stupid court decisions (was: HP sues for pointing out a bug)

----- Original Message -----
From: "jdstarrett" <jstarret@...>
To: <metatuning@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, July 30, 2002 9:35 PM
Subject: [metatuning] HP sues for pointing out a bug

> http://news.com.com/2100-1023-947325.html
>
> Security warning draws DMCA threat
>
> By Declan McCullagh
> Staff Writer, CNET News.com
> July 30, 2002, 4:48 PM PT
>
> WASHINGTON--Hewlett Packard has found a new club to use
> to pound researchers who unearth flaws in the company's
> software: the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Invoking
> both the controversial 1998 DMCA and computer crime laws,
> HP has threatened to sue a team of researchers who publicized
> a vulnerability in the company's Tru64 Unix operating system.
>
> etc. etc.
>
> Please, you dumb clucks in Dee Cee, could you think before
> you pass laws written by your paymasters, and maybe consider
> the consequences?

extrememly doubtful. in 1893 the US Supreme Court actually
*legislatively* declared that the tomato is a vegetable!

this is absurd, as, botanically, the decision as to what is
classified as fruit and what is classified as vegetable is
based entirely on what *part* of a plant is eaten, and not
on the species of plant.

a fruit is the part of a plant which surrounds or contains
the seed(s), and a vegetable is any other part (root, stem,
leaves). the tomato is clearly a fruit.

but the law had a tremendous impact on the taxation of
tomato farmers, which seems to have been the real reason
behind the legislation.

see
http://www.nutrition.cornell.edu/nutriquest/070599/fruitveg.html

(unfortunately, the link that that page provides to details
of the court case, is now dead.)

- monz