Anthony Towns writes: > Uh, dude, "IANAL" is a way of indicating that you may not actually have > a clue what you're talking about because it's all just amateur opinions. > Once upon a time -legal used to be littered with it; now days the concept > that regular posters to -legal might be mistaken seems to be rather alien.
In dealing with areas that I have researched thoroughly and lived through, I am not afraid to say that facts are facts. When I am not sure, I throw in appropriate qualifiers (such as "I cannot imagine xxx", "At least in the US, ..." or even "IANAL"). When I do not think I have enough good information to make a useful contribution, I make no comment. When appropriate, I cite the relevant documents. I am no stranger to the idea that I might be wrong. When someone points out facts that contradict my position, I pay attention. When the only critiques are based on me not having a secret decoder ring -- whether the ring means "JD" or "DD" -- I tend to discount them. I do not pretend Debian should pay much attention to whether I think choice of venue is an appropriate tradeoff for the DFSG, for the reasons you mention. I do believe that many of the arguments in favor of choice of venue clauses are factually wrong[1], that those should be corrected before a decision is made, and that the decision should not be a casual one. [1]- e.g. http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2007/05/msg00140.html [snip] >> Nitpick: The plaintiff would need to issue a summons to the defendant. >> A subpoena is for testimony or other fact discovery[1]. A defendant >> does not become a respondent until he responds to a particular >> filing[1]; the plaintiff would usually also be a respondent to certain >> motions[1]. >> >> [1]- Ask Wikipedia, Google, or whatever floats your boat. These are >> not obscure legal facts or specific instances, they are basic terms. >> Would you take someone seriously who had strong programming opinions >> but thought "CC" was the name of a C compiler or claimed to know the >> Pearl _scripting_ language? > > It's interesting that you started the mail offended about the "ad hominem > attack" of noting you're not a developer; yet somehow you think a computer > expert who tries to avoid paying attention to legal arguments getting > "subpoena" and "summons" confused is an ignoramus who shouldn't be > taken seriously. > > And that is exactly an ad hominem fallacy -- attacking the person in > order to discredit their arguments, even though the flaws the person > may have don't actually affect their argument. I have not attacked your position by attacking you. I have pointed out where and why your posts were wrong, stated why I did not think my corrections needed to be backed up by specific citations, and asked if you would take seriously someone who made analogous errors of fact in a different area. You asserted in another post that -legal was often not taken seriously by the rest of Debian; it seems fair to point out why there may be similar feelings in the other direction, at least as far as legal analysis goes. Michael Poole -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
