Really, the idea that a US courts can order an international organisation, like InterNIC (that's the Inter- bit of InterNIC), to deregister a domain is farcical. The only pressure the US courts can place on InterNIC is "Do what we say or you get shut down". Well, go ahead. Somehow I think that the community might have something to say about that, as it's tantamount to shutting down the internet.
Also, to suggest that a community run organisation in another country can be compelled to do ANYTHING, by a US court anyway, is ludicrous. If E360 had a legitimate claim they should have made it in a UK court. As they files it in the US this makes it obvious that they know their claim is bogus. And, lastly, as much as US citizens hate to hear it, .org is NOT a US domain, .org.us is. The .com, .org, etc domains are international domains. The convention of assuming that the non country coded domains are US domains is simply a result of American hubris. It would actually be great to see international domains be means tested (you have to have offices in two or more countries before you can get one), but I would assume that the bitchfest that would ensue wouldn't be worth it. That's my 2 cents, anyway. As an Australian resident and citizen I do not want opt-out style marketing sent to me and it is very disheartening to hear that a US court would even try to force an international effort to STOP spam to allow a spammer (unsolicited bulk e-mail is unsolicited, period, there is no way to wriggle around that) to continue their nefarious trade is insulting and arrogant. I think the only thing the court should be able to force Spamhaus to do is to provide a voting mechanism to its users on the issue to see if the users who use SpamHaus want E360 blocked, and to put some sort of warning on their front page and in the RSYNC domain files, that E360 is blocked and that's about it. To award for losses is just stupid. People don't have to use SpamHaus, they choose to, and it is a decent assumption that if you use SpamHaus you don't WANT E360's crap. Sure, maybe showing up for the case might have been smart, but that's the way the cookie crumbles. For now the ball is in InterNIC's court, and I say they have a chance to declare their independence. Maybe InterNIC should move it's servers to Finland or somewhere less draconian. > -----Original Message----- > From: Bill Horne [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > Sent: Monday, 16 October 2006 11:24 AM > To: users@spamassassin.apache.org > Subject: Re: Any comments of the SpamHaus lawsuit? > > > On Tue, 2006-10-10 at 23:25 -0700, John Rudd wrote: > > Jason Haar wrote: > > > I've been waiting for anyone else to bring it up - but no-one has. > > > > > > If Spamhaus lose this lawsuit (which they are ignoring as they are > > > UK-based and this is some judge in Chicago), they may > very well lose > > > their ".ORG" domain - which would have a rather large > impact on our > > > Antispam scores for a start... > > > > > > http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/20061009/anti-spam-lawsuit.htm > > > > > > "Americans to arms" I say... Start sending "Internet for > Dummies" to the > > > judge for starters ;-) > > > > I'm not really sure it's such a big deal. > > > > Spamhaus will have to resort to their UK domain. One where > the laws > > entirely protect them from this kind of harassment. We'll > all switch to > > using that domain instead of the .org domain, when > using/referencing > > their RBLs. Oh the horror. > > > > Meanwhile, the twit who sued them has wasted a bunch of > court fees, and > > made only the slightest dent in their operations. > > > > And the UK gets to look good. And the US government gets > to look stupid > > in front of the world court of opinion (like that's > anything new, given > > our current administration). > > > > Where's the problem? > > The precedent is the problem. As soon as one chickenboner > wins the SLAPP > lottery, they'll all line up to SLAPP any organization, > corporation, or > individual that annoys them. Convicted felons like Ralsky will be > laughing themselves to sleep, thinking how easy it is to use a legal > steamroller to quash their opposition. > > Spamfighting is almost entirely a volunteer operation, and those who > join the Lumber Cartel (TINLC) do so with the expectation that they'll > receive a lot of "Cartooney" threats from lawyers and pretend-lawyers. > > If this company succeeds in cutting off spamhaus's domain, > the Cartooney > letters will start to be real. At that point, the options open to the > army of private citizens who've been fighting spam quickly narrow down > to either quiting or joining/imitating SPEWS. Cartel members > (TINC) will > start looking over their shoulder and waiting for the process-server - > and when that happens, the terrorists have won. > > FWIW. YMMV. > > Bill
