Path: sn.no!news-feed.ifi.uio.no!recycled.news.erols.com!feed1.news.erols.com!news.idt.net!cam-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.bbnplanet.com!panix!news.panix.com!lepton From: lepton@panix.com (Mike O'Connor) Newsgroups: alt.religion.scientology Subject: Re: Cult get Grayd cult off net Date: Fri, 17 Oct 1997 00:16:32 -0400 Organization: Leptonic Systems Inc. Lines: 181 Message-ID: References: <3446a368.447329295@news.sol.no> NNTP-Posting-Host: lepton.dialup.access.net X-Newsreader: MT-NewsWatcher 2.3.5 Xref: sn.no alt.religion.scientology:385101 In article <3446a368.447329295@news.sol.no>, heldal@NOSPAMonline.no (Andreas Heldal-Lund) wrote: > What stupidity is this??? Isn't America supposed to be the land > of free speech??? But Helena Kobrin says that you can sign away a right (such as free speech) in order to receive a benefit (such as the services of an ISP.) She says it happens all the time. Here are excerpts from a session seen on C-SPAN some time ago. The moderator was from AOL, by the way. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ BURRINGTON: [moderator] [I threw out the question of] other problems, and they really do come down to this question of online liability.. [snip] Helena had her.. her.. mouth open.. I guess.. not her hand up.. Go ahead. KOBRIN: [cult lawyer] I definitely have comments on this subject, and they are directly implicated in our litigation. Our position.. Copyright law as it currently exists is essentially, I guess what lawyers would call a strict liability law. You don't have to know that you are making a copy, to be liable for that copy. Uh, and this is an area where.. We.. We haven't taken that approach in our litigation. Our approach has been, if.. if we notify you, that there are infringements occurring on your system.. First of all, most access providers have rules and regulations of some sort. Some of them say don't.. you can't do anything illegal through our system. Uh, some of them say.. you can't infringe copyrights through our system. Uh, and they mostly have, some sort of contract with their uh.. their customers. Now.. The contract could be more or less formal, but it's still valid as a contract. Uh.. Our position is, if that's the case, and, and the owner of a copyright calls you up and says my copyright is being violated through your system, I am trying to work with your customer, your customer will not listen to me, you have some obligation to deal with your customer and get your customer to stop. And, at that point, if you refuse to do that, if you don't wish to cooperate, then _you_ start getting into the field as an access provider of having some liability for what is going on through your system, you put that system there, you made the choice of putting that software, that hardware there so people could access the Internet, and you're then facilitating other people violating uh laws. And at that point, it's our position that that's when the liability should kick in, now, many access providers are perfectly willing to cooperate and say hey, we don't this stuff going on through our service, and, they go back to the person and they say hey, you know, you can't do this. If you're going to keep doing this your account is going to be suspended and I know, in dealing with different access providers, there are _thousands_ of people who have had accounts suspended, for, for violating various different uhh, provisions of their rules. [...] BURRINGTON: [...] But also gets at what I know commisioner Leighman (sp) would like to see, and certainly the church of scientology that, and others would like to see.. is a rather quick and immediate takedown of what is deemed to be allegedly infringing material. And once.. that happens then, we're out of the loop so to speak, unless we, you know contribute to that.. infringement, and and this mediation, panel, or cyber, whatever.. we'll come up with some neat name.. that's hip, and cool for, cyberspace. Umm, that, you know they would be out of the loop, and then it's back to where it should be, which is between, the copyright holder, and the alleged infringer to duke it out, under existing law. Right? [To David Johnson] Is that sort of what you had in mind? [several words by others, "I agree"] All right then we're all done, thanks, no.. [...] KOBRIN: I think there's another aspect to this, which is.. I, I am.. certainly a proponent of sp.. free speech, as are my clients very strongly. When you have a situation here where someone is saying my copyright is being violated.. I think.. First of all.. I think it's a bit of an overreaction on the subject of free speech, in that.. we're talking about possibly suspending.. well.. taking off that posting, for that limited period of time..we are not saying you can not speak. We are not saying, you know, you can not continue to say whatever you want to say. We're saying.. this particular posting, is a problem, at least in somebody's.. opinion. You know, and they have, property rights that they claim are being violated. And therefore, for the period of time while we resolve this, you need to take your posting off That can even be a condition in a person's contract with an online service, you know? If, if we receive complaints, and, and I mean there are not.. eight million complaints happening all the time. There are, you know specific individual complaints that occur. If we receive one, and you, you can either willingly take off what you've posted while it's being sorted out, or we'll take off what you posted while it's being sorted out, or if you get really obnoxious about it we will suspend your account but that's not necessary, just cooperate, let's get this resolved. And in the meantime, let's protect this, this person's right, that they say they have, and let's take this off, so it's not being circulated in the meantime. [...] KOBRIN: I agree with the uh, the approach that uh.. An access provider should be required to do something when they are notified. Now I, I would have.. no problem and I don't know exactly wh, how an amendment would be.. with an amendment to the law that says.. that if an access provider is notified and takes all responsible actions.. to deal with the problem and, and not facilitate the infringement.. then the access provider should not have liability, after that point. [...] AUDIENCE MEMBER [The first audience question]: . Without suggesting that copyright holders have done this in the past, or, or with particular legis.. litigation that has been, talked about today.. What's to prevent the copyright holder from harassing the individual? The panel's been very good at addressing these issues from the perspective of the copyright holder. What about.. me? What about the individual who posts to America Online, and then has, church of scientology, or, Time-Warner, or someone else, go to Bill Burrington and say, hey, he can't post that? Now. One of two things happens, either Bill Burrington takes action, and the letter's been written and they do something. Maybe I was wrong.. maybe I was right. But you're either asking him to be the judge and jury there, and I've been harassed by the copyright holder, if in fact it was, within my right, to post that information. Or, we go to this virtual magistrate, where we've got a private law enforcer. I mean you are asking them to, to pass judgement.. on whether or not I violated the law. That's not for a private industry group to decide. Because then you're taking action.. and deciding whether or not I can continue to post that information, whether I can continue to have access to the system.. and you have effectively short-circuited, our legal system.. in the interest of expediency. Or am I misreading this suggestion? BURRINGTON: You raise some actually great, great points and I think, to flesh this out. Do you want to respond, Helen.. KOBRIN: Sure, As someone who works in the legal system, I can say, um I mean I'm not going to get into lawyer bashing here but.. I am a lawyer and.. The system, is, is what it is, but it's not necessarily the most expeditious way to deal with a problem. In other words, if, if someone has a complaint against you for posting their copyrights, and you're going to insist that that person take you to court.. you know, many thousands or hundreds of thousands of dollars later, you may have this dispute resolved. And I don't think that's necessarily helpful to you, or the copyright owner. Uhh.. Now.. It is a way to deal with it and, and you know it can be done that way and it is done that way, frequently. But, if there is a a mechanism short of that to deal with it, uhh, I think you know, everyone will be better off, number one. Number two, uhh.. I don't know that I would call it private law enforcement. To me, you know there are agreements that you make, there are, there are contracts you enter into, when you, when you.. go into an online service and you pay them your monthly fee. And, you agree.. I think, what would have to be set up here I mean already, you are agreeing to certain conditions that they have as part of using your system. And, I think all.. the, the uhh online services would have to review their agreements, and they would have to see what the agreements need to be. You can privately agree, you know to do anything that's legal. You can privately agree to give up a right that you have, in order, uh, to receive a benefit of some sort and this happens all the time. Uhh.. The other point is.. You know you're talking about, uhh harassing someone who is, using, material, well.. I don't think that's a situation at all because.. I mean, you can easily see if that's what's going on. Wh.. If the person is complaining about something that, that is quite obvious on its face, you know.. someone instead of saying uhh.. I don't want you to uh post.. the last novel that I wrote.. They're complaining about a posting that you made which says, you know.. I read this novel by so and so and I thaught it was terrible.. Well, that's gonna be pretty obvious on its face, that this person is just trying to stop you from talking about what they did.. as opposed to reproducing what they wrote, without their permission. I think these kinds of issues can be dealt with quite simply. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ -Mike