Usually, when reading about Georgia, a glance at the article provides enough context to determine whether it's about the American state or the former Soviet bloc nation. Not in this case, it would seem.
Sued for copyright infringement for putting legal materials online
141–150 of 186 posts
Re: Sued for copyright infringement for putting legal materials online
#142The Republic of Georgia claims that the legal code establishing the rights and obligations of its citizens (including annotations commissioned and approved by the state) should not be freely available to its citizens or anyone else, because it is copyrighted by the state. According to the article, 20 other states around the world are making similar copyright claims. The written laws of a state (along with annotations…
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Re: Sued for copyright infringement for putting legal materials online
#143It cannot happen under the Japanese copyright law. I really can't understand the US law system in general.
Re: Sued for copyright infringement for putting legal materials online
#144Earlier quoted context omitted.
The text of the laws themselves are open-source. It's the annotations that are the issue and this is, at least, an area where there is a reasonable ambiguity. Hopefully one that will be resolved in favour of greatest openness, but the state's position is at least not totally unreasonable. What is unreasonable, and why this is getting attention on HN is because Malamud's actions in publish the annotations has been des…
Unofficial versions of the law are available, somewhat. The only official version of the law is the annotated one. Thus the only official law is deemed secret without payment by the state. Thus you cannot know the true law in Georgia without paying. Not to mention the official annotations are considered authoritative. Lawyer and judges reference them, making them part of the law.
Lawyers and judges reference a huge variety of materials in their opinions. That doesn’t make all those reference materials “part of the law.”
These annotations do not appear to be essential to understanding the law. They appear to be explanatory aids.
Re: Sued for copyright infringement for putting legal materials online
#145The Republic of Georgia claims that the legal code establishing the rights and obligations of its citizens (including annotations commissioned and approved by the state) should not be freely available to its citizens or anyone else, because it is copyrighted by the state. According to the article, 20 other states around the world are making similar copyright claims. The written laws of a state (along with annotations…
> The Republic of Georgia claims that the legal code establishing the rights and obligations of its citizens...should not be freely available to its citizens The federal government of the United States claims this as well, for example see Gilmore v. Gonzales . You are subject to classified laws and regulation to which you do not have access.
> The federal government of the United States claims this as well, for example see Gilmore v. Gonzales.
That's not entirely correct: http://volokh.com/posts/1134369043.shtml
> Now, just to be clear, I have no idea whether the TSA's decision not to publish the text of its regulations is a smart one. I can understand why they don't publish the names on the No-Fly list, but it's not obvious to me why they can't publish the regulation or rule (or the relevant part) requiring an ID. Maybe this is a misguided law, or an appropriate law being implemented in a misguided way. I don't know; as I said, this isn't my area of expertise. Further, I think reasonable people can disagree on whether TSA's practices are a big deal. Some will find them deeply troublesome, and others won't.
> At the same time, I think it's important to recognize that this dispute appears to be significantly narrower than Kevin's post suggests. First, Congress isn't passing any secret laws; the undisclosed authority is a regulation, not a statute, and the TSA's requirement is widely known. Second, no one is being arrested; as I understand it, the issue is only who can be let on an airplane.
> Finally, the court isn't being called on to interpret a law it has never seen. DOJ filed a motion attempting file a version of its brief under seal. According to the government's claim at oral argument, the version of the brief filed under seal would have included the text of any regulations TSA follows. The Ninth Circuit rejected the motion without comment, however, and if one judge's comment at oral argument is any sign, it may be because the actual text of the regulation isn't essential to the case. As best I can tell, then, DOJ hasn't filed the undisclosed regulations with the Court because the Court rejected its motion to do so under seal, and the alternative, filing it in open court, would have defeated the purpose of having the text of the regulations unpublished.
Re: Sued for copyright infringement for putting legal materials online
#146Earlier quoted context omitted.
Unofficial versions of the law are available, somewhat. The only official version of the law is the annotated one. Thus the only official law is deemed secret without payment by the state. Thus you cannot know the true law in Georgia without paying. Not to mention the official annotations are considered authoritative. Lawyer and judges reference them, making them part of the law.
Lawyers and judges reference a huge variety of materials in their opinions. That doesn’t make all those reference materials “part of the law.” These annotations do not appear to be essential to understanding the law. They appear to be explanatory aids.
> These annotations do not appear to be essential to understanding the law
At least 3 judges disagree with this (quoted from the article):
> “The annotations clearly have authoritative weight in explicating and establishing the meaning and effect of Georgia’s laws,” Judge Stanley Marcus wrote for a unanimous three-judge panel of the court
Re: Sued for copyright infringement for putting legal materials online
#147The state is saying Malamud called his own actions "terrorism". I think it's irresponsible how the lawyers worded this in their suit. I also think it's irresponsible for the NYT to print this without this context. From the suit[0]: Carl Malamud, has indicated that this type of strategy has been a successful form of “terrorism” that he has employed in the past to force government entities to publish documents on Malam…
Note also that in an effort to create drama, the article obscures the procedural context. The complaint with the word “terrorism” was filed years ago. The Eleventh Circuit disagreed with the State, holding that the entire OGCA was public domain because it was published under the authority of the State. What happened now is that Georgia has filed a petition for certiorari, asking the Supreme Court to overturn the Eleventh Circuit decision. The odds of the Supreme Court even hearing the case are slim, so the Eleventh Circuit decision likely will stand.
Re: Sued for copyright infringement for putting legal materials online
#148Earlier quoted context omitted.
Lawyers and judges reference a huge variety of materials in their opinions. That doesn’t make all those reference materials “part of the law.” These annotations do not appear to be essential to understanding the law. They appear to be explanatory aids.
> These annotations do not appear to be essential to understanding the law At least 3 judges disagree with this (quoted from the article): > “The annotations clearly have authoritative weight in explicating and establishing the meaning and effect of Georgia’s laws,” Judge Stanley Marcus wrote for a unanimous three-judge panel of the court
The Eleventh Circuit’s decision turns more on the annotations being published under the authority of the State than the fact that judges and lawyers “reference” them. Courts routinely reference the Restatements, for example, but those are private works.
Re: Sued for copyright infringement for putting legal materials online
#149This hyperbole on the part of the state is dangerous. It reminds of of lifetime flagging individuals as “sexual predators” and then learning that some state will use this for people convicted of public urination. It makes going to the source very important as my previous reasoning used to be “Are you against Terrorism/Sexual Predation? Yes. Cool, here’s how we deal with it.” Now is much more labor intensive as it’s n…
The word "terrorism" was used by Malamud himself to describe his own actions, see [1]. The state is quoting him. The title and contents of the NYTimes article are misleading on this point.
Re: Sued for copyright infringement for putting legal materials online
#150The state is saying Malamud called his own actions "terrorism". I think it's irresponsible how the lawyers worded this in their suit. I also think it's irresponsible for the NYT to print this without this context. From the suit[0]: Carl Malamud, has indicated that this type of strategy has been a successful form of “terrorism” that he has employed in the past to force government entities to publish documents on Malam…
Direct link to the Prologue page (inside the iframe) might be helpful: https://museum.media.org/eti/Prologue01.html