Re: [DotGNU]Protection from legal harassment (was Re: DotGNU and business)

[Timothy Rue]

On 15-Jul-02 13:53:01 Norbert Bollow <address@hidden> wrote:

[Hmmm, bad formatting <shrug>]

>>  PM> requirments. Wouldn't it be best to provide a DotGNU
>>  corporation PM> for this stuff (the folks needing legal protection
>>  would probably PM> qualify as employees anyway) since some of us
>>  might not be able PM> to start a corporation? I know bizplan died,
>>  but with PM> FreeDevelopers going down it could be useful to give
>>  the concept PM> another try. PM> FreeDevelopers going down it
>>  could be useful to give the concept PM> another try.
>>
>> Perhaps this is something of a GNU business focus project to
>> create.

 NB> Something to be careful about here is to avoid creating new
 NB> liabilities. [snip]

 NB> Anecdote:  The person who organised FreeDevelopers, ...[snip]

I think you might have misunderstood, Norbert.

What I was suggesting was a "research project". To collect general
information in regards to starting up a business (for above mentioned
reasons) from around the world, given the many differing laws to be found
in the different countries of which we are fully aware there exist GNU
developers..

This would be information in regards to individuals creating their own
protection, and would be consistant with distributed authority. The
collection process or stage is on the place to start. Of course it would
not be "legal advice" as laws change enough that country and local laws
might be to much for any one resource (such as this project) to keep up.
But we need to get a bigger overall world scale picture of the subject
matter. Sorta like before you can even see "c" you need to move from "a"
to "b". One step at a time.

The idea of putting liability on FSF for any wrong doings by a
participants is absurd. It'd be like putting a bulls eye on FSF and giving
MS a cannon and a 2 inch distance away from the bullseye that they
couldn't possibly miss even if they tried, in taking down FSF/GPL.

Participants need to be responsible for their own actions, but that doesn't
mean it's not a good idea to work at better understanding what those
responsibilities are, and from around the world, big picture.

Personally I'm not sure I like the sound of "dotgnu corporation" as there
is plenty more to GNU than the dot part.

But as a matter of having an unbiased caretaker of operations, yet clearly
supportive of overall GPL goals, I see nothing wrong in hiring FSF to do
the job of operations.

but right now what I'm wondering about is ..... well the status of
www.dotgnu.org ..... as it seems down (someone didn't pay the annual
registration fee or probably bounced a check? Is the owner of
freedevelopers playing legal games???)

Anyway, you mentioned the bizplan mailing list. <shrug> I'm sure it was
listed on the www.dotgnu.org site but is not listed on the www.gnu.org
site section for dotgnu (which you last updated July 8th this year I
believe). So what is the bizplan mailing list? Device:Null

:7

Any ETA when this www.dotgnu.org mess will get straightened out?

Freedevelopers a false hope, bizplan dropped and now www.dotgnu.org????

Chicken little did say the sky was falling.... :) Maybe there are a few
priorities of stabilizing what exist first before I continue on with
business details?

BTW, the subscribe url below is a........ well device:Null <shrug>

[snip]
 NB> Developers mailing list
 NB> address@hidden
 NB> http://subscribe.dotgnu.info/mailman/listinfo/developers

Tim

---
Timothy Rue
Email @ mailto:address@hidden
Web @ http://www.mindspring.com/~timrue/