Australian High Court To Decide Net Defamation Case

natslovR writes: "In a World first for a 'final' court, the defamation case against Dow Jones by an Australia businessman will go before Australia's High Court, allowing it to determine whether defamation laws apply across the Internet irrespective of geography. The businessman claimed he was defamed by an article that Dow Jones published in a US based online magazine. Australia's High Court will now determine if a lower court erred when it ruled that the article was published in Melbourne, Australia and so defamation proceedings could be brought against Dow Jones under Victoria's strong anti-defamation laws, despite the webserver on which it was 'published' residing in the U.S, the writer residing there too, and the online magazine's primary audience being U.S. based."

Comments

You don't seem to get it

[OeLeWaPpErKe]

Anything you do within the "sovereignty" of a country is governed over by the laws of a country. Since you americans have apparently decided that you fully control the DNS space, and thus the visible part of the internet, you should really not be surprised that antother country does the same

Europe does not want anything racist on it's wires, doesn't it have jurisdiction over those wires ? Certainly it does. How do you stop people from transmitting racist things ? Simple, you sue them. Is that legal ? Ofcourse because they willingly transmitted illegal stuff over Europe's wires. Are they going to get convicted ? Defineately.

In america you can say "Black people are the dumbest, most stupid assholes I've ever seen", but you cannot say "encryption X works like so ...". I really don't get the principles you live by. Then again, as the last round of elections proved, neither do you. "Have a nice day".

Re:You don't seem to get it

[belldandy]

I realize that I may not be the most unbiased person to reply to this post, seeing as how I am an American, but I didn't take to be a "We're American, so we are always right case". Rather, I believe that it was "We're an American company, who was publishing something mainly for Americans, we don't think litigation should take place where the good was consumed, rather where it was manufactured."

Think about it - if this is allowed, where do we draw the line? Is every paper in every country responsible for knowing all countries laws regarding publishing issues? Or do we censor on the lowest common denominator? Should organisations that promote literacy and education for women have removed from the net when the Taliban was in power (I know that they weren't internationally recognized as the government, but you get my point). Should all on-line publications be censored from showing a woman without a head covering because it would offend some Muslim?

At what point does it stop? This case is about WHERE the plaintiff can litigate, not who 'owns' the WWW.

Regards,
-Tammie
BTW: I didn't vote for that bumbling, fumbling idiot.

Re:You don't seem to get it

[Sheetrock]

In america you can say "Black people are the dumbest, most stupid assholes I've ever seen", but you cannot say "encryption X works like so ...".

Not only is it not likely that one could say that and continue to enjoy a full set of teeth in most places in America, but there are a few jurisdictions that have made it illegal as well under hate crimes law (one guy in Idaho is facing up to five years in prison for something similar). The whole concept seems to be that we are free to use speech any way we want as long as it isn't causing harm to someone else, which is why slander and libel laws are still on the books despite their apparent conflict with the First Amendment. I don't know if any case involving hate crimes vs. free speech has gone to the Supreme Court yet, however.

Anything you do within the "sovereignty" of a country is governed over by the laws of a country. Since you americans have apparently decided that you fully control the DNS space, and thus the visible part of the internet, you should really not be surprised that antother country does the same

If you think 'us americans' fully control the DNS space, run an alternative. I'd use it. The whole .com, .org, .net concept is outdated and springs out of the concept that the Internet started here. We'd probably be better off if that was scrapped and country codes were mandatory for every address so that whatever legal craziness abounds is mostly tied to a national scale. BTW: This paranoia that all Americans think as one to do things to piss you off is an unhealthy thing.

You might not be aware that the U.S. has recently decided that it has jurisdiction over its wires as well (see http://www.politechbot.com/p-02845.html). Most Internet traffic passes through our country. This may mean that if you are transmitting something between two sites in your own country that is legal there and illegal here and your connection happens to pass through our country (willing or unwilling) you have just committed a crime in the U.S. I don't know if that sounds stupid to you, but it sounds pretty stupid to me. How is Europe's decision any less stupid? Should the channel of distribution matter any more than the two points doing the communicating? What kind of impact could this concept have on satellite or radio transmissions that may bathe an unintended region with illegal content as part of the process of delivering that content to an area where it is perfectly legal?

Re:You don't seem to get it

[Happy go Lucky]

Not only is it not likely that one could say that and continue to enjoy a full set of teeth in most places in America, but there are a few jurisdictions that have made it illegal as well under hate crimes law (one guy in Idaho is facing up to five years in prison for something similar)

There's probably more to the story than that. Appellate-level courts have taken a very dim view of "hate crimes" laws that criminalize mere speech. The common standard is that "hate crime" statutes are permissible when there's an actual crime and hate is a motive. Merely being an asshole, however, remains protected by the Constitution.

I'm not overly thrilled with the DMCA either. However, I really don't understand the parent's position. One type of speech arguably could be used to facilitate the commission of a crime. And most if not all US states do have laws against supplying training to people knowing that training will be used for criminal purposes. OTOH, so-called "hate crimes" laws (of the Euro flavor) mostly criminalize speech on the basis of "It makes someone feel bad and tries to assuage our guilt over the Nazis/Fascists/Vichy/et cetera."

At any rate, were I with Dow Jones, I'd quite simply tell the Australian plaintiff where to get off. If Australia's court marshalls (or whoever enforces court orders) want to seize DJ's AU holdings, then maybe we should just claim Eminent Domain on Rupert Murdoch's US holdings and offer him the five bucks that Fox is actually worth.

Re:You don't seem to get it

[WinPimp2K]

And you have it backwards.

Europeans leave their country and "visit" places in other countries that have racist content. If the European government has a problem with this, they can take the same approach that the Peoples Republic of China has taken with regards to the Internet (and with regards to actual travel for that manner). Or the approach taken by the former unofficial govenrment of Afghanistan.

By your logic, Canada (with some absurdly strict laws regarding the French language) should be able to fine every single website operator whose every web page does not meet their requirements for the French language. EVERYTHING must be provided in French as well as any other language, and all French text must be AT LEAST the same font size as the non-French text. Remember those folks even have a separate police force whose sole duty is to enforce those language laws.

Why is cnn.com still operating? why haven't the Canadians shut down Slashdot? Could it be that just maybe Canadians are just a wee might more intelligent than the Australians and the Europeans?

Re:You don't seem to get it

[Anonymous Coward]

No. It couldn't.

International Tribunal

[cliffy2000]

Is a tribunal necessary in order to determine the outcome of these international cases? International law is fickle, especially when it comes to the Internet...
Perhaps a court may cause more trouble than it fixes.
Some sort of greater arbiter should analyze such cases. It is the only true possible solution to such dilemmas. The question is: how?

LOL @ those arrogant fools

[dh003i]

Look, they can make a ruling against a US citizen all they want. The fact is, they can't enforce it. US citizens live in the US, and their banks are in the US. There's nothing an Australian court can do to touch a US citizen in the US. Our courts already ruled that we do NOT enforce decisions made by other courts in other nations, and that US citizens don't have to abide by other nations laws while in the US.

Re:LOL @ those arrogant fools

[nerdlyone]

If a US company has any assets in a foreign country, they are subject to jurisdiction in that country. At least the assets are. It is called "in rem" jurisdiction, if I remember rightly. Such assets can be used to satisfy any judgment a court of that land makes. If any company representatives shows up to defend the suit, then they have just agreed to personal jurisdiction there too.

Re:LOL @ those arrogant fools

[Anonymous Pancake]

America tries to enforce it's own laws on a world-wide scale. Don't be a hypocrite.

Re:LOL @ those arrogant fools

[malxau]

I know this is flamebait, but I'll reply to it anyway.

It's true that an Australian court is limited in the actions it can take against US Citizens and Corporations. As you say, it will be difficult to make a case against an individual count for much more than a piece of international protest, but corporations are always at risk.

But the case needs to be examined not from a perspective of what can be logistically done, but from a perspective of what is ideally right. If a Victorian does read the published material in Victoria, the end effect of the publishing is the same as had it been physically published in Victoria. On the other hand, this has the effect of lowering all laws to 'lowest common denominator' across the international sphere. But if material were held to be published only where it was hosted, then this has the opposite effect, making the most relaxed laws possible.

I don't know which way the High Court will go, and I don't envy their decision. Maybe I'm biased as a Victorian, but I don't like to see people defamed unnecessarily. In a sense the decision will have more to do with the relative strength of US anti-defamation law than anything else - the high court would be unlikely to leave a Plaintiff with no course of action if a clear breach of Australian law exists.

Re:LOL @ those arrogant fools

[TekPolitik]

Our courts already ruled that we do NOT enforce decisions made by other courts in other nations, and that US citizens don't have to abide by other nations laws while in the US.

Not true - as long as the foreign court exercises due process and there is a sufficient connection between the venue and the act that gives rise to the suit, a US court will enforce the judgement of a foreign court.

Arrogant perhaps, but not totally fools

[Max Hyre]

I pray they can't touch Dow-Jones's assets here, though I'm not too sure, given the treaties the U.S. has been pushing/signing lately. They could also make it very hard for any DJ execs to take a nice vacation in Sydney.

The real problem, though, comes up should DJ have any significant assets in Oz. Those are definitely at risk, just as the U.S. freezes or takes the local assets of foreign organizations it doesn't like. I suspect an operation like DJ prints an Australian edition, and has local staff for reports on the Aussie stock market(s?), in which case they've definitely got something to lose.

We can only hope the Supreme Court can see what the country, and society, have to lose if they let this stand.

Internet trials = End of Globalization?

[Chope]

There is a reall tit-for-tat nature to these Internet "criminal" proceedings that seems to have gone unnoticed. It reminds me of an old programming joke/definition:

Recursive: See Recursive

Would it be reasonable to assume that on some newspaper stand in Australia one could find a newspaper published and printed in the USA that's been imported into Australia? Who's liable the case of defamation under that scenario - the author, the importer, the newsstand, none of the above, or any/all of the above?

Others have pointed out attempts to enforce laws based on where the wires that carry the traffic are located. Yet in the USA at least, we've absolved the wire owners of liability for content.

Then there's the case of Dmitry Sklyarov, arrested in the USA for doing something in another country that is legal in that country.

Point being: Legislation is a horrendously (and in most cases, thankfully) slow process. It will be years, perhaps scores of years, before meaningful, cogent legislation addressing the global Internet is signed and passes legal scrutiny. Until then (and maybe even afterwards) if our litigious society continues to litigate these matters, it's quite possible that so many people will be under indictment in various countries as to start impacting world travel. Globalization will collapse and the world will start to look very isolationist.

Australian High Snot to Snot Net Desnottation Case

[The WIPO Troll]

THE OFFICIAL TACO-SNOTTING FAQ By The WIPO Troll, $Revision: 1.13 $

Why have I been receiving emails from some guy called "CmdrTaco," in which he seems to be speaking in some kind of code language?

You have been receiving email from a certain Robert "CmdrTaco" Malda, owner of the popular technology website Slashdot. Actually, it's not a very "popular" site in the common sense of the word; the site is rife with pimply, antisocial geeks, zit-faced nerds, dirty GNU hippies and communists, and other societal rejects. It's also home to the world's most infamous pædophile ring, the "Slashdot crew."

Whenever CmdrTaco gets bored (and who wouldn't, running a site like Slashdot all day), he roams through the Slashdot database, penis in hand, looking for people who might enjoy engaging in homosexual orgies with him. How he determines this is anyone's guess; but if you have a homosexual-sounding nickname, or a nick with the letter P or E in it, you're in trouble.

And this time, he found you. Lucky you.

CmdrTaco's code language is relatively easy to decipher. He prefers to speak in thinly-veiled sexual innuendo to evade the watchful (but relatively stupid) eye of Slashdot's parent corporation, VA Software. CmdrTaco's "Commander" is, of course, his penis -- a small, withered little thing that lives in his pants and only comes out in the presence of other male geeks or at the beck and call of CmdrTaco's own lubed-up right hand. His "Taco bells" are the shriveled testicles that droop beneath his Commander, and his "Taco sauce" is his thick, gooey semen. It should be more than obvious to you now what he means if he asked you to "ring his Taco bells" or "taste his gourmet Taco sauce."

Lastly, there is the practice he refers to as "Taco-snotting" and the more revolting "circle-snot."

Good Lord. What is "Taco-snotting?"

"Taco-snotting" is the term used by CmdrTaco to refer to an act of fellating a homosexual man (or unwilling heterosexual; CmdrTaco is rumoured to prefer rape), then blowing the semen out his nose onto the face and body of his partner or victim. Naturally, a long, bubbly stream of milky-white semen is left on CmdrTaco's face, dribbling out of his nose and down his cheek: hence the term, "Taco-snotting."

A "circle-snot" is a Taco-snotting circle-jerk, another practice common among the Slashdot crew. CmdrTaco, CowboiKneel, and Homos get together and snot each other with their gooey, sticky cum -- spooging their jizz-snot all over each other's faces and pasty, white bodies, until they're covered head to toe with their own and each other's man juice. This vile ritual can go on for hours. For the homosexual penetration that follows this lengthy foreplay, Roblowme is usually there to provide plenty of anal lubricant; he owns a limo service and has ample supplies of motor oil and axle grease ready to go.

To complete this perverted orgy, fellow geeks Michael, Timothy, and Jamie will usually join in, dressed in tight leather mock-S.S. uniforms, jack boots, and leather gloves. The whole group then proceeds to snot each other's spunk and whip each other's pudgy asses with riding crops and chains until their pale, white geek bodies are exhausted and soaked in stinking sweat from the hours of passionate, homosexual revelry.

Ewwwwww. So, can I stop receiving these emails?

Hopefully.

You most likely forgot to uncheck the "Willing to Taco-snot" checkbox in your account preferences. CmdrTaco has probably already got the hots for your wad, and he's probably already been lurking outside your bathroom window for weeks with a camera, some tissues and lube. There's no escaping a geek in heat, so it's probably too late for you, but you can possibly rectify this situation. To remove yourself from CmdrTaco's sights, log into your Slashdot account, go to your user page, click on Messages, and uncheck the box next to "Willing to Taco-snot." Maybe he'll ignore you. Probably not.

I can't stop receiving these emails from CmdrTaco!?

If you indulge him in a Taco-snot or two, he might leave you alone. You might also want to look into mail filtering, restraining orders, or purchasing a heavy, blunt object capable of warding off rampaging homosexual geeks in heat. Trust me, when they charge... oh, the humanity. If he gets you, and you let him Taco-snot you, you will most likely end up tied up in his basement to be used as his sex slave for the rest of your life (or until he accidentally drowns you in spunk in a circle-snot).

Have you ever been Taco-Snotted?

Unfortunately, yes. I first met CmdrTaco at an Open Source Convention. He invited me back to his room for a game of Quake and some "gourmet Tacos," but when I got there, he jumped me and tied me to his bed, stripping me. After taking his "Commander" out of his pants, Mr. Taco made me suck the withered thing six times. He then performed his vile Taco-snotting ritual on me three times over the next two hours, bringing me to orgasm after sweaty, mind-numbing orgasm... then he snotted my own milky-white jizz back onto my face, into my mouth, then again on my exposed belly.

CmdrTaco invited several of his Open Source (or rather, "Open Sauce" -- man sauce) buddies over to continue the twisted snotfest. Linux Torvalds raped my ass with his "monolithic kernel," and Anal Cox used his "network stack" in a multitude of unspeakable ways on and in every orifice in my defenseless body. Michael was there in his leather Nazi uniform, caning my ass with a bamboo pole and ranting about "all those Censorware freaks out to get him."

How did you finally escape, you ask? After about 16 hours of countless homosexual atrocities perpetrated against my restrained body, they all finally went to sleep on top of me, sweat-soaked and exhausted. I was left there, covered in bubbly, translucent jizz-snot, chained to the bed, with half a dozen fat, pasty-white fags lying around and on top of me. Fortunately the spooge coating my flesh worked wonderfully as a lubricant; I was able to squirm my way out of the handcuffs and slip out the back door. I'm just glad I survived the ordeal. These geeks had a lot of built-up spunk in their wads -- I could've easily been drowned!

That's horrible. Does "Taco-snotting" have anything to do with CmdrTaco's "special taco"?

No, that's a different disgusting perversion CmdrTaco indulges himself in. CmdrTaco is usually not satisfied with merely snotting your own jizz back onto your face, he most often enjoys involving his own bodily fluids in his twisted games. WeatherTroll has spent some time trying to educate the Slashdot readership about this vile practice (emphasis added):

You may be wondering what CmdrTaco's "special taco" is. You will be wishing that you hadn't been wondering after you finish reading this post. To make his "special taco", CmdrTaco takes a taco shell and shits on it. He then adds lettuce, jacks off on the taco, and adds a compound to make the person who eats the taco unconscious. Of course, the compound does not make the person unconscious until the taco is fully eaten. Thus CmdrTaco force-feeds the taco to the unsuspecting victim.

After the victim is unconscious, he is held against his will and used for CmdrTaco's nefarious sexual purposes. This includes shoving taco shells up the victim's ass, Taco-snotting, and getting Jon Katz involved.

Completely different, yet no less revolting. It should be clear to you now that CmdrTaco is a very, very sick individual, as are most of the Slashdot editors.

Does Jon Katz get involved in any of this? I thought he was a pædophile, not a homosexual.

Actually, Jon Katz is a homosexual pædophile. He's also a coprophiliac, and, many suspect, a zophile. Jon Katz is somewhat of a loner and doesn't involve himself in circle-snots. Mr. Katz usually engages in a game called " Katz juicy-douching" with his harem of little-boy slaves: a vile practice which involves administering an enema to himself of the little boy's urine (forced out of them with a pair of pliers), spooging the vile muck from his ass back into the enema bag, then squirting and slathering the goo all over himself, and the little boy's chained-up and naked bodies. If he's in the mood, he will sometimes skip refilling the enema bag and just squirt it from his ass onto his boys. Unwilling boys are further tortured with the pliers until they comply and allow Mr. Katz to juicy-douche them for the rest of their lives.

As I already said, Mr. Katz is also a zophile. As if the sexual escapades with the helpless little boys aren't enough, Jon usually enjoys his juicy-douches best when his penis is firmly planted in a female goat's anus. He is also rumoured to get off on watching his little boys eat the goat's small, bean-like turds.

...Are you getting hard writing this?

Why, yes. :) Join me in a WIPO-snot?

No, thanks. I'm already CmdrTaco's boi toi.

________________________________________ RECENT READER COMMENTS

Once comments have been archived by Slashdot, they're removed from the Official Taco-Snotting FAQ. However much I would like to paste 200k crapfloods into Slashdot, my browser is a piece of shit and won't let me!

1. Re:Taco-Powered Christmas Snot (Score:0) by Anonymous Coward on 2001.12.15 7:05 (#2707493)

   Has this been submitted to linuxdoc.org yet?

2. Re:Bye bye Windows! (Score:0) by Anonymous Coward on 2001.12.15 5:12 (#2707245)

   That may be true, but have you made love to a wombat today?

3. Re:That's my department, boy! (Score:-1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward (actually afree87) on 2001.12.15 2:51 (#2706921)

   Wow, WipoTroll, you really know how to snot! And you can scramble Slashdot's HTML, too! I love boys who do that! Come over to my place sometime!

4. Re:CmdrTaco BANNED FOR LIFE from Taco Bell!!!!!! (Score:-1) by WeatherTroll on 2001.12.15 2:48 (#2706907)

   CmdrTaco only goes to Taco Bell to get their hot sauce, and to solicit hot sauce enemas from underage male employees. He makes his own tacos.

5. Re:Snottle OSnotX, BSnotD, and Snottan Snottard (Score:0) by Anonymous Coward (actually afree87) on 2001.12.15 2:47 (#2706900)

   We love you, WipoTroll! We want you to snot us, WipoTroll!

6. Re:Bye bye Windows! (Score:-1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on 2001.12.15 1:35 (#2706675)

   I want some Taco-snot! Where can I get some?

7. Re:Bye bye Windows! (Score:-1) by JonKatz on on 2001.12.15 0:29 (#2706495)

   Please, please, please Taco-snot me. I know I would love it almost as much as fucking young boys. Pleadingly, JonKatz

8. Important Information For Slashdot Users (Score:-1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on 2001.12.14 3:09 (#2702660)

   It has recently come to my attention that the entire Slashdot crew engage in homosexual activities. CmdrTaco is one such person, and has dedicated his life to spreading the ideals of Taco-Snotting while enjoying the benefits of it. For further information on Taco-Snotting please refer to George WIPO Bush's Taco-Snotting FAQ which can be easily found by searching for the Slashdot journal of George WIPO Bush or by looking in the comments of Slashdot articles (Usually modded -1).

   It has also come to my attention that CmdrTaco has other interests besides homosexuality (Believe it or not). One such interest includes a budding music career with a song titled "Gaping Anus". The details are sketchy on this topic but I do know that besides the lead vocals of CmdrTaco, it includes Timothy and CowboyNeal (Also members of the Slashdot crew). There has been no release date set for this album or which record label it will be produced under. I believe CmdrTaco is planning to set up his own label, Taco-Snotting Records, with the intention of releasing the song on a cd-single with various remixes as soon as possible (To catch the current popularity of the Taco-Snotting fad). On a side note, I would not believe this fad will ever wear out (like a Snotted-out-geek); I am sorry to say Taco-Snotting is here to stay :-(. Various remixes of Gaping Anus will include: "Extra Jizz", "Snot Me Baby One More Time", "www.Goatse.cx", and "Once You Taco-Snot, You Can't Stop". I am sure many, many, more are sure to come. I predict this album will be a very hot seller this holiday season, especially with in or out of closet homosexuals, and with those who have no self-respect (Readers of Slashdot).

   Through a good, non-homosexual friend of mine, I have recieved a copy of the lyrics to the Gaping Anus musical composition. Included after the lyrics is a very speical tribute written by yours truely. Perhaps CmdrTaco will ask me to provide the vocals. Please feel free to read the lyrics and post your comments and disgust. E-mail CmdrTaco with this disgust also.

   BTW, please do not reply with the intention of flaming me because the lyrics are a rip-off of Insane Clown Posse's "Slim Anus". For more information on ICP and Slim Anus refer here and here. CmdrTaco is the author of this fine musical work and not me. So, it is obviously he who has ripped off ICP and not me. Thank you.

   Read the rest of this shit...

9. Re:Snotback: Snotto, Snotz, Snottion (Score:0) by Anonymous Coward on 2001.12.14 2:44 (#2702581)

   you know, every time i read this i want to punch you more and more. the taco snotting thing is old, lame, boring, and over done. it never was remotely funny or good though. it sounds like a 10th grader wrote it too. so please, go play in traffic or shut the fuck up so real trolls can post.

10. Re:Italics are yummy! (Score:-1, Troll) by Super Mario Troll on 2001.12.14 2:33 (#2702535)

    Keep up the good work! Educate the masses to the dangers of Taco-Snotting!

    It's a me, the Super Mario Troll! Would you like to see my gaping troll anus
11. Re:Italics are yummy! (Score:-1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on 2001.12.14 1:41 (#2702370)

    WIPO - Man you trolls are shit compared to Egg Trolls troll's. Egg Man is just so much more original.

12. Re:The WIPO Troll Announces Portable Snotbox (Score:-1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on 2001.12.07 7:58 (#2669658)

    That leaky sound you hear is CmdrTaco pissing himself after seeing this.

    Slashdot trolling just got a whole lot easier...

    http://www.geocities.com/frostpist/

    Spread the word!

13. Re:The WIPO Troll Announces Portable Snotbox (Score:-1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on 2001.12.07 5:48 (#2669422)

    Q: Is CmdrTaco gay?

    A: He Mos' certainly is!

14. Re:The WIPO Troll Announces Portable Snotbox (Score:-1) by GaylordFucker on 2001.12.07 5:39 (#2669394)

    not to mention... The WIPO Troll used himself as a test subject to try out the portable snotbox... i await your results and hope your product gets approved...

    Regards, Gay

    Get that rats nest off your head, you numbskull -- Wesley Willis

15. Re:Portable Snotcube! (Score:-1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on 2001.12.07 3:58 (#2669117)

    stfu. no one really cares about your lame little "troll". make some new material (not that anything you've ever said is worth a damn..)

16. Re:Yum yum taco-snotting! (Score:-1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on 2001.12.02 22:15 (#2644499)

    Dear SLASH crew - this post makes it clear why you need to add a new category - "tell it like it is (+1)"

17. This is getting old (Score:-1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on 2001.12.02 20:14 (#2644227)

    Hey dicksuck, why don't you come up with new troll material? Everyone has seen the tacosnotting 100 times already. Fuckwit. Assholage. Gay. Lick my anal nectar.

18. Fucking hilarious too bad it didnt get a 5:Funny (Score:-1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on 2001.12.02 19:01 (#2644105)

    this is good shit man

19. Re:Taco-snotting@Home! (Score:-1, Offtopic) by Dark_Cobra87 on 2001.12.01 23:03 (#2642180)

    Oops, forgot to check that Taco-snot option...

20. Re:Fuck Linux! Fuck him hard! (Score:-1) by Fecal Troll Matter on 2001.12.01 20:55 (#2641791)

    Mmmmmmm, Taco Sauce...

    Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)

21. Look (Score:-1) by ArchieBunker on 2001.12.01 20:19 (#2641679)

    I love trolling but this shit is getting old, fast. At least start mixing them up a little bit. How about the 'How OSM was Freed' series?

    http://www.naawp.org/

22. Re:Congratulations! You have been WIPO'd!! (Score:0) by Anonymous Coward on 2001.12.01 8:37 (#2640602)

    Stop posting this! I've got hangover and Taco Snotting doesn't make me feel any better.

    I'm really glad that Taco Snotting is illegal here in Europe.

________________________________________

• The URL of this document is http://slashdot.org/journal.pl? op=display &uid=267426 &id=2346.
• Previous revisions are maintained at http://slashdot.org/journal.pl? op=display &uid=308209.

$Id: tacosnotting.html,v 1.13 2001/12/15 23:00:00 wipo Exp $

Copyright © 2001 The WIPO Troll. Verbatim crapflooding of this document is permitted in any medium, provided this copyright notice is preserved, and next time you take a dump, you think of the WIPO Troll and all he's done to make Slashdot a better place.

national security?

[Anonymous Coward]

Katie Sierra:When I saw dead & dying Afghani kids, I felt a newly recovered sense of national security-God bless America

some people call that bloodthirsty revenge

if you don't want people to rejoice when Americans are killed, you might want to stop repeating vile rubbish

Interesting

[Anonymous Coward]

mod this up

It would be sufficient...

[Krapangor]

to have decent international treaties which regulate such incidents.

I think the only problem that we don't have such things is that states like Iran or China etc. would try to use them to silence any opposition located in different countries or even to silence negative press.
Note that this isn't unlikely, I remember the case of an Iranian author (?) who was arrested in Iran because he attended an converence in Berlin which a not viewed positive by the Iranian goverment. And btw the converence in Berlin was organized by one of the ruling parties in Germany, the Greens. So you can't count on these guys to "play fair".

The other question would be of course if any rulings could be enforced at all. International treaties are one thing, but enforcement often fails. That e.g. the treaties for returning abducted children after a divorce. The rules are pretty clear but the involved countries usually try to keep the children (cases from US, Germany, France well known).

Clarification; Idaho case link

[Sheetrock]

I'm not overly thrilled with the DMCA either. However, I really don't understand the parent's position. One type of speech arguably could be used to facilitate the commission of a crime. And most if not all US states do have laws against supplying training to people knowing that training will be used for criminal purposes. OTOH, so-called "hate crimes" laws (of the Euro flavor) mostly criminalize speech on the basis of "It makes someone feel bad and tries to assuage our guilt over the Nazis/Fascists/Vichy/et cetera."

I'm not clear about which position you don't understand, so I'll try to rehash my thoughts in a different way.

Many seem to feel that free speech in the USA means or should mean that you can say whatever you want. The grandparent to your post has noted that Europe is restricting speech over its wires by prohibiting the transmission of racist content. The poster then makes light of the priorities in America (which are indeed screwed up) because our legislators have seen fit to pass a bill that effectively restricts our speech in regards to certain technical content while racist content is still permitted to exist. The poster's comment also stated that because America runs the DNS system we shouldn't be surprised that other countries want jurisdiction over the Internet.

I don't know whether the poster is upset at our priorities because he/she feels that we should have the same restrictions and laws as Europe (which seems to be a common complaint from Europeans, though I don't know where the poster hails from) or because of the inherent hypocracy of touting free speech and indicting Skylarov with the same mouth. I wanted to address both possibilities, which is probably why my real position sounded conflicted. My position, which I didn't really mention in the post because I only wanted to address the technical side of things, is that hate crime legislation is redundant and unnecessary in the U.S. If someone murders someone else, does the race of the victim really matter in determining the severity of the crime? What about battery? Or repeated harassment? If we think the punishments are too weak in the cases where these crimes cross racial lines, they're too weak when they don't. Hate crime legislation categorizes people in a world where we need to think of each other as equals. It achieves what it is seeking to prevent.

Could hate crime statutes criminalize mere speech? Of course; we've got other laws on the books that do as well. For example, using speech as a mechanism to get someone fired from their job on false pretenses is and should be illegal because it is going from the realm of disseminating ideas and concepts to the realm of actively causing harm to someone in particular (think libel and slander). Both the DMCA and hate crime legislation dance on the line between these two realms. One might say that, however distasteful, a holocaust denial website should be permitted to exist because the creator has a right to speak his mind; that censorship in the past has proven to be a detriment to the sharing of culture and knowledge and that you have to take the bad with the good. On the other hand, someone else would state that such a site is a harassment to a group who have endured misery on a scale most of us can only imagine. My point is that the apparent lack of priorities in the American system is really a symptom of the complexity of resolving the conflict of interest between free speech and anti-racism/pro-corporate agendas (corporations are making more headway against the First Amendment because their lobbyists are better funded). My position is that we need to be a lot more careful about telling people what they can't think and what they can't say because while we're supposedly doing this to bolster freedom (irony, that) it paves the way towards having a naive and unopinionated population that is just as capable of supporting evil as it is of good because it doesn't know any better.

I agree with libel and slander laws, anti-stalking laws, anti-harrassment laws, and the spirit of the DMCA, provided that all would be so carefully worded that there can be no doubt about the intent to harm in the speech or actions of those who violate the laws, but when the legislation is so sloppily constructed as to threaten to ruin the lives of someone who gets careless with his insults (Idaho case, see below) or permit publishers to sidestep our fair use rights with legislation merely intended to protect their works from exploitation it's just wrong.

The First Amendment has been so important to the foundation of our society in the U.S. that we shouldn't start stripping it down now just because we're fat, dumb, and happy and don't think we need to be as free anymore. Many of the problems people have with just thinking for themselves nowadays is because they get information spoonfed from CNN or Fox and think that's the whole story. The flow of information and concepts are being restricted to a couple of chokepoints where everything judged to be unsavory or unnewsworthy is filtered out and no matter where you go you get the same four pieces of news for the day with slightly different spins on them. That's before we even get started with the speech-limiting laws.

I've always viewed the Internet as an excellent way of importing freedom. In my case, I can visit news sites and talk with citizens in foreign countries to find out what the hell is really going on out there. So when each country starts deciding the rules for the rest of us, I get a bit nervous. Yes, that applies to when the U.S. does it every bit as much as it does to when Germany, Australia, or France does it. You mentioned the DMCA, which by the way is largely a codification of international law (WIPO), but I'm even more worried about the potential impact of certain provisions in the USA PATRIOT Act on the rest of the world. International cooperation and a laissez-faire attitude is what helped build the Internet, and I think that the aggregation of unpalatable laws from every country involved in handling its traffic will only serve to tear it down.

I usually cite sources, BTW, but I got lazy in my last post. You can read more about the Idaho case involving Lonny Rae here. This is from August of this year, and while I'm sure there will be more to this story it hasn't happened yet. The latest thing I could find on it was a rethoric-packed plea from his lawyer for support in the beginning of September here saying that it was going to trial in three weeks, but I haven't seen anything about it since. My guess is that media attention to this case will pick up again either when it goes to trial or when a verdict is announced, but I don't think the law has been overturned yet.

Re:Clarification; Idaho case link

[Happy go Lucky]

I don't know whether the poster is upset at our priorities because he/she feels that we should have the same restrictions and laws as Europe (which seems to be a common complaint from Europeans, though I don't know where the poster hails from) or because of the inherent hypocracy of touting free speech and indicting Skylarov with the same mouth.

I'm not fond of blowing hot and cold either. I don't like the DMCA. I didn't become a cop to protect the MPAA/DVDCCA from having their disks viewed on *bsd boxen.

That being said, I can understand the dichotomy. It's a shaky argument, but it is illegal in many US states to teach people specific skills knowing that those skills will be used for criminal purposes (c.f. your state's terrorist training laws such as CO Revised Statute 18-9-120 and equivalents).

Don't misconstrue me here. I'm not defending the DMCA or the disgrace that has been done to Skylarov, Felten, and others. I'm just saying that there arguably is precedent. My own opinion is that, short of perjury/harassment/menacing/threats and Constitutionally-tested time/place/manner restrictions, speech absolutely should not be criminalized. Public safety and peacekeeping give us enough work to do without also having to enforce good manners.

I wanted to address both possibilities, which is probably why my real position sounded conflicted. My position, which I didn't really mention in the post because I only wanted to address the technical side of things, is that hate crime legislation is redundant and unnecessary in the U.S. If someone murders someone else, does the race of the victim really matter in determining the severity of the crime? What about battery? Or repeated harassment? If we think the punishments are too weak in the cases where these crimes cross racial lines, they're too weak when they don't. Hate crime legislation categorizes people in a world where we need to think of each other as equals. It achieves what it is seeking to prevent.

I'll certainly not argue with you here. I've had perfectly valid harassment, menacing, and criminal mischief cases get clouded by DA's who wanted to also charge Ethnic Intimidation (what we call "hate crimes" here.) I believe that involving race/ethnicity/religion/etc. at best will cloud what should be a clear issue.

Could hate crime statutes criminalize mere speech? Of course; we've got other laws on the books that do as well.

There's a slight disconnect here. My state's Ethnic Intimidation law reads a lot like Idaho's. The only things that it seems to criminalize are things that are already illegal under other statutes-harassment/stalking, assault, menacing, criminal mischief, and so forth. It does expand on them a little, but not much.

I also think that we'd be prudent to consider harassment/stalking laws separately from slander/libel/defamation laws. The former are criminal. The latter usually are not. Criminal libel statutes do still exist in some states, but they tend to get knocked down whenever they're charged.

I usually cite sources, BTW, but I got lazy in my last post. You can read more about the Idaho case involving Lonny Rae here [go.com]. This is from August of this year, and while I'm sure there will be more to this story it hasn't happened yet.

Now that I've read it, it seems slightly more plausible. Even without a hate-crimes law it would arguably be a valid disorderly-conduct case. And since the article included the actual statute, it looks a lot more sound to me.

This case will be very interesting.

[thirdrock]

What's more important here is the bigger picture of the 'new world order'. A world under the rule of law, not the rule of the jungle, or some such bullshit rhetoric.

The United States Govt has been pushing for a world government, presumably with the US as it's head of state. What will be interesting to see is if this 'rule of law' is something that also applies to the United States and it's Korporations, or whether it is something that will be imposed by force on the rest of the world by the US, while the new 'Rome' remains exempt.

After all, intelligent well informed people did wonder when the 'war on terrorism', including 'any nation that trains or harbours terrorists' was going to extend to the CIA and US military, who have trained and harboured more genocidal despots and 'counter revolutionary' terrorists than any other nation on earth.

But no, it seems there is a double standard. It's OK for the US to train 'freedom fighters', but piss-poor nations can have the shit bombed out of them for harbouring 'terrorists' (ironically, the same people!)

So now we get to see if the double standard also applies to the rule of law. Will a US Korporation even ACCEPT or COMPLY to a ruling of an Australian court, or will you start bombing Australia as well?

Personally, I don't like the idea of a world government, but what is more frightening is the idea of a world government that is completely above the law.

Actually...

[Anonymous Coward]

You are talking about Quebec, they are a little strange over there, adn also it's not a police force they're more like bylaw officers.