniques et des postes) don't sound too impressed by the project:

On a purely preliminary basis, The authority notes that the concepts of “creation of contents” or “the contents of the services which they are providing” are not defined at all, which leaves to the people in charge of the conservation of the data the responsibility to define themselves the extent of the data they must preserve.

and

The Authority, in comparison with the list of the data envisaged by the 1st article, can only question on the usefulness of them. Indeed, certain data have little report or even none with the identification of the person having created contents.

http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/affichTexte.do;jsessionid=49FC1B694A51971CA4575B3FA1FFE32B.tpdjo12v_2?cidTexte=JORFTEXT000023646852&dateTexte=&oldAction=rechJO&categorieLien=id

There is a "Décret" which actually makes the 2004 law effective published on March 1, 2011 - apparently it is for real, and it is the internert companies response to this decree that triggered the news.

Decrét Text (French)

Yes . .thank you8 for helping me filling up the puzzle --
the law requiring data retnetion is actually from 2004 - -a "opinion" about the law is dated from 2008 - which led to the
required "Décret" to be published on March 1, 2011, as can be seem here:
Official Decrét text(french)
Google Translation

So, what made the news is that large internet services and companies such as Google et all. are in French Justice trying to invalidate the law alltogether(which I believe they will suceed in, since it is really clueless) - but the law is actually passed and getting ready to be effective in a 60 days or so.

The only problem here is that it is about the application decree (posted by an AC in this thread). The law was voted in 2004 (surprise surprise, Sarkozy was the minister of economy at that time).

The relevant portion of the decree is :

Les données mentionnées au II de l'article 6 de la loi du 21 juin 2004 susvisée, que les personnes sont tenues de conserver en vertu de cette disposition, sont les suivantes :
[...]
3 Pour les personnes mentionnées aux 1 et 2 du I du même article, les informations fournies lors de la souscription d'un contrat par un utilisateur ou lors de la création d'un compte :
[...]
g) Le mot de passe ainsi que les données permettant de le vérifier ou de le modifier, dans leur dernière version mise à jour ;

Translation :
The data mentioned in Section II of Article 6 of the Act of June 21, 2004 referred to above, that individuals are required to keep under this provision are as follows:
[...]
3 For the persons referred to in 1 and 2 of Article I of the same, the information given upon subscription of a contract by a user or when creating an account:
[...]
g) The password and the information needed to verify or change it, in their latest updated version;

The password AND data to verify it or change it.

Could people with better French than me please verify my understanding of what it says:

http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/affichTexte.do?cidTexte=JORFTEXT000023646852&dateTexte=&oldAction=rechJO&categorieLien=id

I wouldn't be surprised if they insist on the One True Baguette Recipe.

There you are.

Apparently so. Allow me to refresh your memory:

Your post confirmed my assertion.

Swastikas and perfectly legal in all but one nation,

Read. Read again. Read harder. You are wrong. While every single European country allows the swastika (or any Nazi propaganda) to be displayed for "educational" purposes by some definition or another, there are several countries which ban the swastika (or any Nazi propaganda) when there's the remotest possibility that it is being used to indicate the artist's/author's/speaker's support of Nazism.

Porn is completely legal in all first-world nations,

You have no idea what you're talking about. Ignoring child porn, there are many forms of consensual porn banned throughout the Western world. In the UK, the Criminal Justice Act 2008 bans all sorts of S&M. The Coroners and Justice Act 2009 makes it illegal to make a sexually explicit drawing (as opposed to a pseudo-photograph, which was already illegal) suggesting involvement of a human under 18.

the Terrorism Act of 2006 has nothing to do with the US,

I'm sorry, are we only allowed to talk about the US? There's so much coverage here of unreasonable laws passed by the US over the last decade I thought I'd pick somewhere else.

and assange - despite being an asshat whom I'd personally love to see in a pine box

Death as a punishment for speech? Are there any dictators you particularly admire, or do you go more on the uniform?

is alive and well and not facing any sort of sanctions

A country governed by rule of law rather than rule of men would have either shut up or issued a warrant detailing precisely what crimes it accuses Assange of. Instead it's issued warnings, threats, sabre-rattling and open "we're cowards, please share some of the burden of our unjustifiable action" letters to its allies to request cooperation on imposing criminal sanctions against Assange.

To round off, I hereby accuse Obama of raping me. What's that, all important news about Obama isn't being drowned out by my accusation?

From the cited ruling which discusses application of the EU ban on circumventing DRM:

Ces dispositions ne s'appliquent pas aux actes qui ne portent pas préjudice aux titulaires de droits et qui sont réalisés à des fins de sécurité informatique ou à des fins de recherche scientifique en cryptographie

Which roughly translates to:

These provisions do not apply to acts which do not interfere with rights-holders or to acts carried out for computer security purposes or for scientific research or cryptographic purposes.

So libaacs is legally 100% safe so long as it stays in those boundaries. (That EU law is unjust and should be contested.)

40bit legilsation was never enforced even by state authority neither the 128bit, they never get an application decree. They are undead law, the law passed trough the chambers but never get used become the government never write an application decree with all the practical implication of the law. In short the law exist but no authority will chase you if you trespass it. It's a weird but common situation.

The situation was clarified in the 2004 law on the digital economy.

The official law text ( gouv.fr = French government )
http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/html/actualite/actualite_legislative/decrets_application/2004-575.htm

Article 30
I. - L'utilisation des moyens de cryptologie est libre.

I. - The use of means of cryptology is free.

II. - La fourniture, le transfert depuis ou vers un Etat membre de la Communauté européenne, l'importation et l'exportation des moyens de cryptologie assurant exclusivement des fonctions d'authentification ou de contrôle d'intégrité sont libres.

II. - The supply, transfer to or from a member state of the European Community, import and export of means of cryptology carrying out only functions of Authentication or integrity check are free.

III. - La fourniture, le transfert depuis un Etat membre de la Communauté européenne ou l'importation d'un moyen de cryptologie n'assurant pas exclusivement des fonctions d'authentification ou de contrôle d'intégrité sont soumis à une déclaration préalable auprès du Premier ministre, sauf dans les cas prévus au b du présent III. Le fournisseur ou la personne procédant au transfert ou à l'importation tiennent à la disposition du Premier ministre une description des caractéristiques techniques de ce moyen de cryptologie, ainsi que le code source des logiciels utilisés. Un décret en Conseil d'Etat fixe :

III. - The supply, transfer from a Member State of the European Community or importation of an encryption function that does not ensure only authentication or integrity check are subject to prior declaration to the Prime Minister except in cases provided for in this b III. The provider or person making the transfer or importation give to the Prime Minister a description of the technical characteristics of this form of cryptography, and the source code of the software used. Etc.

There is no "Fair Use" in French law.

The relevant law, the "Code de la Propriété intellectuelle", governs all the exceptions to the author's rights. The default state is that the author retains all rights to his work, and any use of this work needs his authorization. Then the law adds a significant list of exemptions, which builds a system that functions in a way similar to the "Fair Use" system. But the relevant article describing the exceptions is more detailed than the fair use provisions. (Original article of the law, if you read French)

The provision the closest to what Google is doing is number 8 for the article (L122-5 of the CPI), which allows global reproduction for conservation and study by patrons for research or private use, but only if that service is provided by a library open to the public, a museum or an archival service, and the resulting work is only available on dedicated consultation terminals within the building, and only if this does not provide commercial or economic advantage to the entity providing the service. It does not state, however, that no compensation is required, only that the author may not prevent this to be done with works that have been divulged to the public.

But since Google doesn't qualify for this exemption, it means that the copies were unlawful. The only thing in question in this judgment is how much of a prejudice to the authors the use Google made was, and there the ruling is much more debatable.

I am not familiar with the laws of the other countries, but I'm a bit familiar with the laws of France.
What we are currently looking at is article 226-1 of the law texts.

Est puni d'un an d'emprisonnement et de 45000 euros d'amende le fait, au moyen d'un procédé quelconque, volontairement de porter atteinte à l'intimité de la vie privée d'autrui :
1 En captant, enregistrant ou transmettant, sans le consentement de leur auteur, des paroles prononcées à titre privé ou confidentiel ;
2 En fixant, enregistrant ou transmettant, sans le consentement de celle-ci, l'image d'une personne se trouvant dans un lieu privé.
Lorsque les actes mentionnés au présent article ont été accomplis au vu et au su des intéressés sans qu'ils s'y soient opposés, alors qu'ils étaient en mesure de le faire, le consentement de ceux-ci est présumé.

Basically, it says that you do not have the right to take pictures of people or transmitting them without their consent. Their consent is implicit if they have seen you while you were doing the act.
As I understand it, you can take pictures of people, as long as they do not oppose to it and it is not stealthly. However, you still do not have the right to transmit the pictures you have taken, because they do not have agreed to that, explicitely or implicitely.
As far as I know, there is only one loophole - under certain circumstances, the media do not have to abide to some of these rules because of another set of laws on the liberty to inform. But of course, I am not a lawyer.

Article 5 of the French 'Code de la Proprietre Intellectualle'?

And what about the 'Paysanne Amburte vs L'Etate (Loire-Dessus}1998?

These should surely be required reading for any slash-dotter who wants to comment on this radical move on the part of French Resistance?

Give me a day or so and I'll see if I can't dig up some translations of the above. But I'm sure you can read French like a native, so you can start checking here: http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/WAspad/ListeCodes

In France, they are also lock-in periods or opt-ou fees, but if they want to change the terms of the contract, basically you can walk away with no penalty or they have to keep the previous terms (article L. 121-84 of "code de la consommation").

Instead of commenting on stuff based on press reports written by clueless journalists and possibly driven by biased comments from the industry, you should probably read the law, the amendments and the debates:

http://www.assemblee-nationale.fr/12/dossiers/0312 06.asp

The law is essentially a patch on the IP code, which you will find there:

http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/

Of course, this needs a working knowledge of French.

Some information in English is available here:
http://eucd.info/index.php?English-readers

This is a massively complex topic, with lots of politicking, negociating and backhanded tricks. Sorry, but you cannot possibly make a meaningful comment on the issue unless you have followed it a bit.

To me, most of the comments here sound as clueless as if some French guy had commented that the Democrats had rushed Bush to go to war in Iraq.

As a french I'm interested in the details. Do you have links on Legifrance?

You are misleading.
There is a national identity card and there has been one since 1955, it juste isnt obligatory. It is obligatory to establish (?) your identity to a police officer or military police doing a legal identity control at all time, but it can be done by:
-National ID card, passport or driving license.
-election card, birth papers, military papers, social security papers etc
-a testimony of identity (yes, just someone saying he knows you is ok if that person seems ok to the cop)

For foreigners, you have to show your presence in France is valid, which means passport and visa if necessary.

National ID card The Law 1955-1999

Btw, it is now since 1999 a national SECURISED identity card, meaning they already take fingerprints and it can be used to access a police database
And I still don't have it, having no urge to spend money to have my fingerprints taken and getting into administrative troubles if I lose it, and I live without any problem.

English press release from French Association of Audionautes (L'Association Des Audionautes)

"The Court based its decision on the article L-122-5 of the French Intellectual Property Code stating that 'authors can't forbid copies or reproductions that are only intented for the private use of the copyist.'"

English translation of that law

IANAFL (I am not a French lawyer), but this seems to run counter to previous rulings there. In the U.S., the Supreme Court would likely intercede in a situation like this, but the French Cour de Cassation -- the only higher court than the Cours d'Appel -- can, as Jean-Baptiste explained on FreeCulture.org's Discuss list, "only decide on procedural problems or legal interpretation, not on legal qualification. As we say, 'Cassation is judge of law and not judge of facts' and this case is a matter of facts and not a matter of law..."

France indeed has a law often called "Non assistance à personne en danger" (which roughly translates to "non assistance to endagered person") under which you can sue anyone who doesn't promptly assist someone who is in danger if by doing so he doesn't put himself in peril. It is a penal offence and offenders face 5 years in prison and a 75000 fine. See the article or the English translation (scroll to article 223 - 6).

An example that comes to mind is tourists who knowledgely taped someone drowning from afar in the assumption that someone had called for help. Well it turned out nobody had. I remember they were convicted but not the outcome... It was five or six years ago and I can't seem to find anything about the incident on the Web.

France indeed has a law often called "Non assistance à personne en danger" (which roughly translates to "non assistance to endagered person") under which you can sue anyone who doesn't promptly assist someone who is in danger if by doing so he doesn't put himself in peril. It is a penal offence and offenders face 5 years in prison and a 75000 fine. See the article or the English translation (scroll to article 223 - 6).

An example that comes to mind is tourists who knowledgely taped someone drowning from afar in the assumption that someone had called for help. Well it turned out nobody had. I remember they were convicted but not the outcome... It was five or six years ago and I can't seem to find anything about the incident on the Web.

Finally found the text (in french) Here

It does say that the hard-drives integrated into TV, VCR or video decoders and hard-drives integrated into mp3 players (like the iPod) are eligible to the tax.

The law does not apply to hard-drives sold for use in computers.

So this law is not that stupid, if you think that the general law that pay back artists for the right of users to make private copies is a good thing.

BTW, another law (here) says that floppy-disk (3'5 inches only) are eligible for this tax. And this law is probably a lot more stupid.

NB : The site http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr messes badly with cookies so the links above may not work at first.

Finally found the text (in french) Here

It does say that the hard-drives integrated into TV, VCR or video decoders and hard-drives integrated into mp3 players (like the iPod) are eligible to the tax.

The law does not apply to hard-drives sold for use in computers.

So this law is not that stupid, if you think that the general law that pay back artists for the right of users to make private copies is a good thing.

BTW, another law (here) says that floppy-disk (3'5 inches only) are eligible for this tax. And this law is probably a lot more stupid.

NB : The site http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr messes badly with cookies so the links above may not work at first.

Finally found the text (in french) Here

It does say that the hard-drives integrated into TV, VCR or video decoders and hard-drives integrated into mp3 players (like the iPod) are eligible to the tax.

The law does not apply to hard-drives sold for use in computers.

So this law is not that stupid, if you think that the general law that pay back artists for the right of users to make private copies is a good thing.

BTW, another law (here) says that floppy-disk (3'5 inches only) are eligible for this tax. And this law is probably a lot more stupid.

NB : The site http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr messes badly with cookies so the links above may not work at first.

I was commenting the French case. The French constitutional right of free speech comes from the 1789 Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen , which states that "[...] any Citizen can thus speak, write, print freely [...]", and from other sources such as the European Declaration on Human Rights.

All of them talk of human, not corporate rights.

Let me introduce myself : my name is Godefroy Beauvallet and I am advisor for IT to Michel Sapin, who is the minister in charge of public service and eGovernment in France. More about him and the ministry here.

The BBC article is based on Governmental decisions taken on November, 15th here in France. I actually am one of the guys who briefed the BBC journalist on that one.

Branded "eGovernment : Second Stage", these decisions aim at generalising online services in the public sector before 2005.

To know more about the second stage, you can go here. To know more about the first stage, there is a page in English here.

It's of course difficult (and is it really interesting, anyway) to try and find out which government is the most advanced as far as eGov is concerned : what we all know (and we discuss that at EU level and with US, Canada and many others) is we all are still at the begining of the journey.

A few French highlights : the equivalent of FistGov is Service-public.fr. We believe it is a good informative portal, with about 100 online services, 1100 online static forms, access (index and search engine) to 6500 public websites, a "user manual" of 2500 pages and 1600 Q&A on about anything you want to do with the government (both local and national). Another site publishes everyday (and someone who said the opposite on the list is wrong) all laws and decrees taken by the Governement. Among services provided online are tax filings and payments (individual and firms), scholarships to students, access to public service jobs (through competitive examps) and many others.

We also try and do a lot of things to enhance interoperability among our information systems. We believe this is crucial, as we do not want to be mono-supplier of IT (for legal as well as strategic reasons). That lead us to rising interest in open-source software, and the Government Agency in charge of IT publish a lot of information on them here. Michel SAPIN also publicly endorsed the open-source movement in several occasions.

And to end this rather long post, I want to stress out that French citizens are very hot on privacy and personal data handling. Since 1978, there is an independant public body in charge of these questions here : the CNIL. Any database a ministry creates needs to be approved by the CNIL before it is put online, and there are many an example where a project was stopped by the CNIL on privacy concerns. We want to think carefully about these issues before we go on with a technical widget or another : the PM decided on November, 15th that three "wise guys" are to think about it : the former president of the Cour de Cassation (more or less the equivalent to the Supreme court), a high-ranking civil servant and a well-known sociologist. First report due on January 2002.

I could not explain a whole policy in this post. I would be pleased to try and answer more specific questions in the thread of by email.

Best regards !

I checked this, and for those who can read french :
"III. - Toute personne suspectée ou poursuivie est présumée innocente tant que sa culpabilité n'a pas été établie. ..."
from http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/html/frame_codes1.ht m

I would translate that this way:
"every suspected person is assumed innocente as far as it's guiltness has not been proven"

well, maybe not very well translated, but i think it 's enough to get the general meaning sorry, i don't have much to say about yahoo's case

I think that you didn't read right the text law ( available on legifrance ):

Ces dispositions s'appliquent quelles que soient les versions linguistiques de l'oeuvre fixée sur ces supports.
This law applies without any restrictions with languages availables on the support.

This law prevent the sale of a DVD (Zone 1 or even Belgium Zone 2 which are available a few months before) IF:

• the movie due to be featured in a theater in France
• AND
• the 6 months delay following the first presentation at theater is not over.

This law is COMMERCIAL and has nothing to do with culture. It ensures movies distributors to make money by selling theater tickets. I don't see the problem for the USA as this law follow their way of thinking: patent, copyright holder, money...

Not to mention the newly opened French subsidiary, amazon.fr. In France, the law on personal data stored on computers is extremely strict (borderline paranoid, in fact).

Now if such a customer file is shared by amazon between several countries, it must be kept in compliance with the law of every country in question.

So if you're not happy with amazon keeping personal info on your subject, go to amazon.fr, check that the info is indeed shared with amazon.com, and write them ("them" being amazon.fr) a letter (in formal French, of course) stating that you wish to exercise the rights vested upon you by article 36 of the aforementioned law 78-16 of january 6, 1978, and that in compliance with that law they must strike the information concerning you from the record (you can claim, e.g., that it is obsolete). Somehow I doubt they'll make a special effort to remove the info in amazon.fr and not in amazon.com, so they'll have to remove it completely.

(I only mention French law because I know that particular one. But maybe German or English law (for amazon.de or amazon.co.uk) could let you achieve the same results.)

Somehow I feel that we'll have to stand the "socialist Europe" cliché again...

The situation is a bit complex: freedom of speech is a constitutional right, and the 1881 law on the Press (revised many times since) states so. However, restrictions of this freedom have been inserted into this law; to the old prohibition of public advocacy to commit crimes and felonies was added a prohibition on the advocacy of racial hatred and of putting into doubt the reality of the nazi crimes.

Apparently, the jurisprudence considers nazi emblems and books such as Mein Kampf or the Protocols of the Sages of Zion to be banned antisemitic propaganda. It is nevertheless possible to trade such goods provided they are used as historic documentation; this is a very murky area and I do not know the exact criteria applied.

In Germany, where for obvious reason people are wary of anything reminding of nazism, such restrictions are even more stringent.

As for the legal ground of ordering Yahoo US to comply, I think it is quite weak, but I am not a lawyer. I would wait until the legal matters are sorted out (appeals, maybe going before the supreme court).

As for the social opinion of the people here, I think the French people are a bit too prone on legislating on what should be or not be done (mind, after all, many US states legislate on what sex positions are legal between consenting adults). There are reasons for this: there are every so often racist or antisemitic attacks, many old people suffered during WWII, and there is still the remembrance of the traitors of the Vichy government.

I read the press trying to get a few hard facts on the said court ruling. All I got is from imprecise sources such as newspapers, so take it with a grain of salt.

• The ruling is a summary injunction (référé), which means that it has been issued by a single judge.
• The matter has not yet been appealed to a court of appeal. We should probably wait until such things get appealed to the supreme court (cour de cassation) before we conclude that French jurisprudence has been defined with respect to sites abroad selling forbidden material. Unfortunately, with the current overload of the supreme court, it should take several years.
• As with the Georgia Tech case, the lawsuit was not brought by the government but by private nonprofit associations, LICRA (International League against Racism and Antisemitism) and UEJF (Union of Jewish Students of France). Therefore it is wrong to conclude anything from this case about the position of either the president, the cabinet, the national assembly or the senate. They apparently ask for reparations in accordance with article 48.2 of the (revised) law on the Press of 1981 which allows a nonprofit association whose statutory goals include fighting racism to ask for reparations even though the association is no direct victim.
• Apparently, the motive of the lawsuit is article 24 of the same law, which prohibits inciting discrimination, hatred or violence against a person or a group of persons because of their origin or their belonging or non-belonging to an ethnic group, a nation or a determined religion (punishable by one year of prison and/or a 300,000 FRF fine, not precluding the civil damages). Means of such incitation to hatred include drawings or emblems (article 23).

• Whether or not a nazi emblem promotes racial hatred;
• Whether or not a French court can order an US company to comply to its rulings (apparently, the matter will have to be brought before an US court); of course, Yahoo France must comply.

Furthermore, as far as I know, are exempt from the ban prints of such items for education or scholarly research. I do not know where this comes from legally. Surely indeed, some public libraries, including the National Library of France have printouts of Mein Kampf available for readers!

I therefore think the Slashdot community should wait and see further progress in the case; jumping to conclusions is clearly overreacting.

I read the press trying to get a few hard facts on the said court ruling. All I got is from imprecise sources such as newspapers, so take it with a grain of salt.

• The ruling is a summary injunction (référé), which means that it has been issued by a single judge.
• The matter has not yet been appealed to a court of appeal. We should probably wait until such things get appealed to the supreme court (cour de cassation) before we conclude that French jurisprudence has been defined with respect to sites abroad selling forbidden material. Unfortunately, with the current overload of the supreme court, it should take several years.
• As with the Georgia Tech case, the lawsuit was not brought by the government but by private nonprofit associations, LICRA (International League against Racism and Antisemitism) and UEJF (Union of Jewish Students of France). Therefore it is wrong to conclude anything from this case about the position of either the president, the cabinet, the national assembly or the senate. They apparently ask for reparations in accordance with article 48.2 of the (revised) law on the Press of 1981 which allows a nonprofit association whose statutory goals include fighting racism to ask for reparations even though the association is no direct victim.
• Apparently, the motive of the lawsuit is article 24 of the same law, which prohibits inciting discrimination, hatred or violence against a person or a group of persons because of their origin or their belonging or non-belonging to an ethnic group, a nation or a determined religion (punishable by one year of prison and/or a 300,000 FRF fine, not precluding the civil damages). Means of such incitation to hatred include drawings or emblems (article 23).

• Whether or not a nazi emblem promotes racial hatred;
• Whether or not a French court can order an US company to comply to its rulings (apparently, the matter will have to be brought before an US court); of course, Yahoo France must comply.

Furthermore, as far as I know, are exempt from the ban prints of such items for education or scholarly research. I do not know where this comes from legally. Surely indeed, some public libraries, including the National Library of France have printouts of Mein Kampf available for readers!

I therefore think the Slashdot community should wait and see further progress in the case; jumping to conclusions is clearly overreacting.

France passed similar legislation as the one you describe in 1978 (Loi n 78-17 du 6 janvier 1978 relative à l'informatique, aux fichiers et aux libertés, available from this government site).

At the time the law was mainly seen as a precaution against big brother behavior by the state. With hindsight, it seems that today the most serious intruders on privacy are rather businesses that establish databases on clients and pass them to each other.

Article 2 says that no justice decision implying an appreciation on human behavior can be based on automated data processing giving a personality profile of the person.

Article 25 and 26 say that people on which information is gathered can

• ask to check this information at no cost;
• have it rectified in case of errors.

Furthermore, the law prohibits gathering information on political, philosophical or religious opinions, as well as on race (with obvious exceptions for churches or political parties and the like, who, by definition, must collect respectively religious and political information).