[Foundation-l] About that "sue and be damned" to the National Portrait Gallery ...

[Ray Saintonge]

2009/7/11 Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net>:
   

> >> If he didn't want public comments he would not have made the letter
> >> public; he might have chosen more private WMF channels.
> >>     
>   
Thomas Dalton replied:
> Do you know that he sought legal advice before publishing the letter?
> If he didn't, then is may not have been an informed choice. If he's
> made a strategic mistake by publishing the letter and not keeping
> control of the PR then we shouldn't aggravate that unnecessarily.



Thomas Dalton wrote:
> 2009/7/11 Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net>:
>   
>> ROTFL. He published it; that's a fact.  It would be very rare indeed for
>> anyone to have sought legal advice before making online comments.  The
>> NPG site, like many others, has a link to its terms of service.  How
>> often does *anyone* who uses such sites ever get legal advice before
>> proceeding?   Some of these require you to agree that you understand the
>> terms; that's about like agreeing that pigs can fly.  Some ask you to
>> accept the jurisdiction of the courts in the site's home country; does
>> that really override inalienable rights in one's own country? Is the
>> legal profession in any position to provide valid legal advice at
>> reasonable cost to every situation that might be affected?
>>
>> If in retrospect, publishing the letter is seen as a strategic mistake,
>> it can't be unpublished.  There are arguments available for it being a
>> strategic positive.
>>     
>
> This is not a laughing matter. It doesn't matter what the legal merits
> are or what is a good strategy, the fact remains that you don't know
> what you are talking about and it has nothing to do with you, so just
> shut up.
>
> Could we close this thread? It is proving entirely unproductive and
> potentially harmful.
>   
I've restored the comments that I was replying to since you deleted them 
to wilfully mischaracterize my "ROTFL" as applying to the general issue 
rather than your silly comments.

I've yet to see any evidence that you know what you are talking about. 
Your opposition to any kind of free speech on this by making up stories 
about potential harm prove this.  Just because your contributions are 
entirely unproductive doesn't mean that this applies to what many others 
are saying.  I may not agree with all of them, but I would not find that 
sufficient reason to suppress them.

Ec