Slashdot Mirror

andrewdm writes "The Business Software Alliance has a new partner: the grand muftis at Al Azhar in Cairo. The New York Law Journal has an article explaining the new holy(?) alliance between the BSA and the highest religious authorities in the Egyptian Sunni Islam sect. The clerics issued a fatwa (holy edict) against piracy, saying it is "the worst type of theft and prohibited by Islam." What's next? The Pope denouncing mp3's as mortal sins?" The worst type of theft, indeed.

caledon writes: "A Brooklyn judge has ruled that Network Solutions cannot be sued for civil rights violations because it refused to register obscene domain names. This New York Law Journal article describes how Island Online, Inc. sued NSI and the National Science Foundation for denial of free-speech rights because NSI refused to "register three 'dot-com' domain names that incorporated words commonly considered obscene: 'f---me.com;' 'f---you.com' and 'c---s-----.com.'"" The main point here is that NSI is supposedly not bound by the rules that bind the U.S. Government, despite holding a monopoly granted by the Commerce Department.

Scott Brady writes "The New York Law Journal is running an article on how to comply with the DMCA if you happen to be a web provider. The article turns up a particularly troubling part of the act I wasn't aware of: "To qualify for the DMCA's safe harbors, a service provider must first take the following actions: 1) Designate an agent to receive notification of claimed infringement from copyright owners. ... 2) Register the designated agent with the U.S. Copyright Office. ... The cost of registration is only $20. 3) ... [The] contact information for your designated agent also must be posted on your Web site."" Well, I was aware of it, but perhaps others aren't. In order to qualify for the DMCA's exemptions, you have to effectively act as judge, jury and executioner against your users.

Ed Adams wrote to us from the New York Law Journal which has the results of one of the first domain disputes resolved under the new arbitration procedures of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). In addition to the results, the actual decision is online as well.

Ed Adams wrote to us from the New York Law Journal which has the results of one of the first domain disputes resolved under the new arbitration procedures of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). In addition to the results, the actual decision is online as well.

Ed Adams wrote to us from the New York Law Journal which has the results of one of the first domain disputes resolved under the new arbitration procedures of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). In addition to the results, the actual decision is online as well.

ReadbackMonkey writes "AOL sued a Queen's based group of spammers, and was awarded $600k. " As always spam is a nasty problem. This morning I was hit with my wseekly request to purchase toner (I don't own a printer) as well as an exciting pornographic opportunity. Its annoying, but I still don't feel happy about seeing lawsuits like this. I'm happy to see spammers pay, but how far could this go?

biodork writes " A bout of sanity in the courts. Prodigy is NOT responsible for defamatory material sent over its network. Further, they may not be responsible for the material posted in their bulletin boards." This case has been kicking around since 1994. Finally a real, clear-cut, precedent-setting decision.

Seth Scali writes "It appears that Microsoft's appeals might not take as long as everybody thought. According to an article in the New York Law Journal, it seems that an obscure federal law, called the Anti-Trust Expediting Act, could allow the DoJ to skip the regular appeals process and take it straight to the Supreme Court. Since the judges in the federal appeals court were sympathetic to Microsoft last June, there's a very real possibility that the DoJ would make use of the law. "