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I am a former employee of a Lexis-Nexis subsidiary called Lexis Document Services. I know getting information from any level of the government is not free. You either pay by taxes or user fees.

For example, if look up information at the US District and US Bankruptcy courts they charge fees.

LDS performs hard copy searches of court records in municiple, county, state, and federal jurisdications across the US. The customers paid for someone to physically to go to clerk offices and request documents on pending suits, pending judgements, UCC filings, bankruptcies, etc.. The customer could have done this themselves. They would have to know which clerk to search and still have to pay a fee to the jurisdication for the documents.

Heinlein would say TNSTAAFL

This article is a misdirected rant. It is beyond dispute that Lexis, Westlaw, et al. do not own any copyright to public records-- i.e. the actual text of the case decisions.

sPh

Perhaps I missed it, but I didn't see a link to the actual opinion. It resides here (pdf).

Someone get the company e-mail address and send them Chapter 11 paperwork now.

Never heard about the Paperless Office? Here you go: http://www.uscourts.gov/bankform/ ;-)

MEMORANDUM OPINION

The Recording Industry Association of America ("RIAA") has moved to enforce a subpoena served on Verizon Internet Services ("Verizon") under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998 ("DMCA" or "Act"), 17 U.S.C. 512. On behalf of copyright owners, RIAA seeks the identity of an anonymous user of Verizon's service who is alleged to have infringed copyrights with respect to more than 600 songs downloaded from the Internet in a single day. The copyright owners (and thus RIAA) can discern the Internet Protocol address, but not the identity, of the alleged infringer -- only the service provider can identify the user. Verizon argues that the subpoena relates to material transmitted over Verizon's network, not stored on it, and thus falls outside the scope of the subpoena power authorized in the DMCA. RIAA counters that the subpoena power under section 512(h) of the DMCA applies to all Internet service providers, including Verizon, whether the infringing material is stored on or simply transmitted over the service provider's network.

The case thus presents a core issue of statutory interpretation relating to the scope of the subpoena authority under the DMCA. The parties, and several amici curiae, agree that this is an issue of first impression of great importance to the application of copyright law to the Internet. Indeed, they concede that this case is presented as a test case on the DMCA subpoena power.Based on the language and structure of the statute, as confirmed by the purpose and history of the legislation, the Court concludes that the subpoena power in 17 U.S.C. 512(h) applies to all Internet service providers within the scope of the DMCA, not just to those service providers storing information on a system or network at the direction of a user. Therefore, the Court grants RIAA's motion to enforce, and orders Verizon to comply with the properly issued and supported subpoena from RIAA seeking the identity of the alleged infringer.

....

I went to see if I could find Judge's opinion online. Indeed, it is! In PDF form, I bring you Toy Biz, Inc. v. United States.

For those of you decrying our taxpayer dollars going to waste on such a suit, it appears some at least is being used to make such decisions more accessible, a fact which I hope we can all agree upon.

Personally, I think it was worth every penny to expose a fantastic example of corporate hypocracy. I read maybe a dozen X-Men comics (and didn't see the movie) and the main philosophical point I saw that the series revolved around (besides raw action) was that the X-Men should in fact be considered human despite their 'mutant' powers.

Given that, what could be more hypocritical than turning around and claiming that, while for storyline purposes the X-Men should be considered human, but for tax purposes, they are not.

But maybe I should read the Judge's opinion first. It's long, so I'm posting the link here before I read. Based on the first paragraph, it looks like the matter never went to a full trial and was decided in a pre-trial 'summary judgement'.

--LP

I hate it when the cut+paste misses. Try here instead.

...is here

I skipped over the concurrence in the appellate case, which turned out to be a mistake, since it specifically addresses the mysterious 'X:' "[F]or Xerox to prevail, it must prove that each unistroke symbol in the accused symbols (i.e., all symbols except for "x" which is composed with two strokes) has (a) graphic separation, (b) definitive recognition, and (c) spatial independence."

So, I was in error; it would not have been sufficient for Palm to have made the 'X' a multistroke character. Damn these patent cases!

I'm going to have to take some time tonight and read the district court's final decision to satisfy myself, but here's a relevant excerpt on this matter:

The Court noted that Graffiti contained some multi-stroke, multi-symbol characters, the presence of which did not alter the spatially independent nature of the Graffiti symbols. As the concurring opinion noted, the "x" in Graffiti is simply a multi-stroke, (and presumably multi-symbol) character. Because the recognition device recognizes each symbol of a multi-stroke, multi-symbol character without reference to what was written before it, the spatial independence limitation of the '656 Patent is met by all Graffiti Symbols.

The pdf of the request for review by the Supreme Court makes many references to "certification." Viz:

"The decisions of the California appellate courts provide no controlling precedent regarding the certified question, the answer to which may be determinative of this appeal. We respectfully request that the California Supreme Court answer the certified question presented below. We acknowledge that your Court may decide to reformulate the question, and our phrasing of the issue is not intended to restrict your Court's consideration of the case. We agree to follow the answer provided by the California Supreme Court. We invoke the certification process only after careful consideration and do not do so lightly. The certification procedure is reserved for state law questions that present significant issues, including those with important public policy ramifications, and that have not yet been resolved by the state courts."

The impression I get is that this reference to "certified" can be understood as "answering the question specifically and directly so that it may be settled once and for all," but that is just a guess because (you guessed it) IANAL. Can a Slashdotter who is a lawyer provide a bit of detail on this concept of "certified?"

This is an extremely interesting case because afaik, domain names are currently held to be much like phone numbers -- you don't own one, you more or less rent it.

But while reading the pdf, I noticed that the name of the guy who is the plaintif in this sex.com lawsuit is "Gary Kremen."

Oh, the jokes...

Anyone wonder why the heck the Minnesota FBI office went to Washington for a piddly search warrant, instead of their friendly local court? Because this was not an ordinary warrant, but a national security warrant designed to investigate suspected terrorists who might not have committed any crime to provide probable cause for a regular warrant.

I've never served (called 3 times -- twice in Mass, but told I didn't have to come in) and think I would like to for the experience.

IANAL, however I do like reading decisions from the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

Why that particular circuit -- aside from you probably live in it? (For the uninitiated, the system has 11 numbered circuits plus the DC circuit and the federal circuit. The armed services have their own appeals court.)

The 9th is unique, covering -- well, as their site says: "The Ninth Circuit is the largest of the 13 federal circuits and includes all federal courts in California, Oregon, Washington, Arizona, Montana, Idaho, Nevada, Alaska, Hawaii, Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands." That must be about 50 million people?

Maybe because it is so large the 9th is known for internal divisions that can lead to some chaotic and even contradictory precedent. I worked as a staff attorney in another circuit and the informal rule was never to cite to the 9th unless distancing ourselves from it. I know that sounds very parochial, but there has been criticism from other quarters as you likely know.

It's past time to break the 9th up into two or three circuits similar to the others -- it's literally that big! This would hopefully improve the administration of justice, but when and how this will happen I don't know. The circuit itself says everything is fine as it is. The current situation places an unnecessary strain on the people in the circuit, and it must be quite expensive on those occasions all the judges must meet in one place. Aside from those meetings, some judges of the circuit rarely see and faintly know other judges. In other circuits, the court hears all its cases in one or maybe two locations, which does help generate some collegiality.

Whatever. I think it's cool an IANAL is reading and enjoying the decisions.

3) MS adds extensions for Windows only development, which are optional to developers depending on their target market (HINT: Apple has Cocoa extensions in Java......samething......they are optional)

Actually, the issue is that Microsoft was intentionally attempting to propagate a non-standard version of Java in order to kill it off. As emails from Microsoft state, their strategy was to:

"Kill cross-platform Java by grow[ing] the polluted Java
market." Microsoft, 253 F.3d at 76-77 (quoting Government Ex. 259).

The key issue is that Microsoft was deliberately trying to kill off Java using their OS monopoly to distribute a polluted version of Java and thereby fragment the Java market (as indicated by internal documents brought up in the court case.)

The Judge's opinion is available as a PDF obtained via the C|Net article.

Despite the recent California Supreme Court decision, I think every reasonable American knows that the founding fathers designed the second amendment to allow all Americans access to personal firearms. Muzzle loaded, smoothbore, single shot flintlocks.

Just to nitpick: The decision was by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, not the California Supreme Court. The Ninth is a federal appeals court, and its decisions are the next-to-last word (with the Supreme Court having the last word) on the interpretation of federal law in nine western states.*

The Ninth's recent decision (online here) concludes that the Second Amendment preserves the citizen's right to serve in a well-regulated militia - that is, it grants the state government the right to have National Guard units, and grants you the right to serve in them. If the framers had meant to guarantee an individual right to gun ownership, the Ninth asserts, they would have done so in the plain language of the other nine amendments enacted at the same time (e.g., "Congress shall make no law infringing upon the people's right to possess arms" or similar language).

The Ninth's decision is in direct conflict with a recent Fifth Circuit decision that finds an individual right in the Second Amendment, which was the first time a federal appellate court has ever endorsed this view. The conflict between the two circuit courts makes it extremely likely that the Supreme Court will review the Ninth Circuit's ruling and settle the dispute.

As an aside, Howard Bashman's How Appealing is a surprisingly entertaining source of information on the federal courts of appeals, and a goldmine of information about this particular ruling. If you're interested at all in the activities of the judicial branch, check it out.

* To nitpick even further, the Ninth also includes Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands. Nyah.

Despite the recent California Supreme Court decision, I think every reasonable American knows that the founding fathers designed the second amendment to allow all Americans access to personal firearms. Muzzle loaded, smoothbore, single shot flintlocks.

Just to nitpick: The decision was by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, not the California Supreme Court. The Ninth is a federal appeals court, and its decisions are the next-to-last word (with the Supreme Court having the last word) on the interpretation of federal law in nine western states.*

The Ninth's recent decision (online here) concludes that the Second Amendment preserves the citizen's right to serve in a well-regulated militia - that is, it grants the state government the right to have National Guard units, and grants you the right to serve in them. If the framers had meant to guarantee an individual right to gun ownership, the Ninth asserts, they would have done so in the plain language of the other nine amendments enacted at the same time (e.g., "Congress shall make no law infringing upon the people's right to possess arms" or similar language).

The Ninth's decision is in direct conflict with a recent Fifth Circuit decision that finds an individual right in the Second Amendment, which was the first time a federal appellate court has ever endorsed this view. The conflict between the two circuit courts makes it extremely likely that the Supreme Court will review the Ninth Circuit's ruling and settle the dispute.

As an aside, Howard Bashman's How Appealing is a surprisingly entertaining source of information on the federal courts of appeals, and a goldmine of information about this particular ruling. If you're interested at all in the activities of the judicial branch, check it out.

* To nitpick even further, the Ninth also includes Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands. Nyah.

Does this apply to all states after they have settled?

But since this is about punishment for a company and not about declaring a law unconstitutional, I'm not sure what happens.

This decision didn't come from the administration, it came from a judge. True, judges are appointed by the President, but Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly was appointed to the United States District Court in 1997, over three years before the current administration was inaugurated. Only Congress can impeach a judge, so I don't understand how the current administration could possibly have affected the outcome of this case.

The evidence reflects that libraries can and do unblock the filters when a patron so requests. But it also reflects that requiring library patrons to ask for a Web site to be unblocked will deter many patrons because they are embarrassed, or desire to protect their privacy or remain anonymous. Moreover, the unblocking may take days, and may be unavailable, especially in branch libraries, which are often less well staffed than main libraries. Accordingly, CIPA's disabling provisions do not cure the constitutional deficiencies in public libraries' use of Internet filters.

Here are the only ways to make money, long-term, on gambling:

• Open your own casino

Or purchase one. The Crystal Bay Club Casino in Crystal Bay, NV (up on the North shore of Lake Tahoe) is currently bankrupt and for sale. The hearing on the sale is reportedly scheduled for November 21 at the Reno Bankrupcy Court.

There was no real reason for the casino to go to pot, judging from the neighboring casinos who are doing just fine. Indeed, the reported increase in gross revenue -- in spite of 9/11 -- at the neighboring Tahoe Biltmore, Nugget, and Cal-Neva casinos suggest that there is a hefty share of revenue to be made. A total investment of about US$7-8 million should get you a going concern. The place has a current gaming license (the buyer would have to qualify to obtain an operator's license from the Nevada Gaming Board), two restaurants, two bars (liquor licenses would need to be renewed), over 100 slot machines, 10-12 black-jack tables, a roulette table, a craps table, and parking for 500 cars.

In its heyday, the CBC sported more than 260 slot machines, about half of them the networked progressive machines featured in the SlashDot story today. The new owner will be able to get them back, and enjoy the house cut of the play on them.

If this seriously interests you, call the Bankruptcy Trustee at (775) 329-1528 during normal government office hours (closed for Veteren's Day) for more information, including a listing of the components of the estate and times to tour and perform your due diligence inspections.

Disclaimer: The information in this post is based on published reports, Web-gleaned information, and court hearing transcripts, and is not guaranteed to be accurate. You are encouraged to get information directly from the Trustee before making a bid on the Crystal Bay Club Casino. The AC making this post has no financial attachment to the casino.

• UK: www.plainenglish.co.uk/law.html
• India: http://www.globallawreview.com/lr8.html
• Michigan Bar: http://www.michbar.org/committees/penglish/columns /131.html

Actually, just an amendment to the constitution would suffice. Let's not throw out the baby... ;)

On a gut level, I would agree with your implication that only a small portion of the US population would understand that any portion of the Constitution can be changed. However, I then came upon a survey result that makes me question my gut. After pondering the question a bit further, I now think that if a survey were done specifically asking the question, we'd find that most of the US population would not find it surprising that any portion of the Constitution can be changed, they just would never have considered it before being asked.

Bill Gates issued the following initial statement:

"The Settlement is a tough, but fair compromise. It imposes requirements on Microsoft, but it enables us to continue to innovate, and create products that address the changing needs of our customers. We recognize that we will be closely scrutinized by the government and our competitors, and we will devote all the time, energy and resources needed to ensure that we meet our responsibilities."

Shortly after the decision was issued by the Court, U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft made this statement:

"The Department is pleased with the court's decision approving the department's settlement with Microsoft. That decision confirms that the final judgment furthers the public interest by fully and effectively addressing Microsoft's unlawful conduct and restoring the competitive conditions in the computer software industry."

We will continue to update FIN members throughout the weekend and next week. Additional information is also available at these sites:

MORE FROM MICROSOFT
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/legalnews.asp

FROM THE DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE
http://www.dcd.uscourts.gov/microsoft-2001.html

FREEDOM TO INNOVATE NETWORK WEB SITE
http://www.microsoft.com/freedomtoinnovate

sorry about ugly first post of this

Wondering how some Slashdot reader was able to break this story a full hour before any other source?

Simple.

Check out http://www.dcd.uscourts.gov/Opinions/2002/Kotelly/ -- they forgot to forbid people to get a directory listing, so it was easy for someone to just keep hitting Reload until some new files appeared. Nice going, webmaster@dcd.uscourts.gov! :)

to deliver a few hundred characters of ASCII. By delivering these judgments (and there are gazillions of those in the site) in some more sensible (and at the same time more user friendly) format they could probably order everyone a free pizza instead for spending it on bandwith. It's just incredibly stupid to download stuff in more than *20 excess size and to launch a and need an external program to view the content. Hey, but it's official it got to be PDF!

I wonder how many people are (will be) hacking^h^h^h^h^h^h^hsearching through the website in hopes of finding the judgement before its officially published?

http://www.dcd.uscourts.gov/microsoft-2001-email.h tml

Judge Rules That Inaccessible Website Violates ADA October 15, 2002

A federal judge ruled that the Atlanta mass transit agency violated the ADA by constructing a website that was inaccessible for people with visual disabilities. This is one of the first cases to decide that the ADA requires online access for people with disabilities.

This decision came as part of a court order in a class action lawsuit filed by Atlanta-area people with disabilities against the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority (MARTA). The plaintiffs in this case complained about numerous problems they experienced with accessibility in MARTA, including difficulties in obtaining schedule and route information in an accessible format. This information is available on the MARTA website, but people with disabilities had to rely on cumbersome Braille schedules or through MARTA's telephone service.

MARTA staff testified that the MARTA website (http://www.itsmarta.com/) is not yet accessible for people with visual impairments. Since June 2002, MARTA has been working to improve the accessibility of its Internet site, but people who use screen readers to access the site still cannot get complete access to schedule and route information.

Judge Thomas W. Thrash, Jr. stated in his order that "MARTA can do a better job of making information available in accessible formats." The judge stated that although MARTA did provide information to people with visual impairments over the telephone, this service was not equivalent to that provided over the Internet to non-disabled passengers. Although MARTA is attempting to correct accessibility issues on its Internet site, Judge Thrash found that "MARTA must deliver on its promises". "Until these deficiencies are corrected," the judge stated, "MARTA is violating the ADA."

The judge ordered MARTA and the plaintiffs to work together to fashion a court order to remedy the violations of the ADA, including the accessibility of the MARTA website, but did not order MARTA to make any specific changes to its website. The court's order can be found in Adobe PDF at http://www.gand.uscourts.gov/documents/1001cv3255T WTinj.pdf.

The following summary was prepared by the Southeast DBTAC and has not been reviewed by any enforcement agency. The Southeast is authorized by the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research (NIDRR) to provide information, materials, and technical assistance to individuals and entities that are covered by the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) under grant number H133D010207. However, you should be aware that NIDRR is not responsible for enforcement of the ADA The information, materials, and/or technical assistance are intended solely as informal guidance, and are neither a determination of your legal rights or responsibilities under the act, nor binding on any agency with enforcement responsibility under the ADA.

Wow, no offense but was the political diatribe at the end really useful?

Patricia Seitz was nominated to the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida in 1998 by then President Clinton. She was most recently tied (politcally speaking) to the election campaign of former U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno.

So, I doubt she's a Republican and probably not very conservative.

You may think she made a bad call, however, if you'll notice in the Order granting defendant's motion to dismiss she made the decision that Congress very narrowly defined the definition of a 'place of public accomodation'. (Obligatory 'I am not a lawyer') I would have to agree with her on that issue, when the ADA states that X,Y,Z places are covered and doesn't say "The Internet" as one of those then it doesn't cover it. Personally I think that regulating accessibility in websites is ridiculous. By that logic, all books would have to be printed in braille.

I can only suggest that you get a clue. Here's one, courtesy of google. To save you the effort, here's some of the best:

• Civil vs. Criminal FAQon LawInfo.com
• What's the Difference Between a Civil and a Criminal Conviction on Findlaw.com.
• What Makes a Case a Criminal Case? on Findlaw.com
• The Distinction Between Civil and Criminal Law, in USCourts.gov outreach section.
• THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN CRIMINAL AND CIVIL CASES on intolaw.

According to this cnet story, the judge ruled that the ADA doesn't apply to the web. The full opinion can be read here (pdf).

San Jose Federal Building

...to get the picture of what the article is all about:

1
2
3

His opinion goes into a fair amount of detail as to why he is convinced that Deep was playing games with copyright infringement. He is ordering them to try to respect the non-infringing users. He is not saying that if it is not possible, that the service isn't getting shut down.

He does have a clue as to how to be an effective judge, and he also knows that Judge Patel ended up having problems with the Ninth Circuit for not trying hard enough to sort out the infringing from the non-infringing. He is trying to avoid those problems. It is up to the parties to draft the thing, not the Judge, precisely because he knows he doesn't know the technology. Both parties will come back with drafts, and reasons supporting the drafts. Mind you, Aimster won't be able to argue that shutting down infringements without non-infringements is impossible. If Aimster does that, he shuts it all down.

Even if that is the final result, he needed to put the drafting step in so that the Court of Appeals could see that Aimster failed to provide a sound technical basis for shutting one down but not the other when ordered to. That is done to keep Aimster from gratuitously changing positions on appeal. (Before Aspen saying: "Impossible", and then at the Court of Appeals saying: "Very easy.")

As long as the input, manipulation, or output phase differs from the patented process, the patent shouldn't apply. Of course other variables come into play too.

Quite often one word in a patent can make a huge difference to what it covers and how it applies. Look at the recent BT case -- the court's decision is very insightful.

Forge on ahead with some ingenuity to produce other technologies and ways of doing things in the Linux kernel. Then nobody in the future can claim patents on it because it is prior art.

Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly

Judge Kollar-Kotelly was appointed to the United States District Court in May 1997. She received a B.A. in 1965 from The Catholic University of America and a J.D. in 1968 from Columbus School of Law, The Catholic University of America. Following law school, she served as law clerk to Judge Catherine B. Kelly of the District of Columbia Court of Appeals. From 1969 to 1972, Judge Kollar-Kotelly was an attorney in the Criminal Division of the U.S. Department of Justice and then served as the chief legal counsel to Saint Elizabeths Hospital until 1984. She was appointed Associate Judge of the D.C. Superior Court in October 1984, and served as Deputy Presiding Judge of the Criminal Division from 1995 until her appointment to the federal bench. Judge Kollar-Kotelly has been a Fellow of the American Bar Association, a founding member of the Thurgood Marshall Inn of Court, an adjunct professor at Georgetown University School of Medicine in a joint teaching program on mental health and the law, and chair of the Board of the Art Trust for Superior Court.

Pretty impressive.

Okay.

The source for current information is the U.S. Courts website on wiretaps. This covers 1997-2001. Archival information (pre-1997) is available through the U.S. Gov't Printing Office.

What the FBI is allowed to do is summarized on the FBi Website FAQ. I quote the relavant question:

Q. Are FBI Special Agents permitted to install wiretaps at their own discretion?

A. No. Wiretapping is one of the FBI's most sensitive techniques and is strictly controlled by federal statutes. It is used infrequently and then only to combat the most serious crimes and terrorism. Title 18, United States Code, Section 2516, contains the protocol requiring all law enforcement officers to establish probable cause that the wiretaps may provide evidence of a felony violation of federal law. After determining if a sufficient showing of probable cause has been made, impartial federal judges approve or disapprove wiretaps. The approving judge then must continue to monitor how the wiretap is being conducted. Wiretapping without meeting these stringent requirements and obtaining the necessary court orders is a serious felony under the law.

Finally, this site is a good jumping off point for further information on wiretaps and Judicial oversight.

I dug up this link to the opinion and order re the Markham phase of the trial, which concerns how the claims of the patent are construed.

<ramble>
Since it's apparently necessary for all free developers to know the u.s. patent system well in order to more effectively undermine it, here's a good place to start. Hats off to this judge for presenting the material in a clear, almost tutorial manner.

It's essential to be able to read patent claims the way a judge does. It's not as hard as it first appears - remember, the Judge has just as much trouble with technical aspects as we have with the patent legalese. One thing to keep in mind is that it's the claims that matter, and these are generally a fairly small part of the patent.

Once you figure out what the claims mean, it's a lot easier to go hunting prior art or find a workaround.

Of course I'm not suggesting that all developers have to stop coding now and become patent lawyers, but we do need a lot more eyeballs on these things to help counterbalance the prevailing insanity. Besides, undermining patents is an interesting sport in and of itself.</ramble>

Y'know, if Judge Jackson had NOT given interviews, the MS case might have been finalized by now. The appellate courts didn't overturn his Findings of Facts or guilty verdit. They didn't even say that his penalty was inappropriate. They merely said that his penalty *appeared* to be biased, based soley on the fact that he given interviews before the case was over.


Actually, they overturned quite a few of his rulings, but they decided not to throw out the Findings of Fact (which MS asked them to do). They ruled that the DoJ didn't make a strong enough case for several of the 'guilty' verdicts that Jackson handed down, and that the appearance of bias was reason enough to remove him from the case, and they overturned Jackson's Final Judgment. Furthermore, of those portions that were not outright overturned, many portions of the case are 'on remand', meaning that those portions of the case must be reheard before another ruling can be made based on those portions of the case (and as of yet they have not been).

As for the penalty:
We vacate the District Court's remedies decree for the additional reason that the court has failed to provide an adequate explanation for the relief it ordered. ...
The District Court has not explained how its remedies decree would accomplish those objectives. Indeed, the court devoted a mere four paragraphs of its order to explaining its reasons for the remedy.

Check for yourself (PDF) It's in section V.

Followed by Section VI. Judicial Misconduct: ... Section 455(a) of the Judicial Code requires judges to recuse themselves when their "impartiality might reasonably be questioned." ...
All indications are that the District Judge violated each of these ethical precepts by talking about the case with reporters. The violations were deliberate, repeated, egregious, and flagrant.

(emphasis added)

I really wish more people would at least get a good first-hand overview of the 125 page document before they try to state what the court did and did not say. They might also understand why the DoJ changed their tune so quickly after the appeal if they looked over the portions of the case that were thrown out or remanded.

Article
ruling Kuro5hin thread on the subject

The full text of the ruling is here.

The ruling is currently being appealed of couse, but as it stands right now what the spammers have done is prefectly legal. The FCC fine is a joke.

You can also read the relevant K5 story.

Bruce

It hardly seems as frightening as you put it. Some people downloaded some spyware, were not required to click the license to get it, sued because it was spyware, and the court didn't put the case in the jurisdiction that the click-license mandated. If you don't go demanding all kinds of stuff that goes beyound what you are explicitly allowed to control in Title 17, then none of that click-through stuff is necessary.

The warranty situation also isn't that simplistic. For some warranties, you need a sale. If you are giving away something for free, the only warranty needed may be that the product is no more malicious than an ordinary person would presume. The party who is providing the warranty may not be the author or the licensor, but the distributor.

Your alarmist tone in this slashdot piece has significantly reduced my opinion of your organization. Your statements remind me of an anti-virus company's announcements on the latest vague virus threat.

Taken from Chairman Powell's public statement:
"But we conclude, albeit somewhat reluctantly, that under the court's constitutional analysis, companies may satisfy the somewhat less stringent requirement of giving consumers the chance to "opt-out" of intracompany communications-related use of CPNI.(1)

(1) The court instructed the Commission to consider an opt-out strategy, which the court concluded was "an obvious and substantially less restrictive alternative" to opt-in. U.S. West v. FCC, 182 F.3d 1224, 1238 (10th Cir. 1999), cert. denied 530 U.S. 1213 (2000)"

Contact the Court of Appeals and complain. Also, contact your local representative.

-Lucas

The building codes are pretty subjective - also, in most jurisdictions the law just refers to _copyrighted_ and very expensive publications by building industry groups. (There's something fundamentally wrong about a copyrighted law...)

sPh

Yes, I know, they seriously didn't want Netscape controlling what could be done in a browser, because Netscape was on the road to providing a consumer-friendly emacs-with-a-pretty-face, and MS scouts aren't stupid. That's hardball competition, modern style (i.e. without what barbarians would recognize as honor or pride).

If you want anti-competitive behavior, try MS's attempted sabotage on Java, or their demanding license fees on every x86-compatible computer sold even if sold with a competing OS, or most of the other behavior in the findings of fact.

The CIPA was not thrown out in it's entirety. The Ruling for the ALA had specific sections of the document deemed unconstitutional. They targeted sections Paragraph 1712 (a)(2) Titled "Limitation On Availability of Certain Funds for Libraries" and the comments to enact it into US Code. Also targetted was section 1721 (b) Titled "Libraries" which enacts the the code titled "Requirements for certain Libraries with computers having internet access" What they do not target are Paragraphs 1711 and 1721 (a) which are directives against and defining the requirements for SCHOOLS to qualify for E-Rate funds. So all you school districts out there don't turn off you filtering software yet.

CIPA Act
http://www.on-z.net/001218cipa.pdf

Court Ruling
http://www.paed.uscourts.gov/documents/opinions/02 D0415P.HTM

The first illegality is trademark infringement. The defendant, in many cases, used registered trademarks of companies in order to bombard people who attempted to visit a web site related to a product that they owned or were considering the purchase of. He had already lost 200 such sites through court cases.

The next illegality is the use of malicious code to bombard people with pop-up windows when they did things as innocuous as hit the back button. Many people were reduced to restarting their computer to escape from the mess that the defendant created. Exploiting a weakness in a computer, whether to spread a worm or pop up dozens of unwanted windows, is illegal.

It is illegal to display porn to children. That's why porn sites have an "I-am-over-18" button (so I am told). The defendant's web sites had no such protections.

Finally, "typosquatting" is illegal. The Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act became law in November of 1999 and made it illegal for a person to register or use, with a "bad faith" intent to profit from, an Internet domain name that is "identical or confusingly similar" to the distinctive or famous trademark or Internet domain name of another person or company. No one should know that better than John Zuccarini, against whom the third district court upheld that law in a decision rendered in June of 2001.

On a side note, I spoke to John Zuccarini (the defendant) about a year ago. I tracked down his phone number after being pissed off about being hit by his scam when I typed in a URL in the form of "www.{product name}.com". I informed him that the URL contained a registered trademark. He was a rude asshole and I am just sorry that he's being fined rather than jailed.

• Microsoft, States Debate Remedies (eWeek, March 18)
• Microsoft Back in Court (internet.com, March 18)
• States ask for broad sanctions on Microsoft (USA Today, March 18)
• Microsoft 'killed Dell Linux' - States (Register, March 19)
• Microsoft pressured Dell to drop Linux (The Inquirer, March 19)
• Microsoft caught in the anti-Linux act (vnunet.com, March 19)

• Case Filings
• District Court Opinions