the Learning Channel and PBS do all sorts of neat documentaries on our spy agencies all the time with their full cooperation
I would hope (I'm not an American so I don't know) that they do the occasional documentary without their full cooperation too, or else it's difficult to believe there's any point to these "documentaries" other than propaganda.
IIRC, The DMCA makes it illegal to break encryption used as part of a copy-protection system.
You do not rcc. The DMCA has nothing to say on the subject of copy-protection. It is about access controls. It is illegal to circumvent a technological measure that effectively controls access to copyrighted information. When you create information it is by default copyrighted, and in any event you can't tell what the information is until you access it for which you would need to circumvent the access control... i.e. the DMCA does indeed effectively prohibit decrypting the information.
Your second point was valid though. If the court believes that the scheme was set up primarily to circumvent the law then the scheme will probably be illegal to operate.
But downloading MP3s has been an important selling point for internet connectivity, especially DSL. Those announcements that it's being banned followed by the appearance of enforcing the ban would lose you customers. Why do it?
Actually, that's not true. Judge Garzon came up with that excuse after the english courts threw away most of the accusations against Pinochet (which were 1800+, ranging from "genocide" to "A cop hit me." [I'm not kidding]). For further illustration, take a look at his process against Argentinian dictators - same thing.
Genocide would certainly fit as a crime against humanity under international law.
And even if it were international law, you must remember that it wasn't law at the time of the alleged crimes, and law cannot be applied retroactively.
You are wrong on both counts. Crimes against humanity (of which he was accused) date back to the end of World War II. That was the first point at which they appeared and they were applied retroactively at that time. So these laws did exist at the time of the crimes and laws can be applied retroactively.
I think the point he was making with the reference to Marbury v. Madison is that the constitution does not give any special role to the Supreme Court with respect to considering the constitutionality of laws. That has arisen from case law, specifically Marbury v. Madison.
For that reason you are mistaken in saying that it is "the" job of the Supreme Court to examine constitutionality of laws. Their job continues to be to serve as the highest court of appeal, just as it was before Marbury v. Madison.
It is considered to be implicit (following Marbury v. Madison, before that it would have been controvertial to say the least) that the courts do not enforce laws that are not valid under the consitution. As you note, it isn't only the Supreme Court that that applies to.
Sklyarov knew what he did was illegal in the US, so what does he do? Comes to a convention there. I high profile hacker convention no less. Although i'm not comparing the crimes outright, when was the last time you have seen a Columbia drug lord attend a pharmacutical convention in the US?
If you've ever driven on the right in your country then you'd better never come to the UK, we have laws for dealing with people like you.
It depends. If you give a speech at a conference which incites a riot, that would be illegal. If you give a speech at a conference which is slanderous, that's illegal. If you give a speech at a conference which divulges trade secrets, that's illegal. But the mere act of giving a speech at a conference describing how to circumvent access controls is not illegal. As in, it may or may not be legal depending on what else you do.
For the sake of avoiding pointless sidetracking, assume that the speech is not illegal for purposes that have nothing to do with the DMCA. e.g. there's nothing slanderous in it.
The question is, is reading source code a form of speech?
Well, it's a question at least, doesn't seem like a hard one though. Could you provide a reasonable definition of speech that would not cover this?
I think the meat of the question comes down to whether or not the people listening to the speech understand what the speaker is saying, or are just blindly typing things into their computer.
Clearly this is not a conventional test for whether something is speech. For example, whether the people viewing a work of art understand it does not determine whether it is speech. What determines whether it is speech is whether there was a message there to be understood.
In addition, if the message is "typing this into your computer will achieve this effect" then clearly it is speech. You or Congress or the MPAA or even the courts may deem it undesirable speech, but to deny that it is speech is simply dishonest. If I say "my slashdot password is ewfkjdwljf" then did you understand my message? Was it speech? I think you understood and it was speech. The significance of "ewfkjdwljf", if any, doesn't change the fact that I imparted information to you.
That was what the Kaplan ruling said, anyway. It seems clear to me that there is no difference between transferring a program via ethernet and transferring it via sound waves.
Absolutely. I agree with you 100%, Kaplan was saying that it is illegal to tell anyone this information i.e. this specific method of accessing encrypted data. That's why I don't understand your repeated claim that "the mere act of giving a speech at a conference describing how to circumvent access controls is not illegal."
Re: "in order to access", depending on the specific instructions, it could probably be construed as trafficking in a service.
It provides a service, sure, any speech that is understood provides or potentially provides a service to the listener. It provides information, in this case how to access a DVD. (I think you meant "providing" by "trafficking", if not then perhaps you could explain)
It would have to be weighed against the free speech rights of the speaker, of course, and would depend on how understandable what must be typed in would be to the person involved.
The reference to weighing against the free speech rights of the speaker sounds to me like you are now accepting that this is indeed speech. Is that correct or not? You seemed unclear previously. If it isn't speech then there is no weighing to be done.
"you must click on the icon that looks like..." is doubtfully illegal. I'll be so bold as to say that it's not illegal (barring extremely strange circumstances such as "you must click on the icon that looks like Dmitry Sklyarov, in other words, has a huge wart on it's face", which would be slanderous).
So if I say "click on the icon that looks like a DVD with an open padlock on it" then you understand what I say and it it speech? And if I say "type in 'twas brillig and the slithy toves did gyre and gimble in the wabe'" then you have also understood what I have said and it is still speech. And if I say "type in..." anything else then you have also understood what I have said and it is still speech. I have told you a what actions to take in order to achieve something. What is there to not understand?
Well, I think any explanation which could be understood by the audience would probably be legal.
I assume you agree that source code is at least intended to be understood by people. That's the whole point of it. Instead of dealing directly with bits we abstract it to 1s and 0s and then further abstract it to hex and then further abstract it to assembly code and then further abstract it to a high level code... every step the purpose is to make it comprehensible to people.
Obviously anything with a commercially significant purpose other than to break the law would be legal.
Is it supposed to be obvious that commercial speech is now more protected than other speech? Why does the significant purpose have to be a commercial one? If accurate that's appalling.
If the information is "disseminated in a manner reasonably calculated to advance the state of knowledge or development of encryption technology" it might be legal.
So you move from your initial claim that telling someone how to break the encryption is not in itself illegal to the position that in general it is illegal but that there can be a defence in some cases?
Freedom of speech is the freedom of communication between humans.
And everyone listening to the speech is human. I don't think it can be seriously denied that telling someone what commands to enter to a computer constitutes speech. There are limitations on freedom of speech, but denying that this is speech between humans is absurd.
Really it's up to the courts to decide, ultimately the supreme court if it comes to that. The Kaplan ruling is not the final word on the matter, but you should read it.
I know it must seem almost incomprehensible that someone who disagrees with you could be otherwise than completely ignorant but in fact I have read it. Doubtless you'll conclude that I'm too stupid to have understood it.
Ultimately it'll probably be up to the supreme court to set some more explicit guidelines, such as they did in the provisions of fair use.
Yes, I expect it will.
That still leaves the point that either giving a speech that tells someone how to circumvent an access control is itself illegal or else it is not. You seem to hold both positions simultaneously and I don't understand this double think at all. Either telling someone how to circumvent an access control is functional in the sense that Kaplan used or else it is not.
I can send you a legal threat for sneezing, that doesn't make it illegal, nor does it even imply that I think it's illegal.
That's just idiotic. Of course sending a legal threat implies that you think that what they're doing is illegal. It may be untrue that you think it's illegal but the implication is real and deliberate.
While I don't agree with that particular part of the ruling, that is quite different from giving a talk at a conference (as long as that talk does not involve reading out the source code, anyway).
That doesn't make any sense. You were saying, or at least I understood you to be saying, that it isn't illegal to give a speech at a conference descibing how to circumvent access controls. Now you seem to be implying that if you read out source code (i.e. explicitly tell people how to circumvent access controls) that that would or might be illegal. Which is it? I see nothing in the DMCA that distinguishes between source code and any other description of a process.
To be clear on this : you do think that saying "in order to access the disk, you must type the following into your computer..." followed by explicit instructions could be illegal? Would "you muct click the icon that looks like..." be illegal too? If not then what is your distinction between the two acts both of which are "functional" commands to a computer? If you do think these explanations are or might be illegal then what type of explanation could be given that would not be illegal? Basically any explanation that isn't complete enough to genuinely explain?
I guess this must be a matter of taste, but personally I'd much rather not be "saved from myself" (whatever that means, it sounds like gibberish to me, if I want to do something then of course I don't want to be prevented from doing it).
I would much rather have a box that came up telling me what a terrible idea it is, and then let me go ahead and break my system if that's what I really want to do.
The same goes for tobacco, alcohol and other dangerous substances : health warning good, prohibition bad.
If you sent him an email complaining about unfair moderation without telling him what it was that was unfairly moderated then his response seems perfectly reasonable.
If your email was just enquiring after his health with no reference to moderation though then his reply would seem a little odd.
What exactly are we supposed to conclude from just the reply?
BTW, KDE doesn't just run on Linux. AFAIK Gnome is Linux-only.
Since Sun and HP are both adopting Gnome as their standard desktops I think it's reasonable to assume that Gnome doesn't only run on Linux. But just to be clear about it, no Gnome doesn't only run on Linux.
...The philosophers like Stallman are important (and I realize they've contributed significantly on the practical side), but the ultimate goal of OSS is to produce software that people like and use, not write treatises...
...do what Torvalds and ESR (and the Mono guys) did (albeit somewhat unintentionally in Torvalds' case). Create the beginnings of a project...
So if I understand what you're saying, you view ESR as more of a coder and RMS as a mere philosopher? What do you base that on?
I'm sure bickering goes on at Microsoft behind closed doors
And plenty more bickering goes on between proprietary software makers in public, and indeed in court.
Good luck in your quest for a world of harmony where nobody ever disagrees... actually no, I'm not sure I'd like a world like that at all. Good luck in coming to terms with the world, imperfect as it may be, hope it's not too much of a disapointment to you.
Think of how much more powerful the Open Source movement would be if we didn't spend half our time playing politics with other Open Source projects and instead spent that time coding.
How about if you were to stop complaining about how other people choose to spend their own time and instead you spend your time coding?
The part of the DCMA being discussed here is the prohibition of the development and sale of tools to circumvent copyright protection. This is unique to the DCMA and therefore is new.
No, the prohibition is on tools to cicumvent access controls, not copyright protection.
Norway is not a signatory to the Berne Convention?
Whilst I'm unfamiliar with the Norwegian legal system, I'd be very suprised if just signing a treaty had the effect of enacting laws. If Norway has signed a treaty agreeing to prohibit access control circumvention devices then they would be obliged to prohibit those devices. If they failed to prohibit them then it would continue to be lawful for one of their citizens to create such a device, the government would merely be failing in it's obligation to make it illegal.
Treaties bind countries not individuals. If your country breaks a treaty then other countries can erm.. call your country bad names, launch a military operation, be uncooperative or untrusting towards your country... all things they can do anyway of course and will if they really want to and won't if they don't want to but that's not the point:) At most it gives your country's opponents (and maybe your government's internal critics) some moral high ground.
In any event, the Berne convention does not require signatories to prohibit access control circumvention devices. If you think otherwise then please quote the relevant sections.
Of course, last time I checked, no one in this country signed a wavier giving others the right to decide what drugs they may or may not take, unlike this IP issue, which derives from living in a civilized society where people can't just go take other people's stuff.
So far as I know nobody has even accused Dmitry of taking anybody's stuff. What you're saying is that your "civilized" society restricts what ideas people can communicate to one another, even if they do so in other less restrictive societies. At least be honest about it.
That's a swell argument that, other than letting you feel important, isn't going to convince anyone of anything.
That's right, he should pretend to have those feelings / beliefs that would help him "win" the argument. Then we can achieve the ultimate dream for of a world where nobody has any integrity or respect for the truth, where they just say whatever they think will convince others. Seriously, you seem to have pretty twisted values.
Re:The best way to expose a bad law is to enforce
on
Still in DMCA Prison
·
· Score: 1
They have limited resources. Not only should they pick and choose which laws to enforce, they have no option but to do so.
We can't just arbitrarily decide which laws we want to obey from day to day.
Arbitrarily deciding which laws to obey, or arbitrarily doing anything important for that matter, is a bad idea. I suggest you apply reason and judgment in choosing which laws you obey.
The proper way to deal with idiotic laws is to get Congress to repeal them
And the proper way to deal with immoral laws is to break them.
I don't see why it seems to you as though NuSphere did buy the rights to use the trademarked name, I certainly don't get that just from the fact that they paid a lot of money, what are you basing this on?
One could wonder what exactly NuSphere payed mysql ab for?
Mysql AB don't seem to think that NuSphere has anymore rights than anyone else. But if that is the case, what is the point in paying them 2.5 MUSD?
I agree it's an interesting question, but since NuSphere aren't being any more forthcoming than MySQL AB about exactly what the terms were , or even just a summary of the terms, it seems unlikely that the agreement clearly resolves the issue.
Just the fact that they paid a lot doesn't entitle them to receive a lot. Presumably they were happy with the terms of the contract, if it didn't actually get them much then that doesn't in any way entitle them to extra rights that weren't agreed to.
Slashdot Mirror
the Learning Channel and PBS do all sorts of neat documentaries on our spy agencies all the time with their full cooperation
I would hope (I'm not an American so I don't know) that they do the occasional documentary without their full cooperation too, or else it's difficult to believe there's any point to these "documentaries" other than propaganda.
IIRC, The DMCA makes it illegal to break encryption used as part of a copy-protection system.
You do not rcc. The DMCA has nothing to say on the subject of copy-protection. It is about access controls. It is illegal to circumvent a technological measure that effectively controls access to copyrighted information. When you create information it is by default copyrighted, and in any event you can't tell what the information is until you access it for which you would need to circumvent the access control... i.e. the DMCA does indeed effectively prohibit decrypting the information.
Your second point was valid though. If the court believes that the scheme was set up primarily to circumvent the law then the scheme will probably be illegal to operate.
But downloading MP3s has been an important selling point for internet connectivity, especially DSL. Those announcements that it's being banned followed by the appearance of enforcing the ban would lose you customers. Why do it?
Actually, that's not true. Judge Garzon came up with that excuse after the english courts threw away most of the accusations against Pinochet (which were 1800+, ranging from "genocide" to "A cop hit me." [I'm not kidding]). For further illustration, take a look at his process against Argentinian dictators - same thing.
Genocide would certainly fit as a crime against humanity under international law.
And even if it were international law, you must remember that it wasn't law at the time of the alleged crimes, and law cannot be applied retroactively.
You are wrong on both counts. Crimes against humanity (of which he was accused) date back to the end of World War II. That was the first point at which they appeared and they were applied retroactively at that time. So these laws did exist at the time of the crimes and laws can be applied retroactively.
I think the point he was making with the reference to Marbury v. Madison is that the constitution does not give any special role to the Supreme Court with respect to considering the constitutionality of laws. That has arisen from case law, specifically Marbury v. Madison.
For that reason you are mistaken in saying that it is "the" job of the Supreme Court to examine constitutionality of laws. Their job continues to be to serve as the highest court of appeal, just as it was before Marbury v. Madison.
It is considered to be implicit (following Marbury v. Madison, before that it would have been controvertial to say the least) that the courts do not enforce laws that are not valid under the consitution. As you note, it isn't only the Supreme Court that that applies to.
Sklyarov knew what he did was illegal in the US, so what does he do? Comes to a convention there. I high profile hacker convention no less. Although i'm not comparing the crimes outright, when was the last time you have seen a Columbia drug lord attend a pharmacutical convention in the US?
If you've ever driven on the right in your country then you'd better never come to the UK, we have laws for dealing with people like you.
It depends. If you give a speech at a conference which incites a riot, that would be illegal. If you give a speech at a conference which is slanderous, that's illegal. If you give a speech at a conference which divulges trade secrets, that's illegal. But the mere act of giving a speech at a conference describing how to circumvent access controls is not illegal. As in, it may or may not be legal depending on what else you do.
For the sake of avoiding pointless sidetracking, assume that the speech is not illegal for purposes that have nothing to do with the DMCA. e.g. there's nothing slanderous in it.
The question is, is reading source code a form of speech?
Well, it's a question at least, doesn't seem like a hard one though. Could you provide a reasonable definition of speech that would not cover this?
I think the meat of the question comes down to whether or not the people listening to the speech understand what the speaker is saying, or are just blindly typing things into their computer.
Clearly this is not a conventional test for whether something is speech. For example, whether the people viewing a work of art understand it does not determine whether it is speech. What determines whether it is speech is whether there was a message there to be understood.
In addition, if the message is "typing this into your computer will achieve this effect" then clearly it is speech. You or Congress or the MPAA or even the courts may deem it undesirable speech, but to deny that it is speech is simply dishonest. If I say "my slashdot password is ewfkjdwljf" then did you understand my message? Was it speech? I think you understood and it was speech. The significance of "ewfkjdwljf", if any, doesn't change the fact that I imparted information to you.
That was what the Kaplan ruling said, anyway. It seems clear to me that there is no difference between transferring a program via ethernet and transferring it via sound waves.
Absolutely. I agree with you 100%, Kaplan was saying that it is illegal to tell anyone this information i.e. this specific method of accessing encrypted data. That's why I don't understand your repeated claim that "the mere act of giving a speech at a conference describing how to circumvent access controls is not illegal."
Re: "in order to access", depending on the specific instructions, it could probably be construed as trafficking in a service.
It provides a service, sure, any speech that is understood provides or potentially provides a service to the listener. It provides information, in this case how to access a DVD. (I think you meant "providing" by "trafficking", if not then perhaps you could explain)
It would have to be weighed against the free speech rights of the speaker, of course, and would depend on how understandable what must be typed in would be to the person involved.
The reference to weighing against the free speech rights of the speaker sounds to me like you are now accepting that this is indeed speech. Is that correct or not? You seemed unclear previously. If it isn't speech then there is no weighing to be done.
"you must click on the icon that looks like..." is doubtfully illegal. I'll be so bold as to say that it's not illegal (barring extremely strange circumstances such as "you must click on the icon that looks like Dmitry Sklyarov, in other words, has a huge wart on it's face", which would be slanderous).
So if I say "click on the icon that looks like a DVD with an open padlock on it" then you understand what I say and it it speech? And if I say "type in 'twas brillig and the slithy toves did gyre and gimble in the wabe'" then you have also understood what I have said and it is still speech. And if I say "type in..." anything else then you have also understood what I have said and it is still speech. I have told you a what actions to take in order to achieve something. What is there to not understand?
Well, I think any explanation which could be understood by the audience would probably be legal.
I assume you agree that source code is at least intended to be understood by people. That's the whole point of it. Instead of dealing directly with bits we abstract it to 1s and 0s and then further abstract it to hex and then further abstract it to assembly code and then further abstract it to a high level code... every step the purpose is to make it comprehensible to people.
Obviously anything with a commercially significant purpose other than to break the law would be legal.
Is it supposed to be obvious that commercial speech is now more protected than other speech? Why does the significant purpose have to be a commercial one? If accurate that's appalling.
If the information is "disseminated in a manner reasonably calculated to advance the state of knowledge or development of encryption technology" it might be legal.
So you move from your initial claim that telling someone how to break the encryption is not in itself illegal to the position that in general it is illegal but that there can be a defence in some cases?
Freedom of speech is the freedom of communication between humans.
And everyone listening to the speech is human. I don't think it can be seriously denied that telling someone what commands to enter to a computer constitutes speech. There are limitations on freedom of speech, but denying that this is speech between humans is absurd.
Really it's up to the courts to decide, ultimately the supreme court if it comes to that. The Kaplan ruling is not the final word on the matter, but you should read it.
I know it must seem almost incomprehensible that someone who disagrees with you could be otherwise than completely ignorant but in fact I have read it. Doubtless you'll conclude that I'm too stupid to have understood it.
Ultimately it'll probably be up to the supreme court to set some more explicit guidelines, such as they did in the provisions of fair use.
Yes, I expect it will.
That still leaves the point that either giving a speech that tells someone how to circumvent an access control is itself illegal or else it is not. You seem to hold both positions simultaneously and I don't understand this double think at all. Either telling someone how to circumvent an access control is functional in the sense that Kaplan used or else it is not.
something is intelligent when another intelligent being (i.e. a human) cannot tell if it's a machine he's communicating with, or another human
So for example, you aren't intelligent because I'm confident that you're a human not a machine?
I can send you a legal threat for sneezing, that doesn't make it illegal, nor does it even imply that I think it's illegal.
That's just idiotic. Of course sending a legal threat implies that you think that what they're doing is illegal. It may be untrue that you think it's illegal but the implication is real and deliberate.
While I don't agree with that particular part of the ruling, that is quite different from giving a talk at a conference (as long as that talk does not involve reading out the source code, anyway).
That doesn't make any sense. You were saying, or at least I understood you to be saying, that it isn't illegal to give a speech at a conference descibing how to circumvent access controls. Now you seem to be implying that if you read out source code (i.e. explicitly tell people how to circumvent access controls) that that would or might be illegal. Which is it? I see nothing in the DMCA that distinguishes between source code and any other description of a process.
To be clear on this : you do think that saying "in order to access the disk, you must type the following into your computer..." followed by explicit instructions could be illegal? Would "you muct click the icon that looks like..." be illegal too? If not then what is your distinction between the two acts both of which are "functional" commands to a computer? If you do think these explanations are or might be illegal then what type of explanation could be given that would not be illegal? Basically any explanation that isn't complete enough to genuinely explain?
I guess this must be a matter of taste, but personally I'd much rather not be "saved from myself" (whatever that means, it sounds like gibberish to me, if I want to do something then of course I don't want to be prevented from doing it).
I would much rather have a box that came up telling me what a terrible idea it is, and then let me go ahead and break my system if that's what I really want to do.
The same goes for tobacco, alcohol and other dangerous substances : health warning good, prohibition bad.
Is adequacy.org for real or just pisstake?
Bits of it are written very convincingly, but honestly "the wholesome family entertainment of Big Brother" is a bit of a give away.
If you sent him an email complaining about unfair moderation without telling him what it was that was unfairly moderated then his response seems perfectly reasonable.
If your email was just enquiring after his health with no reference to moderation though then his reply would seem a little odd.
What exactly are we supposed to conclude from just the reply?
BTW, KDE doesn't just run on Linux. AFAIK Gnome is Linux-only.
Since Sun and HP are both adopting Gnome as their standard desktops I think it's reasonable to assume that Gnome doesn't only run on Linux. But just to be clear about it, no Gnome doesn't only run on Linux.
HTH
...The philosophers like Stallman are important (and I realize they've contributed significantly on the practical side), but the ultimate goal of OSS is to produce software that people like and use, not write treatises...
...do what Torvalds and ESR (and the Mono guys) did (albeit somewhat unintentionally in Torvalds' case). Create the beginnings of a project...
So if I understand what you're saying, you view ESR as more of a coder and RMS as a mere philosopher? What do you base that on?
I'm sure bickering goes on at Microsoft behind closed doors
And plenty more bickering goes on between proprietary software makers in public, and indeed in court.
Good luck in your quest for a world of harmony where nobody ever disagrees... actually no, I'm not sure I'd like a world like that at all. Good luck in coming to terms with the world, imperfect as it may be, hope it's not too much of a disapointment to you.
Think of how much more powerful the Open Source movement would be if we didn't spend half our time playing politics with other Open Source projects and instead spent that time coding.
How about if you were to stop complaining about how other people choose to spend their own time and instead you spend your time coding?
The part of the DCMA being discussed here is the prohibition of the development and sale of tools to circumvent copyright protection. This is unique to the DCMA and therefore is new.
No, the prohibition is on tools to cicumvent access controls, not copyright protection.
Norway is not a signatory to the Berne Convention?
:) At most it gives your country's opponents (and maybe your government's internal critics) some moral high ground.
Whilst I'm unfamiliar with the Norwegian legal system, I'd be very suprised if just signing a treaty had the effect of enacting laws. If Norway has signed a treaty agreeing to prohibit access control circumvention devices then they would be obliged to prohibit those devices. If they failed to prohibit them then it would continue to be lawful for one of their citizens to create such a device, the government would merely be failing in it's obligation to make it illegal.
Treaties bind countries not individuals. If your country breaks a treaty then other countries can erm.. call your country bad names, launch a military operation, be uncooperative or untrusting towards your country... all things they can do anyway of course and will if they really want to and won't if they don't want to but that's not the point
In any event, the Berne convention does not require signatories to prohibit access control circumvention devices. If you think otherwise then please quote the relevant sections.
Of course, last time I checked, no one in this country signed a wavier giving others the right to decide what drugs they may or may not take, unlike this IP issue, which derives from living in a civilized society where people can't just go take other people's stuff.
So far as I know nobody has even accused Dmitry of taking anybody's stuff. What you're saying is that your "civilized" society restricts what ideas people can communicate to one another, even if they do so in other less restrictive societies. At least be honest about it.
I don't give a damn about the children.
That's a swell argument that, other than letting you feel important, isn't going to convince anyone of anything.
That's right, he should pretend to have those feelings / beliefs that would help him "win" the argument. Then we can achieve the ultimate dream for of a world where nobody has any integrity or respect for the truth, where they just say whatever they think will convince others. Seriously, you seem to have pretty twisted values.
They have limited resources. Not only should they pick and choose which laws to enforce, they have no option but to do so.
We can't just arbitrarily decide which laws we want to obey from day to day.
Arbitrarily deciding which laws to obey, or arbitrarily doing anything important for that matter, is a bad idea. I suggest you apply reason and judgment in choosing which laws you obey.
The proper way to deal with idiotic laws is to get Congress to repeal them
And the proper way to deal with immoral laws is to break them.
I don't see why it seems to you as though NuSphere did buy the rights to use the trademarked name, I certainly don't get that just from the fact that they paid a lot of money, what are you basing this on?
One could wonder what exactly NuSphere payed mysql ab for?
Mysql AB don't seem to think that NuSphere has anymore rights than anyone else. But if that is the case, what is the point in paying them 2.5 MUSD?
I agree it's an interesting question, but since NuSphere aren't being any more forthcoming than MySQL AB about exactly what the terms were , or even just a summary of the terms, it seems unlikely that the agreement clearly resolves the issue.
Just the fact that they paid a lot doesn't entitle them to receive a lot. Presumably they were happy with the terms of the contract, if it didn't actually get them much then that doesn't in any way entitle them to extra rights that weren't agreed to.