From: danisch@ira.uka.de (Hadmut Danisch)
Date: Thu, 10 Feb 94 12:25:29 PST
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: Oh No! Nazis on the Nets
Message-ID: <9402101946.AA08887@deathstar.iaks.ira.uka.de>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


> So, just to clear this up, if you wanted to start a newspaper today,
> could you simply print out a few hundred copies of whatever you wanted
> to say and go out and sell it (or give it away) without any
> interaction with the government?  (I don't know the answer for
> Germany; I'm genuinely curious.  I hope the answer is "yes".)


Of course not without *any* interaction. You have to pay taxes if
you earn money, and 
you are not allowed to do it anonymous. Everything must contain
an address of someone responsible. In bigger papers you have
an "impressum" in small papers and pamphlets you have
a line like "responsible in the sense of press law: Joe Dalton"
And of course you will get sued or accused if you write anything
which violates law, but this depends on _what_ you are writing.


But no one forbids to do produce a newspaper. Every school has
a 'schoolpaper' (don't know how to translate well). Everyone
who thinks he has to tell anything important prints anything
on lots of paper at this University, in most cases political
(often very left-wing) themes. 

Our 'Grundgesetz', the constitution (like "Bill of rights") says
that there is no censorship. Everyone can tell his opinion
in "Word, letter and image":

Art. 5

(1) Jeder hat das Recht, seine Meinung in Wort, Schrift und Bild frei
zu uern und zu verbreiten und sich aus allgemein zugnglichen
Quellen ungehindert zu unterrichten. Die Pressefreiheit und die
Freiheit der Berichterstattung durch Rundfunk und Film werden
gewhrleistet. Eine Zensur findet nicht statt.

(2) Diese Rechte finden ihre Schranken in den Vorschriften der
allgemeinen Gesetze, den gesetzlichen Bestimmungen zum Schutze der
Jugend und in dem Recht der persnlichen Ehre.

(3) Kunst und Wissenschaft, Forschung und Lehre sind frei. Die
Freiheit der Lehre entbindet nicht von der Treue zur Verfassung.


Hadmut