The Cult of Scientology doesn't go to court to win cases, it goes to court to spend money, more money and yet more money (plus, taxpayers money) until its opponents run out of money and give up. This always works because L Ron Hubbard said it would always work, even when it doesn't work.
In short, don't expect logic from fanatics.
Thanks for that personal comment on the cult. If you haven't already done so, you might consider visiting and contributing to the website 'Through the Door' http://alley.ethercat.com/door/index.html
which explores the thoughts of people who have participated in the Church of Scientology in a structured interview format. There is also a message board for ex-members, but you may have already found that: http://www.forum.exscn.net/index.php
For non-UK readers, Panorama programmes are available online at the BBC website for a long while after transmission.
"John Sweeney investigates the Church of Scientology, endorsed by some major Hollywood celebrities, but which continues to face the criticism that it is less of a religion and more of a cult. Some former members claim the Church uses a mind control technique to put opponents at a psychological disadvantage. During the course of his investigation, Sweeney is shouted at, spied on, visited in his hotel at midnight and chased around the streets of LA by strangers in hire cars."
"Unfortunately for him he made some throwaway remark on a usenet forum about aiming a missile at their HQ"
Not true - he was replying to a post on alt.religion.scientology that referred to 'cruise missiles'. Cruise. Tom Cruise. It was a joke.
But this is hardly arcane, hard to find stuff. See the Wikipedia article on Keith Henson.
It's fair use, but I received a letter from the cult's lawyers for putting precisely that quote on my website. They don't sue to win, they sue to shut people up. http://www.daisy.freeserve.co.uk/stolgy_14.htm
The 'secret scriptures' of Scientology have been widely distributed on the Internet. Summaries are easy to find.
This will not deter the Church of Scientology. For theological reasons it is neccessary for them to believe that their secrets are still secret, so they will continue to fight this already lost war for long as there are people willing to fund them and corrupt governments willing to give them tax breaks.
I read on the newsgroup alt.religion.scientology that certain websites critical of the Church of Scientology had been blocked on Wayback Machine. My website (www.daisy.freeserve.co.uk) falls into that category, so I took a look. To my surprise, I found a note to the effect that my website had been blocked at my request.
At my request? I hadn't known Wayback Machine existed!
So I wrote them. Back came a form letter referring me to a post on the Archive.org forum, which indicated that certain websites had been blocked at the request of the Church of Scientology. No apology. They've now changed the notice to say my URL is 'not available'. No explanation as to why.
Earlier this year my website was checked by CoS lawyers who asked me to remove material over which they claimed copyright. I did so. My website is currently legally clean so far as the Church of Eternal Litigation is concerned, but Wayback Machine will continue to block it - forever.
Archive.org have presumably not checked to see if the complaints were valid. That would cost money. So would websurfing to Slashdot and elsewhere to find out what happened to Google - bad publicity.
Let's be clear about this. The Church of Scientology is not concerned about copyright issues in general here - their own website www.scientology.org which is full of copyright notices is still available on Wayback Machine! What they want to do is to block access to their secret advanced courses, for which they charge Church members thousands of dollars.
They are legally entitled to this protection. My concern is that archive.org have yet to formulate a coherent policy towards blocking. They don't inform website owners that their sites have been blocked, they don't check to see if the blocking requests are valid, they don't say why a site has been blocked.
Slashdot Mirror
The Cult of Scientology doesn't go to court to win cases, it goes to court to spend money, more money and yet more money (plus, taxpayers money) until its opponents run out of money and give up. This always works because L Ron Hubbard said it would always work, even when it doesn't work. In short, don't expect logic from fanatics.
Thanks for that personal comment on the cult. If you haven't already done so, you might consider visiting and contributing to the website 'Through the Door'
http://alley.ethercat.com/door/index.html
which explores the thoughts of people who have participated in the Church of Scientology in a structured interview format. There is also a message board for ex-members, but you may have already found that:
http://www.forum.exscn.net/index.php
For non-UK readers, Panorama programmes are available online at the BBC website for a long while after transmission.
"John Sweeney investigates the Church of Scientology, endorsed by some major Hollywood celebrities, but which continues to face the criticism that it is less of a religion and more of a cult. Some former members claim the Church uses a mind control technique to put opponents at a psychological disadvantage. During the course of his investigation, Sweeney is shouted at, spied on, visited in his hotel at midnight and chased around the streets of LA by strangers in hire cars."
but not presumably by Tom Cruise.
"Unfortunately for him he made some throwaway remark on a usenet forum about aiming a missile at their HQ"
Not true - he was replying to a post on alt.religion.scientology that referred to 'cruise missiles'. Cruise. Tom Cruise. It was a joke.
But this is hardly arcane, hard to find stuff. See the Wikipedia article on Keith Henson.
It's fair use, but I received a letter from the cult's lawyers for putting precisely that quote on my website. They don't sue to win, they sue to shut people up.
http://www.daisy.freeserve.co.uk/stolgy_14.htm
The 'secret scriptures' of Scientology have been widely distributed on the Internet. Summaries are easy to find.
This will not deter the Church of Scientology. For theological reasons it is neccessary for them to believe that their secrets are still secret, so they will continue to fight this already lost war for long as there are people willing to fund them and corrupt governments willing to give them tax breaks.
I read on the newsgroup alt.religion.scientology that certain websites critical of the Church of Scientology had been blocked on Wayback Machine. My website (www.daisy.freeserve.co.uk) falls into that category, so I took a look. To my surprise, I found a note to the effect that my website had been blocked at my request.
At my request? I hadn't known Wayback Machine existed!
So I wrote them. Back came a form letter referring me to a post on the Archive.org forum, which indicated that certain websites had been blocked at the request of the Church of Scientology. No apology. They've now changed the notice to say my URL is 'not available'. No explanation as to why.
Earlier this year my website was checked by CoS lawyers who asked me to remove material over which they claimed copyright. I did so. My website is currently legally clean so far as the Church of Eternal Litigation is concerned, but Wayback Machine will continue to block it - forever.
Archive.org have presumably not checked to see if the complaints were valid. That would cost money. So would websurfing to Slashdot and elsewhere to find out what happened to Google - bad publicity.
Let's be clear about this. The Church of Scientology is not concerned about copyright issues in general here - their own website www.scientology.org which is full of copyright notices is still available on Wayback Machine! What they want to do is to block access to their secret advanced courses, for which they charge Church members thousands of dollars.
They are legally entitled to this protection. My concern is that archive.org have yet to formulate a coherent policy towards blocking. They don't inform website owners that their sites have been blocked, they don't check to see if the blocking requests are valid, they don't say why a site has been blocked.