Actually, Russian law only applies to their side of the transaction. American law controls for people in the US who download from there, and it's illegal to do so under US law.
This 1) doesn't apply to TV broadcasts as a whole, 2) doesn't apply to all radio broadcasts, 3) is virtually never used by people who are making the recordings.
Perhaps you should educate yourself on just how limited the utility of the AHRA is.
There have been court decisions upholding sections of sections 107 - 118 in the context of home recordings of broadcasted programs.
Really? I'd be impressed to see a 117 case, for example, that dealt with "home recordings of broadcasted programs." Got a cite for that one?
Incidentally, the Sony case does not say what you think it does. Essentially, Sony says that it can be a fair use. It doesn't say that it is always fair. This is to be expected, as fair use is not a blanket proposition; what is a fair use for one person might not be for another, despite the use being the same.
Actually, it doesn't. It says that fair use is not an infringement of copyright. The purpose of the fair use is not especially important; the list provided is illustrative of what some fair uses might be, but nothing says that they're invariably fair. You see, you aren't parsing the statute closely enough. Looking at it selectively doesn't help either.
In order to determine whether a use is fair or not you need to look at the four factor test in 107. It comes just after the bit you quoted.
Well first, there's a good argument that fair use is a constitutionally required exception to copyright law. Secondly, Congress passes copyright legislation using the copyright power, not the interstate commerce power. In fact, there are some important disputes regarding this going on right now.
Since always in the US, actually. Generally when you rip from CDs, it either has to be under AHRA (which is extremely rare) or a fair use (which is a case-by-case issue). And as the other poster notes, if it's got an access control device, the DMCA becomes a factor too.
most lawyers (at least around here) will work for free on the assumption that they'll get their fees when they win
It sounds as though you're talking about contingency fees. That's where the lawyer and the client agree that if the client wins, the lawyer gets a percentage (usually a third) of the damages. No lawyer would work on contingency, sacrificing certain money now, unless the potential money in the future is substantial enough to be worth it.
This doesn't really work in the RIAA suits. All the defendant gets if they win is that they don't have to pay up. Now, someone might work on contingency for RIAA, but then, they're the plaintiff.
Well, there is a difference between sending someone a C&D letter and suing them. If there is a lawsuit, however, Rule 11 requires the lawyer involved to make certain certifications, including that there is factual support for the suit, or that it is likely to be discovered once the suit begins. I doubt that it would be appropriate to just rely on the filename, and so, there might be sanctions if the case is filed against someone who is not a wrongdoer.
The facts are that often they don't have a strong case in these matters
No, they're pretty strong cases. These are all pretty cut and dried, and copyright law is extremely friendly to the plaintiff (even more than civil suits in the US normally are).
"preponderance of evidence" might be a pretty easy standard to use to protect yourself when the industry is conducting automated and unverified file searches in hopes of bringing suits against defenseless individuals.
No, actually, that's the hardest standard for a defendant to face.
Preponderance of the evidence means a 51% chance. So if you see logs indicating that Mr. A's computer was using IP address 1.2.3.4 on 1/1/05, and that his computer was capable of running A-ster, a P2P app, and that on 1/1/05, the RIAA downloaded an mp3 of a song one of their members holds a copyright to, via A-ster, from IP 1.2.3.4, do you think that it is even _marginally_ more likely than not that Mr. A did it? If so, then it's a fact. He did do it.
The rare chance that he had an open WAP or someone broke into his house and used his computer, etc. is not enough to save him. Not in a civil suit.
That is correct, but people rarely use the chapters when citing to title 17. (compare with title 11 -- bankruptcy -- where people often refer to chapters 7, 11, and 13)
A better looking informal citation would be something like 17 U.S.C. 106.
Well, for children, the reason is that someday we expect them to have some money. But the judgment can still be hanging over them even once they're grown up.
Why it's appropriate for us to decide what they're entitled to is this: copyright exists solely to promote the public interest, i.e. to encourage that works are created that otherwise would not have been, that the works are minimally encumbered by copyright if at all, and that they enter the public domain as rapidly as possible.
If you toy around with how much weight you ascribe to each of the various elements of the public interest, you can find a point where you maximally serve the public good, although you don't maximally serve any one specific interest.
With copyright, the encouragement we're providing to artists is basically the opportunity to make money. No one is guaranteeing that a work will make money, but rather that if it does, the artist will be the one to make it, basically.
The incentive is NOT that the artist will become a millionare, necessarily. Rather, we're looking for the minimal incentive necessary to get them to create the work at all. The Beatles, for example, surely would've done exactly the same thing that they did even if they had become vastly unpopular by the mid-70s and never sold another record again.
Well, the vast majority of the money to be made from a work is made upon initial publication in a given medium. For example, movies get most of their money on opening weekend, with ticket sales dropping thereafter. Then, when they hit PPV, or rental, or sales, they again make most of their money initially. Usually, you'll have made 90% or more of all the money you ever will make within a few months, tops.
This means that the incentive of a copyright that lasts, say, a year, is nearly as much as the incentive of a copyright that lasts a century. This means that the gain to the public re: creation is nearly the same. Since the public also gains by having short terms, it would be a great idea to vastly reduce copyright terms.
Perhaps not to as short a time as a year, but certainly not very long. Myself, I favor multiple short terms that can total 25 years maximum. I cannot think of a single work of art that would not have been created under such circumstances. Of course, term length is only one factor to be considered in copyright reform. It's not a cure all, but it would help significantly.
If someone has "broken the law", the correct prodedure is to contact the attorney general or relevant law enforcement agencies.
Oh, please. Copyright infringement is chiefly a civil matter, and ideally should only be civil. If a copyright holder wants to enforce his rights and recover from the damage that infringers have cost him, that's fine. Frankly I see no need for anyone else to bother enforcing it for them.
Not all violations of the law are criminal, and this is proper.
The thing is, if someone walking in front of you saw a $10 note on the street, but didn't pick it up, you were about 10m behind, saw the same note and picked it up, can that someone claim he saw the note first and want to claim it back?
An interesting idea, but pretty novel. And I think it might be difficult to reconcile with copyright operating in terms of exclusive rights to actions. That is, copying might be illegal or not, but the resulting copy is not inherently legal or illegal.
No, it said that time shifting could be a fair use.
But there continues to be no such thing as a blanket fair use. Each individual occurrence must be considered on its own merits. Therefore, when person A timeshifts show 1, we have to go through the fair use analysis. When person B timeshifts show 1, we have to go through the fair use analysis. And so on.
For what is a fair use for one person, in one circumstance, with one work, may not be if we change any or all of the parties involved, the circumstances, or the work in question.
That fair use is some magic invocation, or can be absolutely relied upon, is a myth.
I would encourage you to carefully read 17 U.S.C. 107, which describes fair use. Original sources are far superior to Internet myths.
Copyright law is involved even when you're doing things in your own home.
However, there is no law that mandates this particular action. Recording any copyrighted material from TV for any amount of time is infringing, unless the particular act of recording in question is exempted somehow, e.g. as a fair use. (n.b. that fair use depends, each time, on the circumstances; there is no blanket rule permitting time shifting, etc.)
If it is exempted, then there's no time limit. If not exempted, then you'd need permission from the copyright holder, with whatever restrictions they'd include, if they even permitted it at all.
In any event, it's none of Tivo's business, and they shouldn't be involved. The reason is just that they're knuckling under.
The legal Citation tool? I didn't until you mentioned it. A quick google search found This. Is that what you meant? Another "service" provided by lawyers to make themselves money untangling the mess they made.
So you're saying that you don't like that Case B might overturn Law A or Case A and you wouldn't know about it without keeping up with every case that comes along, but when someone else does keep up with every case (which isn't cheap for them) you don't like that either? You're a tough person to please.
I'd like to see the government do this sort of thing for free, but that really just shifts the burden to taxpayers instead of the people who happen to be actually interested. (And thus could be seen as lawyers trying to get subsidies instead of paying their own costs)
There isn't any other real way around it. You can't just strike stuff from the statute books just because of one case. After all, that case is only a precedent in a limited jurisdiction, and might be different from another case in another jurisdiction where the law was upheld. Eventually it all gets reconciled, but until then you need to know about both, probably, and need to continue to be able to refer to the statute, whether you're for or against it.
I'd be interested to know what your solution is to what is essentially a matter of keeping track of information.
Unless I'm mistaken, it can't be overturned unless its challenged. And it can't be challenged unless someone is charged under it. Which means *gasp* paying a lawyer.
You're mistaken.
What you're thinking of is an element of standing: the federal cases and controversies requirement in the Constitution. Ever since day one (George Washington was rebuffed by the Supreme Court, which cited this clause) the federal courts have refused to hear cases unless they were real. They do not waste their time, and allow the courts to be flooded, with issuing opinions about things that haven't happened yet. If they did, it would be dangerous (basing cases on mere hypotheticals) and would obscure the important cases where someone really was being affected.
Nevertheless, even at this level, declaratory judgments are available when there is a real controversy but the suit or other conflict hasn't yet begun. Basically, if the effect of the law upon you is imminent, you can go to court to challenge it.
Now, in the state courts, it varies. Some states allow their courts to issue advisory opinions, but in truth it's pretty limited since it still threatens to waste a lot of court time without doing much that is productive.
Two words: Tax Law. Those effect EVERYONE. But only a SELECT few actually understand what the hell is going on there.
Actually, most tax laws don't effect everyone, save in the oblique way that in society we're all somewhat connected. A deduction for emu ranches doesn't matter to me much, as I haven't got one, except in that I might want emu ranchers to pay more taxes so that I can pay less. (which is basically a political issue anyway; courts can't levy taxes) The things that effect me are pretty limited; if I have so many taxable interests that a thorough knowledge of tax law would help me save money, then I suddenly have an incentive to do so, and you can believe I will (or I'll get someone else).
Anyhow, aside from that you woefully underestimate just how many tax lawyers there are, trust me when I tell you that tax law is actually not that difficult. It's just boring as hell, and that deters people from actually going through it. I've had to answer tax questions before and it just involves going through the relevant statutes, rules, and cases, just like anything else. In fact tax authorities are often much more helpful in offering advice than most agencies, IMO.
I won't say that I enjoy tax law, though a basic knowledge of it is important to all lawyers, but some people do, and I'm sure they think I'm crazy for getting all excited about copyright law as I do.
"Natural" to whom? There is just as much "jargon" used to write laws as there is used in technical manuals.
Well a lot of that jargon is really just a standard interpretation which has been reached over time as to initially ambigious terms. Once upon a time, people could probably argue a lot over what what was meant by 'negligence' in tort law. Nowadays we all agree that negligence is the failure to exercise the standard of care that would be exercised by a hypothetical reasonable person in roughly similar circumstances.
These things arise, however, because a long time ago some judge was trying to express himself, and had to resort to ordinary English words such as 'negligence' in order to do it. There is no such thing as an unambigious human language. What do you want -- laws written like mathematical proofs? Would that actually aid understanding?
Another problem is that laws tend to be piled on one another. Laws completely superceded by other laws remain on the books, and often aren't noted as such, making someone with less than a intimate knowledge of the situation in question more likely to be completely unaware that the law they are reading was superceded two months ago by H.R. 2341-1231-431.
So I'm guessing you aren't familiar with Shepard's, which basically solves this? Always shepardize your citations, my man.
"Vested" interests are a generally a political issue, NOT a question of Justice.
Perhaps. The point is that they exist, and influence what happens. You can't ignore reality. Additionally, while it's not justice, political concerns are important; laws should strive to serve both justice and the people.
In some places we still have laws on the book that a woman can't drive without a man walking in front of the car with a lantern.
Just because it hasn't been repealed doesn't mean it's still the law. Courts can't change what's in the statute books, but they can still overturn.
I don't beleive that a "just, vibrant society" can exist when the PEOPLE of said society CANNOT KNOW, much less UNDERSTAND the laws they are expected to follow!
This is why it's important for laws to generally reflect social norms. However, most laws are irrelevant to most people. The Trademark Manual of Examining Procedure is a big book. Unless you're trying to federally register a trademark, or you're opposing someone else's, or looking for a way to attack a prima facie case, it is basically irrelevant to you, despite the fact that it influences all sorts of things around you.
Given that you will probably go through life never needing to know or care about it, why should it be understandable to you? If you do suddenly need to know, it's there and you can learn what it says yourself, or ask someone who has made it their business to know.
This is the case with most laws: they exist to do their jobs, not to be clear to random people that, while they are bound by them, never actually even approach the cases in which they matter.
Claiming that they only "need" legal advice AFTER they are in trouble is just more "job security" for lawyers
Of course, I didn't make that claim. I said that people ought to be able to get the advice they need, when they need it. I'm very much in favor of getting advice up front. Then again, lawyers tend to be risk-averse as a group.
I'd say I illustrated above why that is very much indicative of the problem.
Is there anyone who knows everything there is to know about their profession? Probably only people in the most simplistic of fields. You don't see me claiming that we ought to rip out all plumbing and start over fresh just because plumbers that repair household leaks aren't knowledgable enough to single-handedly design a water and sewage system for a major metropolis that incorporates all knowledge of their field.
the convoluted system of laws CREATED by lawyers so that they are the only ones who CAN do it.
Heh, no. To the degree that law is complex, this is not a deliberate form of job security. Rather, it's because there really aren't simple answers. The complexity is there necessarily, or at a minimum, inadvertantly.
Laws are typically somewhat ambigious because they are written in a natural language. Then they are subject to after-the-fact interpretation by people other than those who wrote them. These interpretations can change over time, and may vary depending on who is doing it. Since one is usually arguing with a particular interpretation in mind, against someone with a different interpretation, and before someone who gets to decide, and likely already has their own interpretation as well (or is required to follow someone else's, which might not be perfectly clear either), the history of how laws have been interpreted is as important as the raw language of the law itself.
Where this ambiguity is sought to be avoided -- perhaps because there are a lot of special cases (tax law is a good example of this: you can't just tax boats, for example, all the same, because there are good reasons to treat working fishing boats differently than recreational yachts) or perhaps because there's a particular interpretation which the drafter seeks -- the law has to be carefully and usually lengthily worded. And it's still subject to interpretation.
Then of course, once you have a law, you've set up a status quo; changing it in the future means running up against people who have a vested interest in keeping things the way they are now. This can result in complex changes that are only partial in nature (requiring the law to indicate what is and isn't effected by the change) in order to satisfy enough people to ensure that the law can become effective. If you can't do this, than it's possible that new interpretations of the law will arise to account for changed circumstances, but this can take time, and again results in a lot of important laws being set forth in lengthy and perhaps difficult-to-read opinions.
Basically the law is a complicated organic system that's been developed, a little bit at a time, for nearly a thousand years now. What's mainly important is that it works. Overhauling the entire shebang probably wouldn't make it work better. In fact, the transition and the loss of nuance would probably make it worse. It would also be very difficult just to implement, not just politically (people affected by the law tend to like the status quo -- lawyers don't mind changes, since they actually tend to increase business as people seek advice on what's changed), but also in terms of looking at the vast amount of law we have and seeing what small amounts of it we can actually change or get rid of without big side-effects on our society, economy, safety, etc.
Frankly, I do not believe that a just, vibrant society could exist without a greater number of laws, and a greater amount of complexity in those laws, than you desire. As there seems to be a lack of significant societies that that lack lawyers and yet have a great dedication to justice, and aren't stagnant in some fashion, my position is not without some basis.
It's not a bad thing. Everyone has a body, but most people don't know how they work in detail, and consult experts as needed. People have cars, but most people aren't mechanics. People use computers, but they might as well be magic boxes to most of us.
So is there anything wrong with the full body of legal knowledge being unknown to most people so long as they can get the advice they need when they need it?
Hell, even lawyers don't know all the law. I'm pretty good in my specialty, but outside of that, I'd need to do research, or bring in someone who specialized in the relevant area. Again, rather like doctors, or engineers, or mathematicians, or whatnot.
We'll find out soon: 160's are due by the end of the year. I already upgraded my 60 to a 100 last year, and it's full already, so I guess I'll find out.
Anyone found a source for these new magic drives?
Newegg has had 120 gig laptop drives for a while now. It's listed at $263.75, so you might want to shop around.
Slashdot Mirror
Actually, Russian law only applies to their side of the transaction. American law controls for people in the US who download from there, and it's illegal to do so under US law.
This 1) doesn't apply to TV broadcasts as a whole, 2) doesn't apply to all radio broadcasts, 3) is virtually never used by people who are making the recordings.
Perhaps you should educate yourself on just how limited the utility of the AHRA is.
There have been court decisions upholding sections of sections 107 - 118 in the context of home recordings of broadcasted programs.
Really? I'd be impressed to see a 117 case, for example, that dealt with "home recordings of broadcasted programs." Got a cite for that one?
Incidentally, the Sony case does not say what you think it does. Essentially, Sony says that it can be a fair use. It doesn't say that it is always fair. This is to be expected, as fair use is not a blanket proposition; what is a fair use for one person might not be for another, despite the use being the same.
Fair use says I can copy it for research.
Actually, it doesn't. It says that fair use is not an infringement of copyright. The purpose of the fair use is not especially important; the list provided is illustrative of what some fair uses might be, but nothing says that they're invariably fair. You see, you aren't parsing the statute closely enough. Looking at it selectively doesn't help either.
In order to determine whether a use is fair or not you need to look at the four factor test in 107. It comes just after the bit you quoted.
The law states that we can record radio/tv broadcasts.
Oh? Mind citing that law?
Well first, there's a good argument that fair use is a constitutionally required exception to copyright law. Secondly, Congress passes copyright legislation using the copyright power, not the interstate commerce power. In fact, there are some important disputes regarding this going on right now.
Since always in the US, actually. Generally when you rip from CDs, it either has to be under AHRA (which is extremely rare) or a fair use (which is a case-by-case issue). And as the other poster notes, if it's got an access control device, the DMCA becomes a factor too.
most lawyers (at least around here) will work for free on the assumption that they'll get their fees when they win
It sounds as though you're talking about contingency fees. That's where the lawyer and the client agree that if the client wins, the lawyer gets a percentage (usually a third) of the damages. No lawyer would work on contingency, sacrificing certain money now, unless the potential money in the future is substantial enough to be worth it.
This doesn't really work in the RIAA suits. All the defendant gets if they win is that they don't have to pay up. Now, someone might work on contingency for RIAA, but then, they're the plaintiff.
That is not the rule in the US, although sometimes it is possible for the winning party to recoup costs and reasonable fees.
Well, there is a difference between sending someone a C&D letter and suing them. If there is a lawsuit, however, Rule 11 requires the lawyer involved to make certain certifications, including that there is factual support for the suit, or that it is likely to be discovered once the suit begins. I doubt that it would be appropriate to just rely on the filename, and so, there might be sanctions if the case is filed against someone who is not a wrongdoer.
The facts are that often they don't have a strong case in these matters
No, they're pretty strong cases. These are all pretty cut and dried, and copyright law is extremely friendly to the plaintiff (even more than civil suits in the US normally are).
"preponderance of evidence" might be a pretty easy standard to use to protect yourself when the industry is conducting automated and unverified file searches in hopes of bringing suits against defenseless individuals.
No, actually, that's the hardest standard for a defendant to face.
Preponderance of the evidence means a 51% chance. So if you see logs indicating that Mr. A's computer was using IP address 1.2.3.4 on 1/1/05, and that his computer was capable of running A-ster, a P2P app, and that on 1/1/05, the RIAA downloaded an mp3 of a song one of their members holds a copyright to, via A-ster, from IP 1.2.3.4, do you think that it is even _marginally_ more likely than not that Mr. A did it? If so, then it's a fact. He did do it.
The rare chance that he had an open WAP or someone broke into his house and used his computer, etc. is not enough to save him. Not in a civil suit.
That is correct, but people rarely use the chapters when citing to title 17. (compare with title 11 -- bankruptcy -- where people often refer to chapters 7, 11, and 13)
A better looking informal citation would be something like 17 U.S.C. 106.
Well, for children, the reason is that someday we expect them to have some money. But the judgment can still be hanging over them even once they're grown up.
I agree. 40 years is far too long.
Why it's appropriate for us to decide what they're entitled to is this: copyright exists solely to promote the public interest, i.e. to encourage that works are created that otherwise would not have been, that the works are minimally encumbered by copyright if at all, and that they enter the public domain as rapidly as possible.
If you toy around with how much weight you ascribe to each of the various elements of the public interest, you can find a point where you maximally serve the public good, although you don't maximally serve any one specific interest.
With copyright, the encouragement we're providing to artists is basically the opportunity to make money. No one is guaranteeing that a work will make money, but rather that if it does, the artist will be the one to make it, basically.
The incentive is NOT that the artist will become a millionare, necessarily. Rather, we're looking for the minimal incentive necessary to get them to create the work at all. The Beatles, for example, surely would've done exactly the same thing that they did even if they had become vastly unpopular by the mid-70s and never sold another record again.
Well, the vast majority of the money to be made from a work is made upon initial publication in a given medium. For example, movies get most of their money on opening weekend, with ticket sales dropping thereafter. Then, when they hit PPV, or rental, or sales, they again make most of their money initially. Usually, you'll have made 90% or more of all the money you ever will make within a few months, tops.
This means that the incentive of a copyright that lasts, say, a year, is nearly as much as the incentive of a copyright that lasts a century. This means that the gain to the public re: creation is nearly the same. Since the public also gains by having short terms, it would be a great idea to vastly reduce copyright terms.
Perhaps not to as short a time as a year, but certainly not very long. Myself, I favor multiple short terms that can total 25 years maximum. I cannot think of a single work of art that would not have been created under such circumstances. Of course, term length is only one factor to be considered in copyright reform. It's not a cure all, but it would help significantly.
If someone has "broken the law", the correct prodedure is to contact the attorney general or relevant law enforcement agencies.
Oh, please. Copyright infringement is chiefly a civil matter, and ideally should only be civil. If a copyright holder wants to enforce his rights and recover from the damage that infringers have cost him, that's fine. Frankly I see no need for anyone else to bother enforcing it for them.
Not all violations of the law are criminal, and this is proper.
Are you seriously going to watch Red Dawn again?
Wolverines!
I dunno. The trailer for the Bone game doesn't look very good at all. Too bad; it's a great comic book.
The thing is, if someone walking in front of you saw a $10 note on the street, but didn't pick it up, you were about 10m behind, saw the same note and picked it up, can that someone claim he saw the note first and want to claim it back?
No. That's a Pierson v. Post question.
An interesting idea, but pretty novel. And I think it might be difficult to reconcile with copyright operating in terms of exclusive rights to actions. That is, copying might be illegal or not, but the resulting copy is not inherently legal or illegal.
No, it said that time shifting could be a fair use.
But there continues to be no such thing as a blanket fair use. Each individual occurrence must be considered on its own merits. Therefore, when person A timeshifts show 1, we have to go through the fair use analysis. When person B timeshifts show 1, we have to go through the fair use analysis. And so on.
For what is a fair use for one person, in one circumstance, with one work, may not be if we change any or all of the parties involved, the circumstances, or the work in question.
That fair use is some magic invocation, or can be absolutely relied upon, is a myth.
I would encourage you to carefully read 17 U.S.C. 107, which describes fair use. Original sources are far superior to Internet myths.
You're right and wrong.
Copyright law is involved even when you're doing things in your own home.
However, there is no law that mandates this particular action. Recording any copyrighted material from TV for any amount of time is infringing, unless the particular act of recording in question is exempted somehow, e.g. as a fair use. (n.b. that fair use depends, each time, on the circumstances; there is no blanket rule permitting time shifting, etc.)
If it is exempted, then there's no time limit. If not exempted, then you'd need permission from the copyright holder, with whatever restrictions they'd include, if they even permitted it at all.
In any event, it's none of Tivo's business, and they shouldn't be involved. The reason is just that they're knuckling under.
The legal Citation tool? I didn't until you mentioned it. A quick google search found This. Is that what you meant? Another "service" provided by lawyers to make themselves money untangling the mess they made.
So you're saying that you don't like that Case B might overturn Law A or Case A and you wouldn't know about it without keeping up with every case that comes along, but when someone else does keep up with every case (which isn't cheap for them) you don't like that either? You're a tough person to please.
I'd like to see the government do this sort of thing for free, but that really just shifts the burden to taxpayers instead of the people who happen to be actually interested. (And thus could be seen as lawyers trying to get subsidies instead of paying their own costs)
There isn't any other real way around it. You can't just strike stuff from the statute books just because of one case. After all, that case is only a precedent in a limited jurisdiction, and might be different from another case in another jurisdiction where the law was upheld. Eventually it all gets reconciled, but until then you need to know about both, probably, and need to continue to be able to refer to the statute, whether you're for or against it.
I'd be interested to know what your solution is to what is essentially a matter of keeping track of information.
Unless I'm mistaken, it can't be overturned unless its challenged. And it can't be challenged unless someone is charged under it. Which means *gasp* paying a lawyer.
You're mistaken.
What you're thinking of is an element of standing: the federal cases and controversies requirement in the Constitution. Ever since day one (George Washington was rebuffed by the Supreme Court, which cited this clause) the federal courts have refused to hear cases unless they were real. They do not waste their time, and allow the courts to be flooded, with issuing opinions about things that haven't happened yet. If they did, it would be dangerous (basing cases on mere hypotheticals) and would obscure the important cases where someone really was being affected.
Nevertheless, even at this level, declaratory judgments are available when there is a real controversy but the suit or other conflict hasn't yet begun. Basically, if the effect of the law upon you is imminent, you can go to court to challenge it.
Now, in the state courts, it varies. Some states allow their courts to issue advisory opinions, but in truth it's pretty limited since it still threatens to waste a lot of court time without doing much that is productive.
Two words: Tax Law. Those effect EVERYONE. But only a SELECT few actually understand what the hell is going on there.
Actually, most tax laws don't effect everyone, save in the oblique way that in society we're all somewhat connected. A deduction for emu ranches doesn't matter to me much, as I haven't got one, except in that I might want emu ranchers to pay more taxes so that I can pay less. (which is basically a political issue anyway; courts can't levy taxes) The things that effect me are pretty limited; if I have so many taxable interests that a thorough knowledge of tax law would help me save money, then I suddenly have an incentive to do so, and you can believe I will (or I'll get someone else).
Anyhow, aside from that you woefully underestimate just how many tax lawyers there are, trust me when I tell you that tax law is actually not that difficult. It's just boring as hell, and that deters people from actually going through it. I've had to answer tax questions before and it just involves going through the relevant statutes, rules, and cases, just like anything else. In fact tax authorities are often much more helpful in offering advice than most agencies, IMO.
I won't say that I enjoy tax law, though a basic knowledge of it is important to all lawyers, but some people do, and I'm sure they think I'm crazy for getting all excited about copyright law as I do.
If someone is
"Natural" to whom? There is just as much "jargon" used to write laws as there is used in technical manuals.
Well a lot of that jargon is really just a standard interpretation which has been reached over time as to initially ambigious terms. Once upon a time, people could probably argue a lot over what what was meant by 'negligence' in tort law. Nowadays we all agree that negligence is the failure to exercise the standard of care that would be exercised by a hypothetical reasonable person in roughly similar circumstances.
These things arise, however, because a long time ago some judge was trying to express himself, and had to resort to ordinary English words such as 'negligence' in order to do it. There is no such thing as an unambigious human language. What do you want -- laws written like mathematical proofs? Would that actually aid understanding?
Another problem is that laws tend to be piled on one another. Laws completely superceded by other laws remain on the books, and often aren't noted as such, making someone with less than a intimate knowledge of the situation in question more likely to be completely unaware that the law they are reading was superceded two months ago by H.R. 2341-1231-431.
So I'm guessing you aren't familiar with Shepard's, which basically solves this? Always shepardize your citations, my man.
"Vested" interests are a generally a political issue, NOT a question of Justice.
Perhaps. The point is that they exist, and influence what happens. You can't ignore reality. Additionally, while it's not justice, political concerns are important; laws should strive to serve both justice and the people.
In some places we still have laws on the book that a woman can't drive without a man walking in front of the car with a lantern.
Just because it hasn't been repealed doesn't mean it's still the law. Courts can't change what's in the statute books, but they can still overturn.
I don't beleive that a "just, vibrant society" can exist when the PEOPLE of said society CANNOT KNOW, much less UNDERSTAND the laws they are expected to follow!
This is why it's important for laws to generally reflect social norms. However, most laws are irrelevant to most people. The Trademark Manual of Examining Procedure is a big book. Unless you're trying to federally register a trademark, or you're opposing someone else's, or looking for a way to attack a prima facie case, it is basically irrelevant to you, despite the fact that it influences all sorts of things around you.
Given that you will probably go through life never needing to know or care about it, why should it be understandable to you? If you do suddenly need to know, it's there and you can learn what it says yourself, or ask someone who has made it their business to know.
This is the case with most laws: they exist to do their jobs, not to be clear to random people that, while they are bound by them, never actually even approach the cases in which they matter.
Claiming that they only "need" legal advice AFTER they are in trouble is just more "job security" for lawyers
Of course, I didn't make that claim. I said that people ought to be able to get the advice they need, when they need it. I'm very much in favor of getting advice up front. Then again, lawyers tend to be risk-averse as a group.
I'd say I illustrated above why that is very much indicative of the problem.
Is there anyone who knows everything there is to know about their profession? Probably only people in the most simplistic of fields. You don't see me claiming that we ought to rip out all plumbing and start over fresh just because plumbers that repair household leaks aren't knowledgable enough to single-handedly design a water and sewage system for a major metropolis that incorporates all knowledge of their field.
the convoluted system of laws CREATED by lawyers so that they are the only ones who CAN do it.
Heh, no. To the degree that law is complex, this is not a deliberate form of job security. Rather, it's because there really aren't simple answers. The complexity is there necessarily, or at a minimum, inadvertantly.
Laws are typically somewhat ambigious because they are written in a natural language. Then they are subject to after-the-fact interpretation by people other than those who wrote them. These interpretations can change over time, and may vary depending on who is doing it. Since one is usually arguing with a particular interpretation in mind, against someone with a different interpretation, and before someone who gets to decide, and likely already has their own interpretation as well (or is required to follow someone else's, which might not be perfectly clear either), the history of how laws have been interpreted is as important as the raw language of the law itself.
Where this ambiguity is sought to be avoided -- perhaps because there are a lot of special cases (tax law is a good example of this: you can't just tax boats, for example, all the same, because there are good reasons to treat working fishing boats differently than recreational yachts) or perhaps because there's a particular interpretation which the drafter seeks -- the law has to be carefully and usually lengthily worded. And it's still subject to interpretation.
Then of course, once you have a law, you've set up a status quo; changing it in the future means running up against people who have a vested interest in keeping things the way they are now. This can result in complex changes that are only partial in nature (requiring the law to indicate what is and isn't effected by the change) in order to satisfy enough people to ensure that the law can become effective. If you can't do this, than it's possible that new interpretations of the law will arise to account for changed circumstances, but this can take time, and again results in a lot of important laws being set forth in lengthy and perhaps difficult-to-read opinions.
Basically the law is a complicated organic system that's been developed, a little bit at a time, for nearly a thousand years now. What's mainly important is that it works. Overhauling the entire shebang probably wouldn't make it work better. In fact, the transition and the loss of nuance would probably make it worse. It would also be very difficult just to implement, not just politically (people affected by the law tend to like the status quo -- lawyers don't mind changes, since they actually tend to increase business as people seek advice on what's changed), but also in terms of looking at the vast amount of law we have and seeing what small amounts of it we can actually change or get rid of without big side-effects on our society, economy, safety, etc.
Frankly, I do not believe that a just, vibrant society could exist without a greater number of laws, and a greater amount of complexity in those laws, than you desire. As there seems to be a lack of significant societies that that lack lawyers and yet have a great dedication to justice, and aren't stagnant in some fashion, my position is not without some basis.
It's not a bad thing. Everyone has a body, but most people don't know how they work in detail, and consult experts as needed. People have cars, but most people aren't mechanics. People use computers, but they might as well be magic boxes to most of us.
So is there anything wrong with the full body of legal knowledge being unknown to most people so long as they can get the advice they need when they need it?
Hell, even lawyers don't know all the law. I'm pretty good in my specialty, but outside of that, I'd need to do research, or bring in someone who specialized in the relevant area. Again, rather like doctors, or engineers, or mathematicians, or whatnot.
What happens when they make a 140gb 2.5" HDD?
We'll find out soon: 160's are due by the end of the year. I already upgraded my 60 to a 100 last year, and it's full already, so I guess I'll find out.
Anyone found a source for these new magic drives?
Newegg has had 120 gig laptop drives for a while now. It's listed at $263.75, so you might want to shop around.