Lawyer Continues Android v. GPL Crusade 155
jfruhlinger writes "Edward Naughton has been insisting for months that Android violates the GPL because Google created a new set of Linux kernel headers that it hasn't released the source code for, despite the fact that it incorporates open source code. While numerous commentators, including those who helped write the kernel headers, claimed this code isn't copyrightable, Naughton in persisting in his crusade, saying that the questions need to be resolved in court for the good of the open source movement."
No legal standing (Score:5, Insightful)
...unless he has a patch in there (Score:5, Interesting)
Only the copyright holders have legal standing - and they've already said its all good.
Have all of them said it's all good? Linux doesn't use copyright assignments, and I was under the impression that Edward Naughton might represent someone who has had at least one patch accepted.
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Wha? Microsoft had one patch accepted, so yes, he's represented someone who does.
Nobody has said it's bad, literally. If anyone had, that's not only a: something for the copyright holder to decide what to do (along with the purported violator), and b: something that has nothing to do with court unless a is resolved first.
Lots of avenues exist outside of going to court. We're not all microsoft and patent trolling for fud, after all.
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I think Microsoft would find it worthwhile to go to court to "validate" that the GPL means that anyone who has ever contributed to non-assignment GPL project has standing to sue over any alleged GPL violation by any distributor of any work derivative of that project (they'd probably like to do the same with assignment-based GPL products under an intended-beneficiary theory, though that's more a stretch legally.) Now, in one s
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It would also help validate the perception of GPL works as legally risky propositions for downstream users.
I have, of late, come to the conclusion that doing anything with a computer more complex operating the power switch is a legally risky proposition. If you write code then chances are high that there is someone else out there who feels entitled to a cut through patent, copyright or trademark (specious or not). Always a cut of the profits but never a cut of the costs/losses.
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It would also help validate the perception of GPL works as legally risky propositions for downstream users.
Well, if you don't want to abide by the GPL, then using that source is no different than stealing code from someone else with any other license. It's the same risk.
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In a world where the legal system had (and used) a 100% reliable filter to assure that only claims that, in fact, had merit would be filed and impose any burden on the defendant, that would be true.
In the real world, expanding the number of people who have standing to sue you for an alleged license violation increases your legal risk even if you
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So what would be so revolutionary about that? If someone makes a photobook with 100 licensed photographs but doesn't care one bit about stopping copyright infringement, then of course the owners of each photograph can go after them instead. It's only legally risky if you violate the license, and between having one mega-corporation with lawyers and a real "lost income" claim as opposed to thousands of mostly harmless OSS pundits, I'd take the FSF over Microsoft, Apple or Oracle on my ass any day.
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Header files are like phone books (Score:2)
Re:Header files are like phone books (Score:5, Informative)
But header use alone does not trigger a GPL requirement.
From the second link:
Torvalds responded to my inquiry on March 21 and had this to say:
"It seems totally bogus. We've always made it very clear that the kernel system call interfaces do not in any way result in a derived work as per the GPL, and the kernel details are exported through the kernel headers to all the normal glibc interfaces too.
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The views of the copyright holders are not irrelevant. When significant copyright holders state their intentions, this enables others who use the code to know whether they are likely to be subject to litigation or not. When you are a lawyer, the world revolves around the law... but for the rest of us, we care about intentions.
I'm not saying that the legal standing is obvious; there are certainly cases where a header file could contain copyrightable material (for example, C++ templates). But the kernel API h
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The copyright holders can always do whatever they want with their code. They can certainly give different licenses to different people. The GPL does not (and can not) bind the authors at all. It is not the 'legal opinion' of programmers that matters, it is their code.
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So only lawyers are qualified to comment on a license? I guess that means all EULAs and licenses are invalid, then, because no one but a lawyer can enter into an informed agreement.
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?? I thought the copyright holders get the say in what license the code is under.
If the author/copyright holder says the headers are not a copyright violation, then regardless of the license that would seem to indicate permission.
And if the copyright owner grants you permission to do something, then the license is irrelevant.
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If the author/copyright holder says the headers are not a copyright violation, then regardless of the license that would seem to indicate permission.
Yes, but one copyright holder can't give his permission to use the project in a non-GPL compliant way, because it would still violate the license on the rest of the code. If Linus owned the copyright on all the code in the kernel it'd be a different matter but he has 1-2% of it. Even if the header is his, he can't give permission to let people use the other 98-99% as they want because it forms a whole work. You're not just using his interface, you are using all the code behind it.
This has been covered many
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Lawyer schmoyer, who cares. If Edward Naughton want's to make a bunch of chug-a-lug claims about Anroid and GPL, well, let him put his money where his mouth is and sue Google. Until that happens, it is all empty FUD and you don't need a lawyer, a judge or a court of law to decide that.
The reality is, there is all sorts of leeway with GPL. Don't use it in commercial application or distribute it and no one really cares what you do. Adhere to the principles or spirit of GPL and contribute to the source, aga
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If he represents one of the copyright holders, he must file the suit on their behalf with them as the plaintiff. Or have people learned nothing from Righthaven?
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It wouldn't matter. Far too many people with standing have argued that there is no violation. Even if there would otherwise be a violation, that kills the violation.
If I say that you aren't violating my property rights be being on the back 1/3rd of my backyard, even though legal reasoning is nonsense that kills the trespassing charge.
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I understand it is not a democracy. However committing a copyright violation requires that the minority prove by preponderance of the evidence that a violation occurred. Large numbers of people with a well over majority stake in the work saying there is no violation is likely to make that impossible.
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laws are meant for protecting minorities
since when?
Don't the headers implement documented standards? (Score:2)
If the headers are merely an experession of documented standards like the SVR4 and BSD compatability macros, then I don't see how it could possibly be copyrightable. The whole point of standards is to share them, not own them.
But I could see a copyright troll trying to take the interpretation that they are copyrightable, as happened with the timezone data.
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don't forget that naughton has worked with microsoft, to boot. His credibility is not only in question, but it's basically inaccurate. This is just banging the same old fud drum that naughton raised before.
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If 'saying it's ok' amounts to a verbal license then there really isn't any GP
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There's no need for a license - everything that was published by Google is unprotected.
This was dealt with back in March [slashdot.org]
Just because a file has a GPL license doesn't mean that the entire contents of the file are copyright, same as a copyright book may also contain, for example, a poem that is in the public domain. You're free to copy the poem.
In the case of the headers, there are large portions that are not under copyright (and this ignores the fact that many of the patches NEVER contained copyright
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Nobody even mentioned fair use. There's no need - the material was not subject to copyright. But since you brought it up, if everything in the Disney movie (your example) were in the public domain or otherwise not protected by copyright, you can distribute the whole thing.
Not everything in a gpl-licensed file is protected. Strip out the protected elements, and the rest is freely distributable, without attribution.
Besides, even the kernel devs said it's okay, and they DO have standing.
Re:No legal standing (Score:5, Insightful)
But is that the correct thing to do? So we should just ignore Google's blatant violation of GPL?
The correct thing to do is respect the opinion of the people who have the copyright. If they say it's OK, then it's OK. It's as much a violation as entering a house after its owner allows you in.
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The authors can let anyone use it any way they like, their word is god. If they say "Google can use them" then by definition, Google isn't in violation of the GPL.
Re:No legal standing (Score:5, Insightful)
Hi, Edward J. Naughton, nice of you to join Slashdot.
So, who's paying you to bring forth all this FUD? Microsoft? Apple? I'm fairly certain you're not doing this due to your altruistic nature.
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Much of the code (type definitions, macros, and function prototypes) contained in those headers are essentially in the public domain as a result of being part of either the ANSI C standard or the POSIX/SUS standards, or both. There could be a violation beyond that, but Naughton nor Miller seems to be bothered enough to post actual snippets of infringing code. Instead they adapt the Darl McBride/SCO approach: I tell you, megabytes of my client's intellectual property have been dumped into Android without t
Re:No legal standing (Score:4, Interesting)
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Most headers are non-copyrightable. There may be some headers that have logic in them that might qualify for copyright. From what I know, the ones in question are mainly #include statements with a few #ifdef. As such they fall under scÃnes à faire exclusion outlined by Gates v Bando and Computer Associates v Altai.
I'd say comments are much more likely to be copyrightable. I can put a little poem into each header file that I create as a comment, and if you copy the header file including my poem, it's very clearly copyright infringement.
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Until I cut your poem out.
Re:No legal standing (Score:4, Interesting)
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If this is a violation, then every single piece of software linked against the kernel headers is also a GPL violation.
No it isn't, a proprietary, BSD, ASL, etc.. -licensed application linking to a GPL-violating (if that were the case here) system library would not be a GPL violation in itself as there is explicit provision in the GPL that states that you can link to system libraries (which includes the kernel) with *any* code proprietary or not without being affected by the GPL in any way, they do not have any obligation to release source code.
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IANAL, but my understanding is if it's just the header files that have changed, and if the header files do not contain code, but only interface definitions, then no copyright violation has occurred. That type of header file is just a list of interfaces, and a list isn't subject to copyright. Since the GPL relies on copyright being valid, the GPL can't apply to that type of header file.
If the header file contains code, then the that code is subject to copyright, and therefore the GPL, but the interface def
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If the copyright owners have said it's ok then does that constitute a verbal license agreement between the copyright holders and Google? Plenty of things get released under multiple licenses. A more common example would be allowing a company to pay to use code which is otherwise available under the GPL in their closed source product. It isn't a GPL violation because they aren't using it under the GPL. The GPL is not involved.
If 'saying it's
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If the copyright owners have said it's ok then does that constitute a verbal license agreement between the copyright holders and Google?
Perhaps, but in this case there aren't any copyright owners because the people who wrote the code have said that the code isn't even copyrightable.
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So we should just ignore Google's blatant violation of GPL?
How can it be a blatant violation if even the people who wrote the headers say it's not copyrightable? What's your basis for concluding that they are violating the GPL?
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If you think there is a violation, then document it.
First of all creating a modified version of a piece of GPL software without releasing it is permitted by the license. The license boils down to the requirement that if you release any of the code, you have to release the source as well. But that requirement is hard to violate with header files. If you release the header files, you have released the source since those header files are source code
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Re:No legal standing (Score:5, Insightful)
You hold copyrights on the headers? If not it really doesn't matter what you think.
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must fix that spell checker!
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You show a complete lack of understanding of the issue, the GPL and of copyright. The poster owns the copyright on the patches he made to the Linux kernel, if Google is distributing code from those patches then they need a license from the author. It sounds like he has licensed that code under the GPL. The GPL defines what source code means, and it includes definition files needed to compile to prevent a licensee from doing just this sort of thing:
Re:No legal standing (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, I'm not ok with it. And I have contributed patches to Linux kernel, and those are my copyrights. I don't think it's good for everyone that Google blatantly violates every copyright law and most importantly, every privacy law.
Well if they've used one of your files, then go ahead and start a suit. If not, then STFU.IIRC copyright in Linux vests with the original author of any patch, so you'd have standing if any of your files were really involved. I strongly suspect that if you really had contributed significant patches to Linux, instead of trolling, you'd have a lower Slashdot ID.
Its possible that Google do play a little fast and loose with some of their code, but since they've promised to release the source to Ice Cream Sandwich fairly soon that event will bring them into strict compliance with the GPL before someone can mutter copytright violation in court.....
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So if we believe that the GP contributed a patch, then he does have standing. If we don't believe him, I'm sure we can find at least a handful of the many thousands of copyright holders who might have an interest in this.
My point isn't "Google violated copyrights" and I think this issue will be sorted out (with code) before the lawyers get involved. My point is that the whole
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So if we believe that the GP contributed a patch, then he does have standing. If we don't believe him, I'm sure we can find at least a handful of the many thousands of copyright holders who might have an interest in this.
The item in question is the use of header files in other code, thusly the only code that matters is the header files and those that contributed it are the copyright holders.
Say I contribute 10 lines of code to a 100,000 line project. 95,000 of which are from a single developer. The only standing I have is those ten lines. So if the entirety of the project (with my contribution) is abused I have standing, if 5k lines of code are copied and they are not mine, they are the single developers and he has given th
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Ah OK, I didn't realise that. This makes sense then.
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What is the problem? The copyright owners are fine with what Google is doing. The only people up in arms are those with no legal standing.
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Shut-up and go on with life?
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EFF [eff.org] is your friend.
Stop whining and go for it.
Re:No legal standing (Score:4, Informative)
Actually, more likely the SFLC which exists specifically to take such cases. But let's be much more specific. I also live in Europe and if you can name a decent sized set of lines of original work which Google has copied without license and you are willing to sue them then I'll give you 500Euro to start it off with.
And please note, there's no reason to go to the US. Google has presence in Europe and if you wrote your code here you can sue them here. Germany is probably quite a good place for that.
If you (the grandparent) can show that Google copied your orignial work. Which I doubt.
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Or maybe have a quiet word with Apple or MS. Maybe they'll offer you some legal advise out of the, erm, goodness of their hearts.
Or you could just put details of what is your's here along with evidence if anything conclusive exists (that part might be difficult if the contribution was some time ago). That might stop people simply calling BS.
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And you are not the copyright holder, so your time and money is again, irrelevant.
What you can do is shut up and stop trying to claim you're being hurt because someone elses work is being used in a way you don't like.
ITS NOT YOUR CODE, YOU HAVE ABSOLUTELY NO RIGHTS WHAT SO EVER OVER IT.
The fact that its GPL DOES NOT CHANGE THAT AT ALL, that only grants you the right to use someone elses code, not the right to demand how it is used.
We've established that YOU DID NOT COMMIT ANY OF THE CODE IN QUESTION because
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Pleaso don't continue to make us all look like freetards. This has been done over many times - not everything in the kernel is copyrightable. Linux contains a lot of stuff that you're free to copy. For example, stuff that came from BSD code, stuff that is governed by a public standard, stuff that is "scene a faire" material and therefore not subject to copyright, stuff that is "sweat of the brow" material and as such not subject to copyright.
The Android headers conform to this. So, where's the problem
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Hmmm ... Fee, fie, foe fum, I smell the stench of a freetard bum :-) (just joking ... maybe ...)
You really shouldn't lie in an open forum where it's easy to disprove.
I made up that joke on October 13th (less than a month ago as of today), as anyone can verify here [slashdot.org].
Seriously, if you're going to troll, can't you at least do better than Naughton?
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You attacked me with a lie, I proved you were a liar, and look at the response ... pretty long. Welcome to Troll Tuesday, where it's okay to jerk the chain of someone who lies, then tries the lame "look - wookies!" defense. :-p
Another freetard bites the dust.
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OK what lines of the header files do you claim copyright to?
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Too bad your opinion means absolutely jack shit because its not your software. You own the copyrights on the bits you committed, thats it, you don't own the copyrights on the rest of the kernel because you added a line.
Your not entitled to everything in the world just because someone slapped GPL on the chain somewhere. Dipshits like you give GPL a bad name.
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Well, I'm not ok with it. And I have contributed patches to Linux kernel, and those are my copyrights.
Specifically which copyrights are you holding that they are infringing? I'm guessing your claim is false and you don't actually know what you're talking about. The writers of the code in question maintain that the code is not even copyrightable.
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Where is the -1 WTF mod? Google published the headers in question a while ago, and it was dealt with on slashdot back in March [slashdot.org]
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Macros and inline functions are not necessarily protected by copyright.
Example - you make a big header file with a bunch of #defines from hex color codes to X11 color names. Not protected, because it's neither creative (one of the constitutional requirements post-feist) nor is the fact that it took time a factor (sweat of the brow work is not justification for awarding copyright protection). It
It's a lawyer... (Score:4, Funny)
Obviously he would like to see it being resolved in court... it's a lawyer.
In a case where neither plaintiff nor accused are interested in this, the lawyer is the only person who could possibly win!
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In every case, the lawyer is the only person who could possibly win!
FTFY.
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Lawyers usually prefer to see cases resolved out of court, as there's more profit in a settlement than reaching a verdict. Plus, if you have a settlement you have a contract, but nobody knows for sure what a judge or jury will decide.
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so basically he's looking for a job.
American History X (Score:5, Funny)
I loved him in American History X
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I'm glad I wasn't the only one thinking this.
Headers are Facts (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Headers are Facts (Score:4, Informative)
Tilting at windmills? (Score:4, Interesting)
Aren't the bionic headers included with the Android source? I wonder who his clients are. I don't think he's wacky but he's certainly chasing a whole lot of nothing.
GPL requirement (Score:2)
the GPL doesn't simply require the source code to be published for each modified version of software that is distributed, it also ask that this source of modified versions comes with the same freedom of modification that the original saoftware came with.
so if you get some GPL software, modify it and distribute it, you need to publish th modified code as GPL too.
but bionic is published under the same BSD-like license as the rest of android. So it would follow the GPL requirement.
except that, GPL is a license
Re:Tilting at windmills? (Score:4, Interesting)
Which rulings concerning copyright in Oracle vs Google? To my knowledge there has not been a ruling yet concerning this subject and I don't recall seeing one on groklaw.
Re:Tilting at windmills? (Score:4, Informative)
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Then again I haven't actually read the GPL for a while, so I could be horribly wrong.
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And with recent Oracle v. Google rulings that APIs and headers are copyright and cannot be used without a license....
You're jumping the gun, as there hasn't been any such ruling; and there probably will never be. Headers have always been considered a functional necessity, and not copyrightable per-se.
because... (Score:2)
a little knowledge (Score:2)
this lawyer doesn't really understand programming - even his understanding of copyright is only enough to make him dangerous. he states, for instance, that a byteswap macro, because it is clever, is copyrightable. it's not: whole works are copyrightable. further, the license for the work in question explicitly states that the headers constitute the interface at which the license stops.
there is no issue here. lawyer is trying to make business for himself and others of his species.
Re:a little knowledge (Score:5, Insightful)
Android is proprietary (Score:2)
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He's a lawyer. Donating money to a lawyer is like donating blood to a vampire. It makes them stronger and then they hurt more innocent people.
Try donating your money to someone who deserves it, like these people [eff.org]
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Try donating your money to someone who deserves it, like these people [eff.org]
"Don't donate money to lawyers! Donate it so someone who deserves it, like these lawyers!"
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The EFF is not a law firm. TOR, HTTPS Everywhere, etc. are not lawsuits.
Even where they're involved in litigation, it's to set a precedent that helps you and me, not to line their own coffers with settlement money.
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Yea, TOR, the US Navy research project that the EFF created ...
If you're going to paint them as useful for more than just lawsuits, at least pick stuff they actually did, not just something they happened to join into late in the game to play along.
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Unless you're trying to argue that they made no contribution to the project whatsoever (which is clearly false), I'm not sure what your point is. Somebody has got to provide hosting services, operate nodes, write FAQs, etc. Somebody has to do the work that isn't sexy. Not everything can be idea men inventing great new things that have never been done before; somebody has got to hold down the fort during the period after you have something new and cool but before it can stand on its own and operate independe
No, it is not (Score:2)
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One doesn't need legal standing to publish one's opinion. Secondly that rule doesn't mean "said something I disagree with". This guy is wrong but is well within his rights to give out his opinion.
Obviously the US is different (Score:2)
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No, he is not within his rights. If you keep doing stuff like this, the court can call you a vexatious litigant and then you will need permission from the court to file any suits, if you had not been disbarred by then.
You're not supposed to bring suit if you have no standing and know it. He likely knows it. It's improper and unethical. The fact that it is rarely punished does not change that.
Wasn't there a rather famous lawyer who became disbarred and fined for bringing bogus lawsuits against the gaming
Re:Even if he's wrong, he's exercising his rights (Score:5, Informative)
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No, this is a different guy.
this guy was in fight club.