Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!henry From: henry@utzoo.UUCP (Henry Spencer) Newsgroups: net.news.group,net.news.stargate Subject: Re: Starhub -- one alternative to Stargate Message-ID: <7006@utzoo.UUCP> Date: Wed, 30-Jul-86 17:59:16 EDT Article-I.D.: utzoo.7006 Posted: Wed Jul 30 17:59:16 1986 Date-Received: Wed, 30-Jul-86 17:59:16 EDT References: <260@dmsd.UUCP> <6945@utzoo.UUCP>, <262@dmsd.UUCP> <6971@utzoo.UUCP>, <3688@ut-ngp.UUCP> Organization: U of Toronto Zoology Lines: 72 [legal issues of Stargate etc] Caveat: I am not a lawyer. Consult an expert before doing anything rash. Further caveat: I have no official association with Stargate. > If we founded a non-profit corporation which puts a sattelite into the > sky that does nothing but "echo" or "forward" transmissions radiatated at > it, would that make the corporation, management, or founders liable for what > gets "forwarded" ??? It depends on whether you are a "common carrier" or a "publisher". A common carrier is something like the phone company, which is definitely not responsible for what you say over the phone. A publisher is something like Newsweek, which is responsible for every word. If you are running a point-to-point communications service, you are probably a common carrier. If you are running a broadcast service, the situation is much less clear. You might or might not be. Electronic communications haven't been around long enough for this to be resolved. > now what if we used "store-and-forward" technology, either in the air or on > the ground ... This only makes the legal fog even murkier. > quite honestly, from all I hear about the "legal conisderations" regarding > Stargate, I'd be afraid to moderate a group there, or, at least, would feel > that I'd have to "censor" a lot more than I'd really feel needs to be done > at such an alternative, or on the Usenet as it currently exists... Would you be similarly reluctant to become an editor for a magazine? The same ground rules would probably apply: moderators for Stargate will probably have to be paid, and Stargate will probably have to indemnify them against legal action. Yes, being a moderator for Stargate will probably mean being more careful than for, say, a Usenet moderated group. This problem is not at all unique to Stargate. Any scheme which involves a central organization will probably have to exercise control over content. > ...I do believe that some form of moderating or limiting the distribution > of articles unless approved for wider distribution by some form of > reader-concensus (as the article gets read by more and more people) is > needed. And I'm not looking for something fail-safe or unbeatable, just > something that reduces the swamping of the net with improper articles. I agree that we need something like this. The biggest problem is the chicken-and-egg one: how to get it started? mod.sources has been very successful; mod.unix hasn't been. Wholesale conversion of the net to moderation appears to be difficult approaching impossible. Basic points of the laws as I understand them (see caveats above): Non-profit status doesn't help at all. It matters to the IRS but not to the libel lawyers. You cannot just claim "but I wasn't paying attention to what people were sending over my satellite". If you are not a common carrier, you have a legal obligation to exercise control. Claiming you are a common carrier doesn't necessarily make you one. Setting legal precedents can be unpleasant and very expensive. Being sued can be very expensive even if you win. Insurance against lawsuits is becoming hard to find and very expensive. Anybody can sue you over anything. He may not win, but he can try. Usenet escapes the problem only by having no central point to sue. -- EDEC: Stupidly non-standard brain-damaged incompatible Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology proprietary protocol used. {allegra,ihnp4,decvax,pyramid}!utzoo!henry