4 ms·

Yes, but the lawmakers are the ones that should abstain from referencing closed standards in the law, not the standard the one that has to open itself because t

Yes, but the lawmakers are the ones that should abstain from referencing closed standards in the law, not the standard the one that has to open itself because the law references it. Or maybe the law could create its own official standard that simply paraphrases what the closed standard says, effectively making it open.

csense 3y ago
I figure this should be a straightforward case of eminent domain. Say you own a house. The government needs to take your house to demolish it to build a road. The government is within its rights to just take it (after due process and fair payment). Now say you own a document that you make people pay to read. The government needs to take your document to make it part of the law to build a building code. Why doesn't the government exercise same kind of rights to just take it (after due process and fair payment)?
- rat9988 3y ago
  Because nobody will make the effort afterwards to make good standards. Fair payment is in most countries quiet unfair in fact.
  - csense 3y ago
    > nobody will make the effort afterwards to make good standards That's not true. If 3000 people a year would have paid you $100 for access over the next 20 years, that's $300,000, which as a future income stream has some PV X. You'll be indifferent [1] between collecting the trickle of revenue from customers paying the paywall, and a one-time lump sum from the government of X [2]. [1] You'll be indifferent by definition. Because you'd say "Yes please" to a lump sum of $1 trillion, "No thanks" to a lump sum of $1, and PV is defined to be the crossover point where your answer changes. [2] If you have a discount rate of 5%, then X ~= $300,000 / 1.05^10 or so, depending on how front-loaded the payments are and how much you care about payments more than 20 years in the future. > quite unfair in fact If the government pays you less than X, in theory it's unconstitutional, plain and simple. If the legal system doesn't accept your projected revenue, or discount rate, or you have to pay the lawyers and expert witnesses too much to legally establish the basis for those calculations...well then, the problem isn't the government taking your document to make it part of the law. The problem is the legal system is too inefficient or unreasonable, which has a different set of fixes (e.g. make laws about what calculations the government has to use in this situation, and make the government pay the plaintiff's attorney fees if the case is sufficiently clear-cut instance of "the government didn't follow its own official rules and this should never have gotten to court in the first place")
    - rat9988 3y ago
      What do you mean by unconstitutional? Which country's constitution are we talking about?
- jstanley 3y ago
  > The government needs to take your document to make it part of the law to build a building code. This part doesn't follow. Why doesn't the government make their own document? Eminent domain exists for land because it's not possible to make more land in the same place.
  - csense 3y ago
    > Why doesn't the government make their own document? (Sorry this is a US-centric explanation, I don't really understand how the EU system works) Sometimes legislators say "We don't feel like having government employees write this particular set of regulations from scratch. Instead we'll make a law that says such-and-such a document written by a private organization is effectively promoted to a law." There are three separate questions here: (1) Should legislators promote documents to laws? (2) Should legislators be allowed to promote documents to laws? (3) If legislators do promote a document to a law, how should the legal system interpret that action? If you say "(1): No," then you should vote for a Congress / President that doesn't think it's okay to promote documents to laws. But sometimes a Congress / President might be elected that does think it's okay, and they might promote some documents to laws. US law currently says "(2): Yes." If you think it should say "(2): No" you probably need to change the system. I.e. pass a Constitutional amendment, which is extremely difficult, much harder than merely voting in a Congress / President that agrees with you. Good luck on that. That means it comes down to (3). Which is where I make the analogy with eminent domain. You had a document that people were paying you money for. The government made that document part of the law, and the law must be freely available, so now because of the government's actions, people aren't paying you money because a copy of your thing is now free. Sure, the government could have not promoted the document to a law. Or the system could be set up so the government isn't allowed to promote documents to laws. But those things that could have happened didn't happen. Instead, what actually happened is the government promoted your document to a law. Why didn't they make their own document instead of promoting yours? It doesn't matter at this point. They did promote your document, and they are allowed to do it under the current system. The obvious ways to resolve the conundrum are: (a) Make people pay to see the law, or (b) Make the law free and have the taxpayers compensate you for the lost revenue of the document, or (c) Make the law free and you just have to suck it up, too bad, so sad. (a) just feels icky because it effectively means the law is a secret. Penalizing people for violating laws they can't know about (without paying) seems pretty unfair and maybe violates some legal principles (due process maybe), I dunno the specifics, not a lawyer. (c) definitely seems wrong too because it seems like "the government took my stuff and didn't pay me for it" falls (or should fall) under eminent domain even if the thing the government took isn't land. That leaves (b), I can't really think of any other options
- immibis 3y ago
  Historically, the government doesn't pay fairly. The market value of a house that's in the way of a highway is *very low*.
layer8 3y ago
The first option would mean that the law couldn’t, for example, mandate the use of ISO time formats. The second option would mean they would still get sued by the copyright holders of the closed standards, paraphrase or not. The better option is probably for the government to re-publish the standards as-is, with some compensation for the copyright holders.
- Eddy_Viscosity2 3y ago
  The government could give itself immunity from such lawsuits. But agreed, there should be a set compensation for use of standards in law which in doing so makes them openly and freely available. Unless the copyright holder is Elsevier, in that case they get nothing - screw you Elsevier.
johannes1234321 3y ago
On most cases law doesn't cite a specific standard however refers to the "state of the art" which then is commonly interpreted as "as defined in a standard" It is possible (but often impractical) to prove to be "state the art" without following a standard. Purpose is that the government doesn't have to rule all details, but can leave that to domain experts and ongoing research.

csense 3y ago

I figure this should be a straightforward case of eminent domain. Say you own a house. The government needs to take your house to demolish it to build a road. The government is within its rights to just take it (after due process and fair payment). Now say you own a document that you make people pay to read. The government needs to take your document to make it part of the law to build a building code. Why doesn't the government exercise same kind of rights to just take it (after due process and fair payment)?

rat9988 3y ago
Because nobody will make the effort afterwards to make good standards. Fair payment is in most countries quiet unfair in fact.
- csense 3y ago
  > nobody will make the effort afterwards to make good standards That's not true. If 3000 people a year would have paid you $100 for access over the next 20 years, that's $300,000, which as a future income stream has some PV X. You'll be indifferent [1] between collecting the trickle of revenue from customers paying the paywall, and a one-time lump sum from the government of X [2]. [1] You'll be indifferent by definition. Because you'd say "Yes please" to a lump sum of $1 trillion, "No thanks" to a lump sum of $1, and PV is defined to be the crossover point where your answer changes. [2] If you have a discount rate of 5%, then X ~= $300,000 / 1.05^10 or so, depending on how front-loaded the payments are and how much you care about payments more than 20 years in the future. > quite unfair in fact If the government pays you less than X, in theory it's unconstitutional, plain and simple. If the legal system doesn't accept your projected revenue, or discount rate, or you have to pay the lawyers and expert witnesses too much to legally establish the basis for those calculations...well then, the problem isn't the government taking your document to make it part of the law. The problem is the legal system is too inefficient or unreasonable, which has a different set of fixes (e.g. make laws about what calculations the government has to use in this situation, and make the government pay the plaintiff's attorney fees if the case is sufficiently clear-cut instance of "the government didn't follow its own official rules and this should never have gotten to court in the first place")
  - rat9988 3y ago
    What do you mean by unconstitutional? Which country's constitution are we talking about?
jstanley 3y ago
> The government needs to take your document to make it part of the law to build a building code. This part doesn't follow. Why doesn't the government make their own document? Eminent domain exists for land because it's not possible to make more land in the same place.
- csense 3y ago
  > Why doesn't the government make their own document? (Sorry this is a US-centric explanation, I don't really understand how the EU system works) Sometimes legislators say "We don't feel like having government employees write this particular set of regulations from scratch. Instead we'll make a law that says such-and-such a document written by a private organization is effectively promoted to a law." There are three separate questions here: (1) Should legislators promote documents to laws? (2) Should legislators be allowed to promote documents to laws? (3) If legislators do promote a document to a law, how should the legal system interpret that action? If you say "(1): No," then you should vote for a Congress / President that doesn't think it's okay to promote documents to laws. But sometimes a Congress / President might be elected that does think it's okay, and they might promote some documents to laws. US law currently says "(2): Yes." If you think it should say "(2): No" you probably need to change the system. I.e. pass a Constitutional amendment, which is extremely difficult, much harder than merely voting in a Congress / President that agrees with you. Good luck on that. That means it comes down to (3). Which is where I make the analogy with eminent domain. You had a document that people were paying you money for. The government made that document part of the law, and the law must be freely available, so now because of the government's actions, people aren't paying you money because a copy of your thing is now free. Sure, the government could have not promoted the document to a law. Or the system could be set up so the government isn't allowed to promote documents to laws. But those things that could have happened didn't happen. Instead, what actually happened is the government promoted your document to a law. Why didn't they make their own document instead of promoting yours? It doesn't matter at this point. They did promote your document, and they are allowed to do it under the current system. The obvious ways to resolve the conundrum are: (a) Make people pay to see the law, or (b) Make the law free and have the taxpayers compensate you for the lost revenue of the document, or (c) Make the law free and you just have to suck it up, too bad, so sad. (a) just feels icky because it effectively means the law is a secret. Penalizing people for violating laws they can't know about (without paying) seems pretty unfair and maybe violates some legal principles (due process maybe), I dunno the specifics, not a lawyer. (c) definitely seems wrong too because it seems like "the government took my stuff and didn't pay me for it" falls (or should fall) under eminent domain even if the thing the government took isn't land. That leaves (b), I can't really think of any other options
immibis 3y ago
Historically, the government doesn't pay fairly. The market value of a house that's in the way of a highway is *very low*.

layer8 3y ago

The first option would mean that the law couldn’t, for example, mandate the use of ISO time formats. The second option would mean they would still get sued by the copyright holders of the closed standards, paraphrase or not. The better option is probably for the government to re-publish the standards as-is, with some compensation for the copyright holders.

Eddy_Viscosity2 3y ago
The government could give itself immunity from such lawsuits. But agreed, there should be a set compensation for use of standards in law which in doing so makes them openly and freely available. Unless the copyright holder is Elsevier, in that case they get nothing - screw you Elsevier.

johannes1234321 3y ago

On most cases law doesn't cite a specific standard however refers to the "state of the art" which then is commonly interpreted as "as defined in a standard" It is possible (but often impractical) to prove to be "state the art" without following a standard. Purpose is that the government doesn't have to rule all details, but can leave that to domain experts and ongoing research.