Subj : Re: How much should I charge for fixed-price software contract? To : comp.programming From : Richard Heathfield Date : Tue Aug 23 2005 12:03 pm Gerry Quinn wrote: > In article , > invalid@address.co.uk.invalid says... >> Gerry Quinn wrote: > >> > The issue is that Elcomsoft sold their software in the US. This was >> > checked by a Federal agent who bought a copy that was offered for sale >> > there. >> >> Where in the US? > > Don't know - Washington, I suppose, via the internet. So he bought the software in the US. That doesn't mean it was sold in the US. The seller was in Russia, where the DMCA does not apply. >> Are you claiming that Russian law prohibits the sale of Elcomsoft's >> software? > > Sklyarov wasn't indicted under Russian law. Indeed, and US law doesn't apply to stuff that happens in Russia. The software seems to have been sold in Russia, irrespective of where it was bought - so Sklyarov shouldn't have been indicted at all. >> >> That's not a serious charge. It's a serious punishment all right, but >> >> it's not a serious charge. >> > >> > A charge with a serious punishment is a serious charge. >> >> So all you have to do is put library fines up to seven million dollars a >> day, and suddenly failing to return a library book becomes an arrestable >> offence. What a pleasant country you live in. > > Actually, I don't live in the US - Oops - I apologise for the false assumption. > but yes, if library fines were put > that high for some reason, I guess there would be no point doing so > unless stringent efforts were made to enforce them. Thank you for making it so clear how you define serious charges that merit arrest. But it doesn't make sense to me to let the seriousness of the charge depend on the size of the penalty that applies if the defendant is found guilty. Rather, the size of the penalty should reflect the seriousness of the charge! > >> > Particularly >> > when the relevant question is whether an indicted party may flee the >> > jurisdiction. >> >> A jurisdiction within which no crime was committed by the indicted party. >> His selling activity took place outside the US, in an independent country >> called Russia. > > So what? So US law doesn't apply. So Sklyarov's arrest was without merit. >> > If Sklyarov went to some country where there >> > was no law against contract killing, and hired somebody to kill a >> > Russian business rival, do you think he could walk around free in >> > Moscow (perhaps he could, but that would be more due to poor >> > enforcement than lack of grounds to arrest him). >> >> I think he could do precisely that. If the contract was set up in country >> X and carried out in country X, then like it or not, it's country X's >> laws that apply. If they don't forbid that activity, then that's life. > > We are supposing that the contract was set up in country X, but carried > out (by the hitman) in Russia. That's a significant change to the scenario, which does not improve the (very loose) match of your original scenario to the Sklyarov case. > In this scenario, Sklyarov could make > the same claim that you seem to think automatically exonerates him of > all liability, i.e. that while he might have helped cause a crime to > happen in Russia, he didn't do anything inside Russia to make it > happen. A closer scenario, in which I will use "MetaSklyarov" in an attempt to avoid confusion: We assume for this scenario the existence of a Country X, where contract killings are legal. Never mind the morality of it for now - we're just talking about the legal aspect. MetaSklyarov, in this scenario, is a citizen of Country X. He offers a service which is legal in Country X - the hire of contract killers. Someone from Russia buys a contract over the Internet. MetaSklyarov accepts the contract (perhaps without even knowing at the time that his customer lives in Russia, since the acceptance may well be computerised), and an agent is dispatched to Russia to fulfil the contract. In this scenario, the agent (who commits murder in Russia) breaks Russian law and would be open to prosecution. The Russian purchaser resident in Russia would also, presumably, be in violation of Russian law, and would similarly be open to prosecution. But MetaSklyarov would not have broken Russian law at all! After all, all his activities took place outside Russian jurisdiction. > My guess is, though, that while he may be safe if he remains in country > X, he will be arrested if he goes to Russia. He might well be, but it would be wrongful arrest. > >> > A Federal agent bought one, actually. As I said, the charge seems to >> > have been conspiracy to sell them. >> >> In Russia, where it is not illegal. > > No, conspiracy to sell them in the US. "Conspiracy to sell in the US" is almost certainly not a crime in Russia, and it was in Russia that any such alleged conspiracy, had it existed, would have existed. >> > But I don't think this was a key issue - the bottom line >> > is that the selling crossed national borders. >> >> Sure. At the selling end, the laws prevalent in the land where the >> selling took place apply to the act of selling. At the purchasing end, >> the laws prevalent in the land where the buying took place apply to the >> act of purchasing. > > Richard, I am not a lawyer, and neither are you. Indeed. But we are people, and the law is supposed to enable people to get along with each other; so it is right that we should be able to express our opinions on what we think the law is, and what it should be, and what it should not be, and whether or not it is being upheld. > But the plain fact is > that the world does not operate in the fashion you assert. At one time > it might have. One consequence of globalisation (and nothing is more > global than the internet) is that transnational legal cooperation, > willing or unwilling, is a fact of life. Those who think they have a > good thing going living between the cracks are likely to be disabused > of the notion, unless they have the good fortune to avoid the hostile > attention of major players, be they governmental, corporate, NGO or > other. So you think the Internet means the end of national sovereignty? How interesting. > If that makes the internet world as presently constituted look more > like Deadwood than some idealised community of free thinkers, so be it. > There's too much gold there for it to remain outside the bonds of > civilisation... Civilisation is one word for it, I suppose. -- Richard Heathfield "Usenet is a strange place" - dmr 29/7/1999 http://www.cpax.org.uk mail: rjh at above domain .