From: "Alex F" <alexf@iss.net>
Date: Fri, 26 Jul 1996 02:57:39 +0800
To: tcmay@got.net (Timothy C. May)
Subject: Re: Digital Watermarks for copy protection in recent Billbo
Message-ID: <199607251458.KAA02604@phoenix.iss.net>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



> >> To go to trial, an indictment would be needed. How likely is this?
> >
> >The likelyness is irrelevant to the point.  Possibility is relevant.
> >Probability is not.
> 
> "Likeliness" is _always_ relevent when discussing law.

I disagree.  The CDA is not likely to ever get enforced.  Does this 
mean that we should just ignore it because likeliness is zero to 
none?


> Thus, the guy who buys a bicycle that later turns out to have been stolen,
> will usually lose the bicycle, but is not knowingly receiving stolen
> property and hence is guilty of no crime. And no DA will charge him; the
> courts and jails are already clogged up enough.

Uhh, if the DA has a personal vendetta against the guy w/ the bike he 
*COULD* charge him, if he wanted to, and it would be 100% legal.  
What we are talking about here are laws that allow for harrassment 
under the guise of the legal system.  Granted, laws are not 
necedssarily bad, people are, but still....

This stuff CAN and DOES (there goes the "likeliness" theory) happen 
all the time.

Your point of view strikes as one from a text book where people are 
not crooked (nothing wrong w/ that), but the sad fact is that there 
are people out there who can and will take advantage of any legal 
loophole in order to get done what they want done.

Alex F

> I maintain that this "wiggle factor" in the law is not something to get
> worried about ("But they _could_ arrest me for buying a book stolen 10
> years ago! We've got to do something!) and is, in fact, essential in any
> justice system. There just is no "automated" or "formal" system, and
> probably/hopefully never will be.
> 
> --Tim May
> 
> 
> 
> Boycott "Big Brother Inside" software!
> We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, we know that that ain't allowed.
> ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:----
> Timothy C. May              | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
> tcmay@got.net  408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
> W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA  | knowledge, reputations, information markets,
> Licensed Ontologist         | black markets, collapse of governments.
> "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Alex F    alexf@iss.net
Marketing Specialist
Internet Security Systems
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-