OT: Spamhaus petition rejected - followup from previous discussion

[Richard Frovarp]

Res wrote:
>  Richard Frovarp wrote:
>>> <snip>
>>> Because Spamhaus said so! They told the state court they have no
>>> jurisdiction. They asked for the case to be moved to the federal
>>> court. Then they decided that the federal court didn't have
>>> jurisdiction, and didn't show up. If you don't show up for your case,
>>> you lose. I think that is pretty standard around the world. Read this:
>
>
> Why should they turn up if they have no jurisdiction?
> the US courts do not get to tell an organisation of any other country 
> what they can and cant do.. period.
>
>

By asking for the case to be removed from state court and moved to 
federal court, they in effect said the federal courts have jurisdiction. 
You then need to show up. They should have argued from the beginning 
that no US court has jurisdiction. This may claim may have gone up the 
chain of courts a distance. However, I do have faith in the system that 
the end result would have been a precedent in the right direction. I am 
not aware of any case in the US that has tested this territory.

Your second statement is the problem. They do get to tell an 
organization what they can and can't do if they have a US presence. The 
question is what constitutes a presence in the current age where brick 
and motar buildings aren't necessary. The fact that the service is free, 
really does not matter in the US. The only thing a paid service does is 
provide revenue to a company making it more appealing as a target. (Now 
that YouTube has Google's finances, it is a more appealing target to 
sue, even though it is a "free" site). Yes, in the Australian case the 
WSJ was imported in, but are not Spamhaus packets imported into the US? 
The WSJ was a push and Spamhaus is a pull, I will concede there is a 
difference there.

However, look at the case against Lik-Sang.com 
(http://www.lik-sang.com/news.php?artc=3900), which is a "pull" 
scenario. Sony did it right and filed a suit in Hong Kong, in addition 
to the out of jurisdiction UK courts. However, it was the UK court that 
said it is illegal for Lik-Sang.com to sell PSPs to UK customers. 
Lik-Sang.com doesn't have a presence anywhere but in HK. So here is an 
example of UK courts telling an organization of any other country what 
they can and can't do. Does it make the Spamhaus case right? No. The 
point is that it does happen in other countries and there is a real 
problem with jurisdictional issues today.

I do think the case is pure baloney. However, Spamhaus has set a 
precedent in the wrong direction. I hope that they do appeal and get a 
quick judgment that this case belongs in UK courts. This will make it 
easier for other groups to defend themselves in the future, at least in 
US courts. The right call was made by the judge saying that getting 
Tucows or ICANN to drop their domain is not something the courts should 
do. This does appear to be a decent judge, but there is only so much a 
judge can decide to do own their own.