From: Christopher Dicely <cmdicely@...>
Date: 2011-05-24T23:40:25+09:00
Subject: Re: BARRIER - json, thin, eventmachine - do not install on windows

2011/5/23 David Masover <ninja@slaphack.com>:
> On Monday, May 23, 2011 05:35:26 AM Ilias Lazaridis wrote:
>> On 23 Μάϊος, 02:27, Johnny Morrice <sp...@killersmurf.com> wrote:
>> [...] - (off topic, off line, personal)
>>
>> Mr. Morrice.
>>
>> I hope you are aware that you have already crossed moral and legal
>> lines.
>
> Unlikely.
>
> Moral -- When you ask a group of volunteers for help, you _ask_. You don't
> demand, with "requirements", and then refuse to read the responses because
> they're "too complicated" without offering a single reason why. I would
> actually consider it a moral obligation to point these things out, so that
> others don't waste their time trying to engage you.
>
> Legal -- I'm calling your bluff. You can either claim that troll is well-
> defined enough that it is a factual claim, in which case, I think the evidence
> is against you -- and even if you were able to show it to be false, for it to
> be slander, you would also have to show it to be malicious. If troll is not
> well-defined enough to be a factual matter, then it is an opinion, and
> opinions are not actionable -- if it is merely our _opinion_ that you are a
> troll, it is also our right to express that opinion.

Well, all of this is approximately true of U.S. law (not quite though;
actual malice is only required in certain cases, though where it isn't
at least actual or constructive knowledge of the falsity of the
statement is still required.) There are jurisdictions that have much
looser standards when it comes to defamation, (e.g., the UK), and
plenty of jurisdictions are willing to treat anything on the internet
as subject to their law no matter where it originated or where the
notional victim is located. So its almost impossible to say anything
on the internet without there being an arguable case that you've
broken some law somewhere on Earth where the jurisdiction might
plausibly be convinced to actually treat you as subject to its law if
a case where brought against you, but as long as its not a
jurisdiction in which you have vulnerable assets, are likely to seek
to do business or travel, or a jurisdiction with the will and capacity
to forcibly reach into foreign jurisdictions to enforce the law in
question, or with which a jurisdiction meeting one of those
descriptions is likely to cooperate in enforcing the law,  it really
doesn't matter all that much except in the theoretical sense.