Project Gutenberg blocks access from Germany • Hacker News Board

Re: Project Gutenberg blocks access from Germany

#121

Post by freeflight » Sat, Mar 03, 2018, 10:46 PM UTC

Grollicus wrote: post #102

freeflight wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If germany doesn't like that they are now being blocked, then they should change their laws. Sadly it ain't as easy as that, the copyright lobby is very powerful in Germany, with their very own special interest laws like "mitstörerhaftung" [0] and the "Impressumspflicht". It's stuff like that which prevents open WLAN easily being run and operated because in Germany the person running the AP is liable for everything…

The Störerhaftung is not a special interest law for copyright. The idea is that you are at fault if others use you (/your stuff) to violate rights of a third party. For example if someone were to spray paint "freeflight sucks" on my house you could ask me to remove it and if I didn't, you could sue me.

Its interpretation in regards to online access is (was) very much special interest for copyright claimants and one of the major hurdles for getting free WiFi coverage in Germany.

Re: Project Gutenberg blocks access from Germany

#122

Post by antoncohen » Sat, Mar 03, 2018, 10:46 PM UTC

Findus23 wrote: post #97

I’m really for open access to old books, but for playing devils advocate I can see the courts point: International websites have to respect local laws. After all those are the only ones I can directly influence (by voting, etc.) If we’d start to ignore this (even if it is in my advantage in this case), this means I have no influence any more on how companies are allowed to interact with me (which shouldn’t be the cas…

> International websites have to respect local laws.

No way.

If I, a US citizen, publish a website hosted in the US that is critical of the Turkish president, should a Turkish court be able to compel me to take it down or block access from Turkey?

What if I'm Israeli and I publish open source software, source and binary hosted in Israel, that is against US hacking laws. Should a US court be able to order an Israeli to stop doing something that is legal in Israel?

(Both of these are hypothetical, I don't know if there are such laws.)

If I have no business in a country (or pseudo country like EU) they should have no jurisdiction over me. I shouldn't have to comply with every crazy authoritarian, free speech suppressing, restricted use country in the world.

If countries want to prosecute their own citizens for visiting my site, consuming my content, or using my software, that is their business.

Now if I do business in that country... that is different, then they might have some legal jurisdiction over me.

Re: Project Gutenberg blocks access from Germany

#123

Post by zmmmmm » Sat, Mar 03, 2018, 10:47 PM UTC

KenoFischer wrote: post #76

zorked wrote: post #21

The explanation is at least slightly dishonest (hopefully not intentionally) in claiming that jurisdiction was established due to content being available in German, which makes it sound like a whacko court claiming to own a language. Reading the decision one learns that some of the volunteers involved in running PG and posting these materials were residents of Germany.

I thought so too reading the first couple of pages of the decision, but in the judicial conclusion section, the jurisdictional issue is squarely resolved on the "targets German users" issue, which the court bases on 1) Partial translation of the website 2) The availability of German language works 3) The "anyone anywhere" language on the website 4) A disclaimer that people should check their local laws (implying in t…

> 4) A disclaimer that people should check their local law

How perverse. If you extrapolate this, any web site warning anybody about anything could be seen as endorsing that activity. "Child pornography is illegal and not supported by this web site" becomes "You knew there were child pornographers accessing your web site and this is proof you were aiding and abetting child pornography".

Re: Project Gutenberg blocks access from Germany

#124

Post by Tomte » Sat, Mar 03, 2018, 10:48 PM UTC

thomastjeffery wrote: post #110

Tomte wrote: post #89

"The legal guidance PGLAF received is that US law requires that such proceedings would have taken place in the US" Cute. Who cares about what US law may require?

Considering how much US patent law has been enforced abroad: most governments. I do hope that these proceedings are forced to take place in the US, because that would set a precedent, however insignificant, that copyright does not apply in other countries.

I hope that countries other than America still get to have their own court system. I certainly don't want America to have final say over everything in the world.

Re: Project Gutenberg blocks access from Germany

#125

Post by greenyoda » Sat, Mar 03, 2018, 10:48 PM UTC

jaakl wrote: post #32

> PGLAF is entirely in the US PGLAF has awesome mission, but that base assumption is not really correct. With publishing content in Germany (or whatever country) over Internet (or otherwise) they have crossed physical and legal borders. You must obey local laws everywhere and US laws are legal in their soil only. The attitude that US laws are something globally applicable and Internet is something above local laws is…

> total blockage “revenge” is just plain childish

The article claims that they're doing it to protect themselves from future lawsuits, not as "revenge":

"Q: Why block all of Germany, rather than just those 18 books?

A: PGLAF's legal advisors disagree with all claims that there must be any blocking, or removal, or anything associated - censorship, fines/fees, disclaimers, etc. - for items that are in the public domain in the US. Period.[1]

Because the German Court has overstepped its jurisdiction, and allowed the world's largest publishing group to bully Project Gutenberg for these 18 books, there is every reason to think that this will keep happening. There are thousands of eBooks in the Project Gutenberg collection that could be subject to similar over-reaching and illigitimate actions.

PGLAF is a small volunteer organization, with no income (it doesn't sell anything), other than donations. There is every reason to fear that this huge corporation, with the backing of the German Court, will continue to take legal action. In fact, at least one other similar complaint arrived in 2017 about different books in the Project Gutenberg collection, from another company in Germany."

[1] For the reasoning behind this, see the quotes in my earlier comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16512068

Re: Project Gutenberg blocks access from Germany

#126

Post by robjwells » Sat, Mar 03, 2018, 10:49 PM UTC

Findus23 wrote: post #120

robjwells wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> for playing devils advocate I can see the courts point: International websites have to respect local laws I think this is an untenable position as it would mean that any website, published from any country, hosted on servers in any country, would have to abide by the laws of the world’s 193 countries. Project Gutenberg’s argument is that they are only a US concern — everyone involved officially is in the US, and th…

I agree with you. Following every law is neither practical and in the case of censorship even counterproductive. I just wanted to point out that the reaction of the court isn’t as entirely pointless as it may seem on first thought.

> I just wanted to point out that the reaction of the court isn’t as entirely pointless as it may seem on first thought.

And I think you’re right to do so!

Honestly, regarding the whole case, I think the court has erred in accepting the publisher’s argument that Project Gutenberg is a valid target for a lawsuit in Germany.

If the publisher wants the books removed it should sue in the US, if it wants to prevent access from Germany it should seek another local remedy.

Re: Project Gutenberg blocks access from Germany

#127

Post by driverdan » Sat, Mar 03, 2018, 10:49 PM UTC

What would be the consequence of not complying? Would they just require German ISPs to filter the site? Could they enforce a judgement on a US company?

Re: Project Gutenberg blocks access from Germany

#128

Post by Xylakant » Sat, Mar 03, 2018, 10:49 PM UTC

freeflight wrote: post #117

Xylakant wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The EUGH decision is fairly recent and it’s about as far up as possible. So I wouldn’t hold my breath unless the EU doubles down on net neutrality.

The EUGH link does not work, but the Vodafone case was a decision by a Munich court, which could still be overturned if somebody bothered going all the way up to the BVerfG.

Odd, link works for me. In case you want to search for it, it’s lawsuit C‑314/12, the document identifier seems to be ECLI:EU:C:2014:192

Or you can follow the link in the first article to https://netzpolitik.org/2014/eugh-legt-zensur-grundlagen-net... which has a link to the court decision (grep for “Das Urteil”)

Re: Project Gutenberg blocks access from Germany

#129

Post by pgeorgi » Sat, Mar 03, 2018, 10:53 PM UTC

raverbashing wrote: post #83

freeflight wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But it's either them being sued or ISPs being ordered to block the website. Sued by whom? Afaik gutenberg.org is registered in California, no German jurisdiction, the cease&desist orders usually used to shut something like this down don't apply here. Same deal with ISPs: Afaik there's no legal framework to support anything like that, it's for exactly that reason why law firms like Waldorf and Frommer uses cease&des…

Rights owners in Germany would request the blocking to the Justice system, due to theirs rights being violated If someone hosts a website in another country, hosting US copyrighted material, I assume something similar would happen if the site refused to take the material down

> a website in another country, hosting US copyrighted material, I assume something similar would happen if the site refused to take the material down

https://ustr.gov/about-us/policy-offices/press-office/press-... is what happens. Being on the 301 report watch lists can have pretty nasty consequences in trade relations with the US.

Re: Project Gutenberg blocks access from Germany

#130

Post by kameit00 » Sat, Mar 03, 2018, 10:56 PM UTC

dsacco wrote: post #5

Can someone in Germany confirm this block is actually in place? In any case, if anyone in Germany would like to access Project Gutenberg, I maintain a full, daily updated mirror here: https://mirrors.sorengard.com/gutenberg . I also support FTP and Rsync if you’d like to download that way. No donations are asked for, but it would be helpful if more people hosted mirrors for precisely this reason :). Unfortunately thi…

Confirmed. Download pages are blocked. But reachable via non german VPN servers. Seems like money rules the world - sad...