3 ms·

Unfortunately, if the infection is bacterial, amoebic, or prionic in nature, you'll still have to use something else.

by gwd 5y ago

dragonwriter 5y ago
Even more unfortunately, there is no “US Centers for Disease Control” (there is a US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which typically uses an acronym in which the “and Prevention” is not represented) so the certification condition can never be met.
- Gaelan 5y ago
  Surely a reasonable court would say that it's very clear what they meant?
  - dragonwriter 5y ago
    I think many a real court would (however much it conflicts with certain idealized views of court operation) in different ways depending on whether the issue before it was Amazon seeking to exclude the use as unauthorized as a basis for breach (either seeking damages or seeking to avoid damages for cutting off the entity using the software in a CDC certified zombie invasion) or the some other party seeking to use the fact that it was an authorized use of Amazon software to make a product liability claim against Amazon for harms resulting from such use.
  - gwd 5y ago
    In fact, if something like that actually happened, it's likely a court would interpret "viral" more in the sense of "going viral" -- i.e., something that spread widely and quickly, as opposed to something that was spread specifically by a virus.
- knorker 5y ago
  This is the kind of "bug" that I would expect matters in smart contracts, but is easily treated by a court (the ultimate interpreter of a contract) as meaning being perfectly clear, and therefore is not a problem. IANAL, though.
  - capableweb 5y ago
    At least in smart contracts (in a world where everything would be smart contracts), you could bind the association to a UID for the right entity, so it couldn't be fooled by setting up a organization with exactly the same name in order to fool humans. I do like anal.
    - knorker 5y ago
      You could, but it would likely be against the intent of the contract. Note that it also mentions "or successor body". So a smart contract would still be worse in this scenario. For this kind of event I don't think it's possible to define what "successor body" means. If the US government falls, is the "New United States" body "US Centre of Disease Control" a successor body? If CDC (and its private keys) gets nuked as part of containment, is the spinoff "US Centre of Zombie Prevention and Control" the successor? Maybe. Depends how the role of CDC was split up in the new world. Is it an easy question? No. A court will likely have a hard time doing the right interpretation. But with smart contracts it instead becomes impossible to achieve the goals intended by all parties involved in making the contract. (Of course laws can be enacted and dictate a given interpretation, too, saying e.g. that any contract clause preventing use by the military against zombies is void) And so it goes for all smart contracts. A smart contract can bring back slavery. But slavery is illegal. Now what?
      - capableweb 5y ago
        > So a smart contract would still be worse in this scenario Not necessarily, contract could be made to accept "claim" from either UID matching exactly X, or where inheritsFrom/inheritsTo is set to UID Y. Just has the court would have to think about the right interpretation, a contract would have to think about the right implementation. Sure, both of tradeoffs, but such is the world. > A smart contract can bring back slavery How exactly? Slavery is something physical, smart contracts only deal with concepts in the digital realm.
        knorker 5y ago
- dllthomas 5y ago
  The "Center for Disease Control and Prevention" was previously the "Center for Disease Control", although I don't know if the rename makes it a "successor organization".
perihelions 5y ago
Examples: ophiocordyceps [0,1] is a fungus, and toxoplasmosis [2,3] is a single-celled eukaryote. I've commented this before: this is a loophole in the ToS. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15651231 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15651231 ("'Zombie ant' brains left intact by fungal parasite") [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ophiocordyceps_unilateralis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ophiocordyceps_unilateralis [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15376654 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15376654 ("Rage Disorder Linked with Toxoplasmosis") [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toxoplasma_gondii https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toxoplasma_gondii

Unfortunately, if the infection is bacterial, amoebic, or prionic in nature, you'll still have to use something else.

by gwd 5y ago

Unfortunately, if the infection is bacterial, amoebic, or prionic in nature, you'll still have to use something else.

Even more unfortunately, there is no “US Centers for Disease Control” (there is a US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which typically uses an acronym in which the “and Prevention” is not represented) so the certification condition can never be met.

Gaelan 5y ago
Surely a reasonable court would say that it's very clear what they meant?
- dragonwriter 5y ago
  I think many a real court would (however much it conflicts with certain idealized views of court operation) in different ways depending on whether the issue before it was Amazon seeking to exclude the use as unauthorized as a basis for breach (either seeking damages or seeking to avoid damages for cutting off the entity using the software in a CDC certified zombie invasion) or the some other party seeking to use the fact that it was an authorized use of Amazon software to make a product liability claim against Amazon for harms resulting from such use.
- gwd 5y ago
  In fact, if something like that actually happened, it's likely a court would interpret "viral" more in the sense of "going viral" -- i.e., something that spread widely and quickly, as opposed to something that was spread specifically by a virus.
knorker 5y ago
This is the kind of "bug" that I would expect matters in smart contracts, but is easily treated by a court (the ultimate interpreter of a contract) as meaning being perfectly clear, and therefore is not a problem. IANAL, though.
- capableweb 5y ago
  At least in smart contracts (in a world where everything would be smart contracts), you could bind the association to a UID for the right entity, so it couldn't be fooled by setting up a organization with exactly the same name in order to fool humans. I do like anal.
  - knorker 5y ago
    You could, but it would likely be against the intent of the contract. Note that it also mentions "or successor body". So a smart contract would still be worse in this scenario. For this kind of event I don't think it's possible to define what "successor body" means. If the US government falls, is the "New United States" body "US Centre of Disease Control" a successor body? If CDC (and its private keys) gets nuked as part of containment, is the spinoff "US Centre of Zombie Prevention and Control" the successor? Maybe. Depends how the role of CDC was split up in the new world. Is it an easy question? No. A court will likely have a hard time doing the right interpretation. But with smart contracts it instead becomes impossible to achieve the goals intended by all parties involved in making the contract. (Of course laws can be enacted and dictate a given interpretation, too, saying e.g. that any contract clause preventing use by the military against zombies is void) And so it goes for all smart contracts. A smart contract can bring back slavery. But slavery is illegal. Now what?
    - capableweb 5y ago
      > So a smart contract would still be worse in this scenario Not necessarily, contract could be made to accept "claim" from either UID matching exactly X, or where inheritsFrom/inheritsTo is set to UID Y. Just has the court would have to think about the right interpretation, a contract would have to think about the right implementation. Sure, both of tradeoffs, but such is the world. > A smart contract can bring back slavery How exactly? Slavery is something physical, smart contracts only deal with concepts in the digital realm.
      - knorker 5y ago
dllthomas 5y ago
The "Center for Disease Control and Prevention" was previously the "Center for Disease Control", although I don't know if the rename makes it a "successor organization".

perihelions 5y ago

Examples: ophiocordyceps [0,1] is a fungus, and toxoplasmosis [2,3] is a single-celled eukaryote. I've commented this before: this is a loophole in the ToS. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15651231 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15651231 ("'Zombie ant' brains left intact by fungal parasite") [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ophiocordyceps_unilateralis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ophiocordyceps_unilateralis [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15376654 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15376654 ("Rage Disorder Linked with Toxoplasmosis") [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toxoplasma_gondii https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toxoplasma_gondii