In an episode of the famous series Breaking Bad, the main character, Walter White, is responsible for the death of Jane, the girlfriend of Jesse. The main question is, from a legal point of view, how much is he responsible for this? Is this a homicide? What kind?

Here's a summary of what happened; you can find a video [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RGEmFpitjYw). Walter and Jesse are partners and they make drugs. Jane is the girlfriend of Jesse and Walter doesn't like that, since he thinks she could be an obstacle to their business. Both Jane and Jesse have problems with drugs.

One day Walter enters Jesse's house, where Jesse and Jane are in the bed together, on their sides, completely stoned, unable to wake up, and apparently sleeping. Walter tries to wake up Jesse shaking him strongly without success. Doing that he modified slightly the position of Jessie and a conseguence (since she was in a sort of hug with him) Jane. In particular now she is on her back. It is not clear if she had a pillow on her back to avoid this position. Some time before, Jesse had explained to Walter that in this situation the pillow is important, since it keeps you on your side and not in your back, so if you vomit you avoid choking to death. And this is exactly what happens. In the new sleeping position, Jane starts to vomit and cough, while still sleeping. At first Walter tries to react, running to the other side of the bed to help her, but then he stops and decides to do nothing as she dies.

What is this? Homicide? Voluntary? Or just failure to assist a person in danger? Are there extenuating circumstances due to the fact that the actual cause of death is the drug?

Take into account that Walter could have easily saved her with no risk.

What crime did Walter White commit against Jane in Breaking Bad?


I'm getting confused on the differences between "GDPR", "Privacy Shield", and "Safe Harbor". Can someone please elaborate? I *think* Privacy Shield replaces "Safe Harbor" but I still don't understand why GDPR wouldn't just apply to everything.

What's the difference between "GDPR" "Privacy Shield" and "Safe Harbor"?


Consider this recent ruling:
[U.S. Supreme Court rules against police over motorcycle search](https://www.yahoo.com/news/u-supreme-court-rules-against-police-over-motorcycle-143951001.html)

In it, the court ruled that the police unlawfully searched a stolen motorcycle parked on private property in Virginia because they did not have a court-approved warrant.

The case involved a stolen motorcycle that was covered by a tarp and was parked on private property next to a house in Charlottesville, Virginia.

The man who stole the motorcycle was convicted for receiving stolen property.

Now, in this case, SCOTUS returned the case to a lower court, which will allow the police to argue exigent circumstances, or maybe rule that there were alternative measures that the police could have done.

So, suppose the court rules completely against the police. Barring no other evidence, the case is thrown out, the man's conviction is overturned, and he's free.

What happens to the bike? Is it returned to the person who stole it, or is it returned to the original owner on its title?

In this question...

[Evidence found during police search of incorrect address listed on search warrant](https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/24123/evidence-found-during-police-search-of-incorrect-address-listed-on-search-warran)

There is discussion that the police do not have to return "contraband". So, maybe that answers my question - but I don't know the legal definition of contraband. Stolen property may be contraband (having a motorcycle certainly isn't) but the police can't show that the motorcycle was stolen, because legally, they can't use any evidence they have of it (fruit of the poisoned tree).

I guess if the cops keep the motorcycle, and the man then tried to claim it, they could get him for receiving stolen property again (new case), but the man who owns it probably wants his bike back. So that doesn't seem like a viable option.

How does this work?

When stolen property is illegally seized, must it be returned to the party which stole it?


[Two Live Crew](http://genius.com/2-live-crew-pretty-woman-lyrics) was sued by the holders of [Roy Orbison's](https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=pretty+woman+yrics) copyright for their version of "Pretty Woman." Titles are not copyrightable, so the basis for this suit was the copied first line: "Pretty woman walking down the street." (The rest of the two songs were very different.)

"Crew" had a "parody" defense for using the first line. But suppose they didn't. Could they fix the problem by e.g. changing the infringing first line to something like "Pretty woman running through the park?"

Is it possible to "fix" copyright infringement by deleting the "infringing" part?


I'm going to guess the likely answer is no, but I'm interested to know more. So let's say I have an image of James Bond from Goldeneye.

[![enter image description here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/1Whjg.jpg)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/1Whjg.jpg)

Then let's say I run it through ASCII art generator such as this <http://picascii.com/> and it produces the following ASCII code made for the web as such (can't post here but here is a JSFiddle of the generated code).

<https://jsfiddle.net/caimen/ope1j9w0/>

Why or why would I not be allowed to use this version of a copyrighted image in my game?

Can I used an ASCII generated version of a copyrighted image in my game?


How does one even create the title of an app when basically most nouns in the English language have been trademarked?

* When and when isn't a trademark valid?
* For example, I was surprised that even the word corgi and jets are trademarked! Jacuzzi seems to be the strong advocate of their trademark. But, what if these words are used in combination? Such as: Front Jacuzzi Back Corgi?

Related to:
[Trademark Infringement notice for usage of a dictionary word Jacuzzi in app - Google Play Store](https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/40581/trademark-infringement-notice-for-usage-of-a-dictionary-word-jacuzzi-in-app-go)

Understanding trademark infringements in a world where many dictionary words are trademarks?


If someone has an illegally downloaded copy of a software that is used to produce something (for example, Photoshop for producing (/editing) pictures or FL Studio for music), is it illegal to produce something with it?

If you know someone who has an illegal copy of Photoshop (I'll use Photoshop as an example since pretty much everyone knows it), and you create something with it, have you done something illegal, or something that could be considered illegal? Does it matter if you didn't know that it was an illegal copy?

In this case, by production I mean producing something just for yourself, or sharing it with other people but without gaining any money from it. "Production" also includes editing, in the sense that if you edit a picture with Photoshop, you've produced something with Photoshop.

I'm from Finland but I doubt that there's anyone here who could shed some light on this from the viewpoint of the laws of Finland, so all answers, no matter what country's laws they are based on, are welcome.

Is it illegal to produce something with an illegal copy of a software?


A person vandalized a ups type work van by opening the brake bleeder valves , causing the owner of van to nearly crash when leaving for work . Despite there being no hard evidence , just a police report , are suspects texts and posts claiming responsibility enough for a charge and or prosecution ?

Are text messages and social media posts enough to charge someone with a crime?


I'm trying to understand how the automated exchange of tax information works between countries. I'm vaguely aware of the OECD's Common Reporting Standard "activating" this year and introducing some additional reporting responsibilities of customer's accounts for financial institutions, but I don't understand the details or know to what extent the automated exchange has been working already and what the CRS changes in terms of that.

What I'm mostly interested about is, what kinds of institutions are required to report information about their customers and to what extent? I understand that things like banks or brokerages have to share account information. But what about all the other various kinds of companies that in some way process payments/hold some funds of their customers?

For example, what about "online wallets" like Paypal/Neteller/Skrill? Do those share their customers' account information? What about all the sports betting sites, do they have to report? How about online marketplaces, where for example people sell/buy games, virtual items and so on among each other? The list could go on, but I think you understand my point - are only the "traditional" forms of financial insitutions required to report all this information, or do all these businesses that in some way process payments, participate in the automatic exchange of information?

What kinds payments/accounts are reported under the automated exchange of tax information between countries?


While reading through contracts, every time I think to check, all the section titles end with a period.

Example:

>
> 1 Some Random Section.
>
>
> (Section's text goes here)
>
>
>

Is this just the standard formatting style, or is there any legal requirement for it?

Is there a guide online that lists the standard contract formatting style conventions?

Do section titles in a contract have to end in a period?


Say I want to contact a government agency from the U.S. This agency can be in any country/territory/state or province. For example, I want to contact the Nova Scotia government regarding zoning laws and etc. for a property I am building.

In the contact form I put a fake name or send an email from an account that gives a fake name. I am contacting a government agency. Is this illegal if I just use a fake name to inquire info about something? Nothing illegal or shifty -- just for an email/question, and no further actions are taken beyond this (for example, I may ask a question but won't show up at city hall and give fake info).

Giving a fake name in a government contact form: illegal or no?


If I made an image that includes a pattern that comes with CorelDraw X4 and attempted to sell it printed on a T-shirt online, would that be a copyright violation? This is from the CorelDraw license agreement, but it seems contradictory and I don't understand it:

>
> 2. COREL GUIDELINES FOR THE USE OF CLIPART, STOCK PHOTO IMAGES AND SAMPLE CONTENT:
>
>
> Corel products may contain clipart, photo images and sample content such as forms, templates, “tubes” or similar items (collectively referred to as the "Images") which are either owned by Corel or licensed from a third-party. As a user of Corel products you are free to Use, modify and publish the Images as you wish subject to the restrictions set out below. If you are uncertain as to whether your intended Use is in compliance with the Guidelines set out below, Corel recommends that you seek the advice of your own attorney or legal counsel. Corel will not provide you with an opinion as to whether your Use is in compliance with these Guidelines.
>
>
> 2.1 YOU MAY, subject to any restrictions set out in Sections 2.2 and 2.3 below:
>
>
> (i) incorporate any Image(s) into your own original work and publish, display and distribute your work in any media, provided you include a copyright notice in your work reflecting on the copyright ownership of both you and Corel as follows:
>
>
>
> >
> > "Copyright (c) 200\_\_ [your name] and its licensors. All rights reserved."
> >
> >
> >
>
>
> and
>
>
> (ii) make one (1) copy of the Image(s) for backup or archival purposes.
>
>
> 2.2 YOU MAY NOT:
>
>
> (i) resell, sublicense or otherwise make available the Image(s) for Use or distribution separately or detached from a product or web page. For example, the Image(s) may be Used as part of a web page design, but not be made available for downloading separately or in a format designed or intended for permanent storage or re-use by others;
>
>
> (ii) provide the Image(s) to third parties or permit the Use of the Image(s) by third parties separately or as part of any other product, however, third parties may be provided with copies of the Image(s) (including digital files) as part of a work product;
>
>
> (iii) create scandalous, obscene, defamatory or immoral works using the Image(s) nor Use the Image(s) for any other purpose which is prohibited by law;
>
>
> (iv) Use or permit the Use of the Image(s) or any part thereof as a trademark or service mark, or claim any proprietary rights of any sort in the Image(s) or any part thereof;
>
>
> (v) Use any of the Images which contain identifiable individuals or entities for any commercial purpose including, without limitation, in a manner which suggests their association with or endorsement of any product or service;
>
>
> (vi) Use the Image(s) in electronic format, on-line or in multimedia applications unless the Image(s) are incorporated for viewing purposes only and no permission is given to download and/or save the Image(s) for any reason;
>
>
> (vii) rent, lease, sublicense or lend the Image(s), or a copy thereof, to another person or legal entity. You may, however, transfer all your license to Use the Image(s) to another person or legal entity, provided that (i) you transfer the Product, including the Image(s), and this License, including all copies (except copies incorporated into your work product as permitted under this License), to such person or entity, (ii) that you retain no copies, including copies stored on a computer or other storage device, and (iii) the receiving party agrees to be bound by the terms and conditions of this License; or
>
>
> (viii) Use any Image(s) except as expressly permitted by this License.
>
>
>

copyright on patterns in CorelDraw


Consider the following scenario.

I am an independent Turkish game developer and I make profit by developing games for ios devices and app store. I am not happy about the high income tax rate in Turkey so I open a company in another country(say Bulgaria for convenience) with low tax rate. I stay in Bulgaria for 1 year during the development of the game and then I submit the game to app store. After that I return back to Turkey. I pay the income tax of the money that I get from Apple to the Bulgarian government every month.

Can I transfer money from Bulgaria to Turkey and spend it freely in Turkey? I appreciate answers for other countries instead of Turkey to get an idea.

Income tax from digital goods


I live in Massachusetts which recently passed a very complicated law for Paid Family and Medical Leave (PFML). I'm trying to understand my obligations under this law as described on this [mass.gov page](https://www.mass.gov/info-details/whos-a-covered-individual-under-the-pfml-law#counting-ma-1099-misc-contractors-as-covered-individuals-).

This page states `a 1099-MISC worker` is covered by the law unless the person is an `independent contractor` as defined in the usual way (see [here](https://www.mass.gov/service-details/independent-contractors)).

So this PFML law seems to be stating that:

* you can be an 1099-MISC worker, but
* not be an independent contractor.

I was under the impression that a 1099-MISC worker was the same thing as an independent contractor. A Google search seems to confirm this.

Can anyone explain what is going on here?

Difference between "1099-MISC worker" and "independent contractor"


I'm considering a contract with a very small startup (in the US). The compensation is largely equity-based, as opposed to salary. I understand the offer and have strong trust in the other owners (I've worked with them previously). I don't, however, have a huge amount of trust that the small lawyer hired by the company did a great job with the contract. The primary risk I'm concerned about it that an acquiring company might take advantage of a poorly written contract to not pay me.

What services are available to an individual to have this contract reviewed and ensure it protects my interests?

How important is it to get the contract reviewed at this point? Is there any recourse in a future dispute for the legalese not matching the lay-person's understanding of the contract?

Review of contract with startup


Can recent (2012-2016) historical emails and documents/reports pertaining to the Human Rights abuses of a marginalized group of people be published?

Setting up a website to document current and past Human Rights abuses


Scenario...

* A is hired by B to perform a task - Project X. They agree and sign contract which details payment terms, ownership, project scope, dispute resolution, etc. All goes well. Project is completed and payment made.
* Three months later B returns and asks A for a separate project - Project Y. Both agree on pricing via email but no contract is signed. Project is completed, payment is made.
* Six months later B returns to A for yet a different project - Project Z. Both agree on pricing via email but no contract is actually signed.

A dispute arises over ownership of Project Z.

Are the (more general) terms on the original contract still assumed to be accurate for this third project?

In other words, are there cases where a previously singed contract would be seen as an agreement for future collaborations?

I understand (perhaps incorrectly) that by default, leases tend to have the terms seen as extended if no new lease is signed but occupancy continues, but does this apply to other contracts?

Are contracts seen as "future" agreements as well?


Why's "warranty" coupled with "representation", not 'condition'?

Context
-------

In [Canadian](https://renx.ca/representations-v-warranties-are-they-different-do-you-know-the-difference/) and [English](https://mundays.co.uk/insights/to-warrant-is-not-to-represent/) law, representations differ from warranties1. Thus they aren't doublets, as
[Ashurst's](https://www.ashurst.com/en/news-and-insights/legal-updates/quickguides-warranties-and-indemnities/) distinguishes them beneath (as do [Cripps LLP](https://www.cripps.co.uk/contractual-representations-warranties-difference-matters/), [Osborne Clarke](https://www.osborneclarke.com/insights/representations-and-warranties-in-private-ma/), [Blake Morgan](https://www.blakemorgan.co.uk/training-knowledge/features-and-articles/warranties-representations/), [Walker Morris](https://www.walkermorris.co.uk/publications/disputes-matter-autumnwinter-2016/warranties-andor-representations-matters/)).

>
> A warranty is a term of the contract, a breach of which gives the innocent party the right to claim damages but not to treat the contract as repudiated. A warranty can therefore be contrasted with a condition, which entitles the innocent party to treat the contract as repudiated, and an "intermediate" (or "innominate") term, which may entitle the innocent party to treat the contract as repudiated depending on the nature and consequences of the breach.2
>
>
>

p. 613 in [*Contract Law: Text, Cases, and Materials* (2018 8 ed)](https://www.amazon.co.uk/Contract-Law-Text-Cases-Materials/dp/019880816X/ref=dp_ob_title_bk) instances one use of 'representation or warranty'.

>
> The principles applied by the courts when deciding whether or not a clause is reasonable
> have been discussed earlier (pp. 427–434, Chapter 13, Section 3). It is probably wise not to
> attempt to exclude liability for ‘any **representation or warranty**’ because such a clause may,
> as a matter of interpretation, extend to a fraudulent misrepresentation and an attempt to
> exclude liability for fraudulent misrepresentation must be unreasonable (see *Tomas Witter
> Ltd v. TBP Industries Ltd* [1996] 2 All ER 573; for a contrary view see *Zanzibar v. British
> Aerospace (Lancaster House) Ltd* [2000] 1 WLR 2333, where it was held that the words ‘any
> representation’ were not apt, as a matter of construction, to encompass a fraudulent misrepresentation given that liability for fraud generally cannot be excluded, see p. 612, earlier in
> this section). It is, however, safer to state that the exclusion or limitation applies to any representation other than one made fraudulently
>
>
>

---

^Perhaps they are in US law too? Tina L. Stark. [*Drafting Contracts: How and Why Lawyers Do What They Do* (2013 2 ed)](https://rads.stackoverflow.com/amzn/click/com/B00HSLR5V6). [18.3](https://books.google.com/books?id=YajfDgAAQBAJ&lpg=PT308&ots=OubWLZVMBX&dq=couplet%20%22represent%20and%20warrant%22&pg=PT308#v=onepage&q=couplet%20%22represent%20and%20warrant%22&f=false).

>
> Therefore, they should be pared down to
> one word—unless the drafter intends a substantive difference, as in the
> phrase *represent and warrant*.
>
>
>

Why 'representation or warranty', not 'representation or condition'?


First of all, I am not a lawyer, I do plan to become one however, and therefore I am very eager do some "thought experiments" in regards to law. Also I am from Latvia and I am familiar with how the law hierarchy works here. I have some very basic knowledge from my high school law lessons, about how my question works in Latvia(As mentioned on my bio, I am about to start my studies), however I am interested in hearing from both European Union setting as well as The United States.
So as for my question - I stumbled upon this discussion on reddit and started thinking, what if country X just passed a law that grants marijuana the same legal status as for example tobacco. A code of conduct in a workplace A objects any use of marijuana and punishes their employee for a failing a single test by a small margin by relieving him from the duty. As far as I know, in the hierarchy of law, a company's code of conduct, must comply or in other words "is under" the actual laws of employment, etc (That is at least how it works in Latvia). So unless the employee was under such an influence that would hinder his ability to work and this has been a regular occurrence; was it a lawful sacking?
This is my first question here, so I hope that this is an appropriate way of asking.

Marijuana use by an employee, if it is completely legal in the particular country/state


Say you operate a quasi-business. You make money, but the operation is categorized as a hobby by the IRS and isn't actually registered.

If someone sues you, can you quickly form an LLC and then "transfer the blame" to the LLC, or will the court see what you're doing and still make you liable?

Is forming an LLC soon after being made aware of a lawsuit a legitimate way of protecting your personal assets?


I have two questions concerning copyright.

I need sometimes, to go to a website and listen to some sound samples to make a decision. If I then specify in a document the items in a contract, based on what i am listening to those samples, am I infringing?

On one of the pages it says that it is prohibited to use the website for "any for profit uses".

<http://www.organstops.org/_apps/Copyright.html>

How is non-commercial use usually decided on, and how can someone test to make sure what they are doing will avoid copyright infringement?

Help in interpreting "no commercial use" of the copyright


I work for a festival in the digital department. I received a request from a documentary filmmaker about wanting to use a portion of a live-streamed footage of our concert. The clip lives on our YouTube channel, which is where the filmmaker came across it. In the contract with the performing band, it stipulates that the festival reserves to right to live stream the performance and place on YouTube in perpetuity, and also that media outlets may use record and use 2 minutes of the performance (doesn't say of the 'livestreamed' performance). It doesn't say anything about allowing a third party to use it for another type of a production (=documentary).

My question is: who owns rights to this footage? The festival, the company that did the livestreaming, the band, the band's label? Do I (as the festival) have a right to give permission to use the footage to this filmmaker? If I should refer them to someone else, who should it be?

If it helps, I am in Canada, the artist from Columbia, as is the filmmaker who made the request.

Who owns rights to a live streamed footage of a concert?


With the recent trend of cord-cutting, cable companies are suffering with low ratings, especially on NFL. I understand that not all of it is due to illegal streaming but even a single streaming result can be shown to be a detrimental impact on their business. Google has tried to remove or downgrade stream results but still they show up.

How strong would, say ESPN, case be against google if it tries to sue?

How strong would a cable company's case be against Google for allowing users to find illegal streams through search?


After years of complaining about the lack of care the landlord had for the property I was renting from them I finally got served an eviction notice.

I moved out, and 2 weeks later because of terms in the tenancy agreement I was still renting the property but there was a water leak from a bathroom pipe.

I was issued a demand for £4,500 worth of damage to the property which would partially be covered by the deposit which i refused to pay.

I went to my insurance company who told me that they would sort everything out until the landlord claimed that I had deliberately damaged the pipe in the bathroom.

At this point the Insurance company offered me only advice but would not handle the case.

I raised a dispute with the tenancy deposit scheme in order to recover my deposit giving lots of evidence showing that I had continuously complained about the bathroom the whole of of the time I had been living there, at one point the landlord sent their brother in law to fit a whole new bathroom (poorly I might add) and yet all of this was shot down by the adjudicator with the reason being ...

The landlords report states that I damaged the pipe so due to "the balance of probabilities" I was in breach of my tenancy agreement and my full deposit has been awarded to the landlord to cover renovation costs.

I am also aware the landlord intends to sue me for the rest of the cost I refused to pay outside of the adjudication process.

My understanding (which may be wrong) ...

In a civil case the law seems to state that if I am "probably at fault" (in this case, I had a set of keys which appears to be enough to implicate me) then I likely am liable.

In a Criminal case it would have to be certain that I did indeed cause the damage and proof to that nature would need to be provided in order for me to be deemed liable.

So, my question is ...

Given that the landlord claims I "criminally damaged" their property but never provided a single shred of evidence to back this up what can I do to fight this with no help from my insurer?

... or ...

Is there some way I can force this in to a criminal court or in the event that this can't be forced that way perhaps force my insurer to step in and help?

Disputing Tenancy Deposit Scheme Adjudication Decisions


I have worked for some university. I got a grant from the government for a project. The department and the government specifically wrote a contract that I have an intellectual property (including the copyright.) Then the department took down the server and took the code while I was at a conference without any prior notice. (A member of faculty abruptly cancelled the conference and was on the notice.) Is it a copyright violation?

took down the server while one is away


This may seem a bit inane, but I'm having a minor tête-à-tête with a local Quiz Master. Our weekly quiz is 10 rounds of a certain topic with 10 questions per round. Each round is displayed for about 5 minutes on TV screens around the room, answers are handed in and graded, the correct answers are read out loud and then the next round appears.

The QM claims that the questions are copyrighted. Doesn't want people taking pictures of the questions.

The QM also claims that taking pictures of the Final Results Spreadsheet (Team A in 1st place with xx points. Team B in 2nd place with yy points. etc.) is plagiarism.

I think the QM is spouting nonsense. "I don't think that word means what you think it means."

I'd like to rebuke these claims, but can't find anything that references quizzes.

Help?

Can a Pub Quiz be copyrighted? What about the Final Results spreadsheet?


I've encountered a trademark in the USPTO database which is listed as:

>
> CONTINUED USE NOT FILED WITHIN GRACE PERIOD, UN-REVIVABLE
>
>
>

What does this mean and what rights might the trademark registrant still have over the mark?

* Does the registrant still have common law rights over the mark? If so, are they affected by this status?
* Does this mean the registrant can never register this mark again?
* Can another entity register this mark for the same purpose?

Trademark "un-revivable"?


If the execution of payment to HOA homeowners is specified in the HOA Governing document (specific term?), is it not a contract? I ask because if the explicit payment instruction is not followed (e.g. the payment is less than formula prescribed in the document), does the owner not have cause to seek remedy in small claims court / mediation for small enough amounts?

Maybe the better question, is when would it not be a contract wherein the owner would be unable to seek remedy in court / mediation?

Is it a contract: HOA Bylaws?


I went to this store where in order to buy merchandise, I need to have a membership card from them, but in order to get the membership card, I need to own a business. I found that some of the things that they sell are very cheap, so if I am able to get the membership card, I might be able to save a lot in groceries. But here is the thing: I do not own a business.

I was wondering, it is illegal/fraudulent to register a new business, just to be able to get the membership card from the store?

Assume that the business will not offer any services and will not sell anything (which I do not know if this is possible at all). It will solely exists to get the membership card from this store, and to get other business discounts.

It is considered fraud to register a business just to get store discounts / benefits?


Are there case law examples where a reseller was forbidden to publish the name of the item being resold?

For example suppose a computer reseller acquires a used computer made by HALCO, model HAL-9001 (fake brand and model).

Can HALCO stop the reseller from publishing the brand and model, perhaps in an ad, on their website, or on a piece of paper taped to the unit, as both are trademarked? (There are no authorized HALCO resellers.)


In the popular game "Animal Crossing: New Horizons" the TM symbol is used for an in-universe product. It doesn't actually represent a real product of course, and just acts as flavor text. While the TM symbol isn't all that protected, it made me wonder if other symbols for Registered (R) or Copyright (C) are more strictly guarded from use in this capacity in fiction.

Can ® © ™ (R, C, TM) symbols be safely used in fiction to describe fictional products?


My wife has had a new boss a few months back. He does not understand the role his team plays in the organisation.

He has tried to force (he uses the word encourage) my wife to take up work that is not in the purview of her role.

He has tried to get her to take on work that other teams have to do (this is documented in the process), all under the name of improving working environment.

He has tried to force (again encourage according to him) her to change her personal development goals in the company.

My wife is 5 months into pregnancy and a few days back I had to take her to the A&E after she complained about severe abdominal pains. This followed an extremely stressful 2 hour long meeting with her boss.

I have observed that she is stressed every time there is a meeting with her boss.

What are her legal rights? She does not want to quit her job. She has absolutely no confidence in the HR.

Can she talk to the doctor and get off for a few days without affecting her maternity leave?

My pregnant wife is experiencing a lot of stress at work due to an incompetent manager. What are her rights?


I have a mobile app that applies filters to user photos. Suppose that i want to add a filter (or a set of filters) named "Gotham" or "Daredevil" or "X-Men". Suppose this filter (or set of filters) are available only after the user purchases it (that is, they are in app purchases). Does this use of trademarked words constitues a trademark infringement? My guess is that this should not be a trademark infringement, since there is no possible confusion of the source of good.

Trademark infringement?


We are a VAT registered web design company in the UK and we're offering a Wordpress website to a new client which will include a third party plugin purchased from a US website.

My question is; when we bill our client for this plugin, do we have to charge them VAT for it?

Charging VAT on reselling foreign Wordpress Plugin?


When now Acting US Attorney General Matt Whitaker was on the board of directors of a company that acted as an agent for inventors, he sent a letter to a complainant inventor client, warning of possible legal consequences if the inventor persisted. Since Whitaker stated(correctly) in the letter that he was a former US prosecutor, could he have been guilty of a crime involving “color of authority?

“color of authority” Matt Whitaker vs inventor with complaint


[*O'Sullivan & Hilliard's The Law of Contract*](https://www.amazon.co.uk/OSullivan-Hilliards-Law-Contract-Janet/dp/0198807821/ref=dp_ob_title_bk) (2018 8 ed). p. 93.

>
> [![enter image description here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/2dhV2.jpg)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/2dhV2.jpg)
>
>
>

Can 'the other party' (underlined in red) be interchanged with 'promisee' here?

"It makes sense for the promisor to request, as the price of his promise, that the other party should benefit some third party"?


I have read the documents stating which types of work are available for the students, studying in the UK and having TIER4 visa. These state that you can't be self employed. Another site suggests that being self-employed means to sell goods or services, not being registered as a company. If I have written a book and I want to publish it, this excludes Kindle Direct Publishing. If I sign a contract with a Publisher, does it mean, that I sell good, i. e. manuscript and considered again to be self-employed?

How to publish a book having TIER4?


I have a static webpage that advertises my mobile app for the App Store. The page is stored on an Amazons S3 bucket. It has no ads and doesn't use cookies. Do I still need a privacy policy, because I can't speak for Amazon, what happens with his meta data, since my page is sitting on their server.

User privacy policy when visiting page on Amazon S3


We have a non-commercial (academic) blog, and are writing a post about a commercial company.

The post is not especially flattering, for context.

Can we use the company's logo to illustrate the blog post, or can the company legally complain about this?

What are the laws on using a company's logo in journalistic coverage?


In [this answer](https://opensource.stackexchange.com/a/1673) on another SE, it is suggested that the anonymous authors of a piece of software might use a "[poor man's copyright](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poor_man%27s_copyright)" technique to establish that they possessed the work before it was published, in case they ever want to assert their copyright. This could consist of an unopened letter with a date stamp, a notarized copy, or some other scheme involving a third party. According to the wikipedia entry there is no specific provision for this in US copyright law.

Is there any legal reason to use a "poor man's copyright"? Have these techniques been used successfully in court, or are they mostly useless? And if one wanted to use such a technique, what is the best way to go about it?

I am looking for an answer for US law, but would appreciate other countries' perspectives too.

How does "poor man's copyright" work?


Some universities do not provide solutions/mark-schemes to exam papers. If someone (e.g. a student) was to upload online (e.g. via a blog or in a document) solutions that they themselves have made would this be legal?

**Additionally**

On a very related topic what about uploading the answers to problems in textbooks that do not come with answers only problems?

Providing exam solutions?


When you are offered voluntary redundancy, do they have to tell you who else have been made offers to as well? Or can they do it on targeted basis?

Does this depend on the number of affected personnel, similar to forced redundancy?

In this case there *should* at least be 20+ staff affected.
ie, our business unit MIGHT get restructured in a couple of of months, hence being made the offer.
However, I have asked if anyone else have been made offers, not even names, just in general, but they would not answer that, other than quoting the restructuring line.

I know of one other person who probably got an offer.

They quoted some law (s111a of employments act 1996) which effectively prohibits me from discussing this with colleagues, or using anything said in that meeting against the company at a later stage, and have 1 week to make up my mind.

When I left the managers office, he suggested that I hid the letter with the offer as to not give anyone else the wrong idea. Surely if everyone else in the same business unit had been made an offer, they would know what the envelope was?

I'm just getting the feeling that they are starting a 'selective culling'. Don't get me wrong, the offer they made seems reasonable and might be a good opportunity to move on. They also cover solicitor fees, so do not want to rock the boat and have them withdraw the offer, but I would appreciate honesty on their side.

So, does any of this sound fishy at all?

Voluntary redundancy


I want to teach songs (the songs are around 1 - 25 years old) I do not own to private students online. My concern is that if I charge a fee for these classes, would it fall into an illegal activity?

Can I charge fees for teaching songs I do not own?


If I transcribe the words to a song I listened to on YouTube, do I have a legal basis to sell the transcript?

Do I have copyright control of a transcript I created listening to a YouTube video?


To my understanding, the lawsuit against hiQ from Linked-In is about being able to scrape publicly available information from sites. Would that generalize so that if Linked-In loses the web scraping lawsuit to hiQ, other companies like Google will also be open for public webscraping since they have public facing results and data?

If Linked-In loses the web scraping lawsuit to hiQ, will that mean that other companies like Google will also be open for public webscraping?


I did some research and I can't really work out if it is okay or not to host videos from 3rd party websites.

Because embedding YouTube video is okay, but embedding another videos which you don't have any rights as well as YouTube video does not seem to be legal.

As example, there are hundreds of videos posted online and hundreds of websites showing full movies etc. But is it legal to actually have the video embedded which was not uploaded by yourself on your own website? If not, how come there are so many websites doing so?

Hosting 3rd party videos on my own website


In England and Wales, a court can impose an absolute discharge if it concludes that 'it is inexpedient to inflict punishment'. The power to do this is granted by [s12(1) Powers of Criminal Courts (Sentencing) Act 2000](http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2000/6/section/12).

Section 14(1) of the Act provides that—

>
> ... a conviction of an offence for which an order is made under section 12 above discharging the offender absolutely or conditionally **shall be deemed not to be a conviction for any purpose** other than the purposes of the proceedings in which the order is made ...
>
>
>

However, the [Crown Prosecution Service's guide to sentencing](https://www.cps.gov.uk/victims_witnesses/going_to_court/sentencing.html) says this:

>
> Absolute discharge - no further action is taken, since either the offence was very minor, or the court considers that the experience has been enough of a deterrent. **The offender will receive a criminal record**.
>
>
>

(emphasis mine in both extracts)

If a person receives an absolute discharge and also a criminal record, surely this is treating the discharge as a conviction, which appears to fly in the face of s14(1) above.

Does an absolute discharge result in a criminal record and, if so, how is this squared with s14(1) of the 2000 Act?

Does an absolute discharge result in a criminal record?


I'm making a malware software in my final thesis at the university. I won't use it ever, and it was made by educational and scientific purposes only. But my university will publish it, giving the opportunity for everyone to use it. If someone commit a crime with my software, can I get in trouble?

Can I get in trouble for making a malware?


I've heard some fellow geeks (who are always obsessed with computer privacy) talk about how 'amazing' a hidden partition is for privacy. I don't really see the point of all the trouble if I'm not actively engaging in illegal activities on my machine, but for now I'm more interested in rather or not such a hidden partition is as foolproof as these individuals claim; specifically would it really render any law enforcement powerless to do anything.

Without going too deep into the technical factors involved the idea is to have another partition (ie part of the computer reserved to install and run software on) where the partition is both encrypted and not listed in the boot sector, where partitions are usually stored. The net result is a hidden partition, no one can see or access it without using some special boot technique, such as using a CD or thumb drive to change how the computer boots up, to connect to it. if you don't plug in your magic thumb drive before you start your computer then in theory it would be impossible to tell you have another hidden partition or connect to it.

I know enough about computers to know this hidden partition isn't quite as foolproof as claimed, as inferring the existence of a hidden partition shouldn't be impossible on a technical level. The fact that a large part of the computer isn't allocated, effectively preventing use of part of your computer's storage, should be enough to make an analyst at least suspect a hidden partition may exist, doubly so if someone mostly used their hidden partition so that their visible partition was rarely used or too small to be useful. Once a hidden partition is suspected some analysis of 'randomness' of the 1 and 0 on the unallocated space could be used to provide extremely strong evidence that there was encrypted data saved there, with a very large area of encrypted data in turn being very suggestive, but not definitively prove, that a hidden partition is being used.

So say that a suspected criminal, who used one of these hidden partitions, had his computer confiscated. Let's further say the polices' technical folks are on the bar and noticed the evidence which strongly suggests, but could never definitively prove, that the suspect was using a hidden partition. The police would, of course, like to get access to this hidden partition to see if anything incriminating is saved on it, but their going to need the magic thumb drive to view anything saved on it.

I suspect the police could not compel the criminal to hand this over directly, as the evidence, no matter how suggestive, would not be be absolute proof that the hidden partition existed. Though if the police were able to find some other proof of a hidden partition, such as conversations the suspect had with someone where the suspect refers to his use of such a partition, they may be able to meet a sufficient burden of proof to compel the suspect to make the content of the partition available to them?

Would there be any other options that the police may have to deal with such a suspected hidden partition which may contain incriminating data? The two obvious ones I could think of are:

1. getting a second search warrant to allow them to search for the thumb drive used to connect to the partition. I imagine that they only need reasonable suspicion of a hidden partition to get a more extensive search warrant? Though I doubt that would be too useful since a criminal would presumably destroy such a device immediately after their computer was confiscated to prevent police from getting hold of it?
2. Could the mere (strongly suspected) presence of a hidden partition be used against the suspect? for instance in a criminal trial could the prosecutor argue the fact that the suspect was apparently going to great lengths to make it impossible to see what he was using his machine for as evidence that the suspect likely was doing something unlawful with the machine?

Would police in the US have any alternative for handling a confiscated computer with a hidden partition?


Suppose I have a firm named Blue. I signed a contract with a firm, named Green, to manage our fleet of motorcycles. The contract states "Green shall solicit and negotiate contracts with qualified independent contractors approved by Blue owners for repairs to the property motorcycles".

Does that statement prevent our firm, Blue, from contacting and negotiating contracts directly with contractors to repair our motorcycles?

Does "shall" in a contract preclude the other party from performing a task?


From <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberation_fonts> :

>
> As a further exception, any distribution of the object code of the Software in a physical product must provide the right to access and modify the source code for the Software and to reinstall that modified version of the Software in object code form on the same physical product on which it was received.
>
>
>

I'm not sure if I understand this correctly... Does this mean that if I embed such a font in my software and use it to display GUI messages, then I must open the source of this software or else I'll run afoul of the licence of this font?

Can I embed Liberation fonts in a piece of non-free software?


I entered into a program which comprised of going to a specific trade school with an explicit promise of a one year paid apprenticeship upon successful completion. At the end of the program, I was told that the apprenticeship was not guaranteed and that, although they were sorry for misrepresenting themselves, they would work to secure employment for the graduates of the program. I recently received an email stating that they would no longer be providing any assistance.

The terms of the promise were:

>
> "Start a paid apprenticeship: You'll start working right after you graduate from the bootcamp, in a paid apprenticeship with one of our hiring partners...which includes companies like Amazon, iFixit and PG&E!"
>
>
>

Do I have a reasonable claim for lost wages based on the promise of employment?

False employment promise


I know that you need to ask the user for permission to use cookies. However I use OAuth from Google Firebase. OAuth works with tokens instead of cookie-authentication, however, for the user it makes no difference. She/he gets authenticated across pages. Since I didn't find anything regarding "permission for tokens", I assume that I don't need it. Is this right? Any legal proof would be awesome.

Do I need to ask for permission to use tokens?


I work in information security, and one project I have been considering undertaking would involve using a bot (automated web spider) which crawls Tor hidden services for analysis. I am currently in the process of writing the code for the bot. I am concerned that I will run afoul of laws regarding child pornography or copyright infringement, as some hidden services contain such material. The current implementation of the bot does not make a distinction between legal and illegal sites. It does not query me for permission before performing an action (I never give it the "go ahead").

Some relevant information:

* The bot will be running remotely on a rented server in US jurisdiction.
* No web resources, legal or otherwise, will be saved to persistent storage.
* I will not be viewing any material the bot accesses. I will only view its analysis.
* I cannot keep a site blacklist. The bot will crawl as far as it can.
* The crawling activity will not interfere with the functionality of the website.
* Only public resources that can be accessed by anyone will be crawled.
* The bot may attempt to sign itself up to websites if registration is necessary.

I believe that it is likely, if not certain, that the bot will end up accessing illegal material at least once. When it does so, it will fetch the webpage into memory and analyze it. This analysis will be saved to disk. The analysis will contain information regarding anomalies in image file formats, obfuscated JavaScript, non-standard use of CSS, rare HTML tags and uses, etc. It will also save the URL. After analyzing the page, it will continue crawling as a typical web spider, following links.

Am I responsible for any laws broken by the bot, given that I am not intending for it to access illegal material but am aware that there is a distinct possibility that it will? Is there anything I should be aware of to reduce the risk of the bot taking an illegal action which I would be responsible for? Given that one could argue (correctly, but out of context) that I am writing a program that signs itself up to illegal websites and downloads illegal material, this makes me very weary.

Automated analysis of potentially illegal material using a web spider


i live in EU. somebody from another EU country is writing me that they intend to take me to court for a very minor possible copyright infringement. my question is - if meanwhile i move to live in a completely different EU country, can he have success in court over there since the actual copyright infringement took place in a different country?

cross border copyright claim


I came across this type of clause, and found that it's quite common. I understand the part that says an agreement supersedes any previous agreements, but the clause looks something like this:

>
> Supersedes Previous Agreements. This Agreement supersedes all prior or contemporaneous negotiations, commitments, agreements and writings with respect to the subject matter hereof, all such other negotiations, commitments, agreements and writings will have no further force or effect, and the parties to any such other negotiation, commitment, agreement or writing will have no further rights or obligations thereunder.
>
> [Lawinsider.com](https://www.lawinsider.com/clause/supersedes-previous-agreements?cursor=)
>
>
>

I understand that a new agreement can supersede an older one. All that needs to be done in that case is to establish the time that any other ones were made, and by comparison you can know that one in particular is the latest one. But I don't understand how an agreement can supersede all over contemporaneous agreements. I understand "contemporaneous" to mean at the same time, am I wrong about that? Is it even possible for two separate agreements to be made exactly contemporaneously? Also what happens if other agreements have this clause (that it supersedes all other agreements)? If it is possible for multiple agreements to be made exactly contemporaneously (which I take to mean exactly at the same time, which I'm not sure is possible), doesn't this result in multiple agreements superseding each other?

How can an agreement supersede another contemporaneous agreement?


>
> In World War II, Executive Order 9066 suspended basic rights of
>  Japanese Americans - even people whose loyalty to the United States
>  was never questioned, though the government feared the group as a
>  whole might contain some spies - and led to a lot of people (>100K)
>  being rounded up and kept at internment camps. Korematsu v. United
>  States ruled this was constitutional.
>
>
> Today, in the "War on Terror," at least one politician can make
>  surprisingly strong statements about plans for negative treatment
>  against large groups of people (e.g. Muslims) because of concerns that
>  a small minority of them might be radical enough to kill a bunch of
>  people, and [the politician can] remain surprisingly popular.
>
>
>

What, if any, modern-day obstacles are in place that would nullify the same or materially same executive order? [This link indicates: "The Court would then have to adhere to, reconcile with, or overrule Korematsu & Hirabayashi." However, it does not state that there this is the only obstacle and hence the question](https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/5927/could-executive-order-9066-be-repeated-with-other-groups-today)

Executive Order 9066


One person I know is currently building an iOS application, in the main page there are some icons where inside one of them he clones my whole website.

In the World Wide Web it's always a copyright infringement but on mobile, applications like Pinterest or Facebook leave you navigate through external websites without leave the application itself, so I'm not sure.

Clone a website inside an app, is it copyright infringement or not?

Copyright on mobile, clone an entire website


Where can one check that the agreement made and sent to any client by a stock broker genuine and legal?

Stock Broker Company Agreement


Recently [a post](https://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/392867/in-case-you-missed-it-shog9-and-robert-cartaino-are-no-longer-staff-members-at) on Meta StackOverflow got unfeatured by SE employee, with the [explanation](https://meta.stackoverflow.com/a/392953/113662) that it was done because of some "legal concerns."

Given that:

1. [similar](https://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/342031/thank-you-shog9) [posts](https://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/342079/thank-you-robert-cartaino) exist on main Meta and are featured there, and
2. the problematic post is still present on MSO, only that the "featured" tag got removed from it

What kind of legal concerns might cause such an action? If the post content is problematic, only removing the post (or the problematic part) would help. Featuring posts is a responsibility of moderators, who represent the community, not the company, so I don't think there is a risk of treating the post (or its being featured) as a statement coming from company. So what concerns might be present here?

What legal concerns may be caused by featuring a post on meta?


I have created an App at [helpathome.me](https://helpathome.me) which isolated people can use to fill out a form and request help from others.

[![enter image description here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/X0MUs.png)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/X0MUs.png)

I innocently thought this would be fine but a friend told me that I must comply to GDPR rules and that when it goes live it shows information directly to the public which could be used inappropriately.

Further more he said that if some not so nice person was to use the data of somebody asking for help and then go to their house and commit some type of crime then I would be liable because I provided the facility for them to meet.

I really want to role this out in my local area (maybe larger area if I have the resources to manage it) but before I do I want to make sure I'm not setting myself up for some nasty legal issues. I would also like any recommendations as to what I can do if anything to the app to make it more secure and compliant) Thanks . I am in the UK

I have created an App to help isolated people in Corona Virus lockdown. Do GDPR rules apply


In many different situations, people will have an incentive to lie in court while the other parties cannot verify whether they are lying or not.

I'm wondering whether there are techniques that can be used to (relatively robustly) incentivize people not to lie, even though what they say cannot be verified/falsified.

For example, one technique that might be used is:
- We will ask you 10 questions. We know the answer to 5 of these questions, but you don't know which of the 10. If you tell us a lie in even one of the 5 cases, you will go to jail.

That person will be incentivized to tell the truth in almost all 10 cases, since statistically, if it lied in half of them they would almost certainly go to jail. In this way, we incentivize the person to tell the truth even in the cases where we can't verify the answers.

**Are there methods that are used to achieve this?**

What are techniques used in law to robustly incentivize people to tell the truth?


Let's imagine the case I offer to see a 3D sportscar (Ferrari or any sportscar brand), and you can explore it in my own programed VR/AR web-visor. The customer is not buying the product (the 3D model is not downloadable, I do not offer any files to download, so it's no digital goods). The customer buys access to the web-visor to see that sportscar in VR/AR.

Since I do not offer any digital/tangible goods and I offer my own 3D web-visor to display products like these, and it's not a videogame, nothing downloadable, just a 3D visor.

Product experience in 3D VR/AR


Can anyone explain the difference between leaking classified information where the information leaked doesn't technically violate any laws (ie- wikileaks) & printing something like the drone report (drones violate international law but we knew that before the papers) and actually whistleblowing like cigarette companies have been using carcinogens or NSA violating American rights. The first two are treason, but the latter two are whistleblowing? Does what is reported actually matter to avoid a treason charge?

Treason vs Whistleblowing charges?


It's hard to tell what I mean in just one sentence. For example: If I would create a mobile JnR-App, with Super Mario Textures, Nintendo can sue me. But now, for another example let's take "Gravity Guy" by Miniclip. There is no mobile app for the current operating systems, last time it has been updated 6 years ago and now you can't play it on newer phones. But you still can play the game at their Website for free.

Now what if I create an Application, that uses a web-browser engine to "stream" the game, so you can play it. The website gets cut off, only the game is visible. Could Miniclip sue me for that?

I don't talk about other things like a name for the app. If I would call it "Gravity Guy", they can sue me, I mean the specific scenario "The app connects to Miniclip and opens the game in fullscreen, so I can play it". While connecting and opening, the user only sees a Loading-screen

EDIT: With streaming, I just mean that a javascript game you normally have in your browser gets displayed in fullscreen on your phone. The game is not by me, but as the app is just a browser for it, it shouldn't be illegal I think

Is it legal to create an app, that "streams" a specific game from a website?


I often do freelance app and web development and design. Sometimes I have clients ask if I do logos as well, I don't personally know a lot about graphic design but am familiar with some online software for logo making (particularly canva). So am I allowed to use these logos I make through canva and other software in the apps or sites that I make for clients?

Am I legally allowed to use logos that I create using online logo making software for clients?


Can I refuse to upload my personal ID and picture into a website that my boss wants me to book a reservation in?

I just started this job a few months ago and my boss wants me to secure AirBnB and VRBO reservations for our guests. however, in order to make reservations, the websites ask you to upload a government ID and a "selfie" in order to secure certain properties. When I got the job, these type of reservations were not in my job description. She just sprung it on me later. Saying "you will be handdling the AirBnB/VRBO bookings. I don't know anything about AirBnB/VRBO bookings but thought I would give it a try. Then I came across having to enter this information. I explained that I am not comortable doing that. So she gave me access to her account. I was booking a reservation in her account but it asked me to upload a government ID and selfie again. I forwarded the message to her since it was in her account. And now she is questioning why I do not want to upload my pictures, asking what is the big deal. I feel like she will fire me for this. Any suggestions? Thanks!


It's been a while since I last pushed out an app to the iOS store, and since then the new EU requirements for data protection General Data Protection Regulation Compliance, GDPR, came into force. Most of what I can find in a Google search seems to come from entities pushing a commercial solution for GDPR in apps, and other snippets that don't look applicable or are just an over-the-top compliance advice.

I am a one person LLC entity, about to push out a free app, mostly to demonstrate my Swift coding ability. I plan to use both Fabric/Crashlytics and Flurry to monitor crash history and also analytics. Does anyone who actually has an iOS app recently submitted to the store know if I need to provide an opt-in screen on first run before enabling Crashlytics and Flurry? My inclination right now is to prevent the app being available in the EU to avoid legal issues.
Thanks

Is opt-in now required for iOS app using Fabric/Crashlytics/Flurry due to GDPR?


How to tell if an image is copyrighted?

For example, I want to say that my client uses a product for their hairdressing service.

Can I use images of the product directly from the product website?

What are some general ways to tell?

And who gets sued, me or the hairdresser?

How to tell if an image is copyrighted


I would like to rewrite an old story, written in the 16th century, in the hope that more people may benefit from its message. The latest reprint was in 1971 in Great Britain.

Is it legal to rewrite a book written in 16th century English in modern American English?


My husband and I got pulled over. Officer said it was for speeding. My husband has past felonies,so they searched the car and found a gun (not loaded). So they charged him with possession of hand gun ( bond is 5,000 cash ) but did not give ticket for speeding which was reason he said he pulled us over.
 Would the Fruit of A Poison Vine apply here??

Does the ( Fruit of A Poison Vine ) Apply if police find a gun when pulled over for speeding but not ticketed?


I was charged with a misdemeanor, but the court messed up and sent the misdemeanor complaint to a wrong address. Never receiving it, never appearing at the court, they then created a warrant for my arrest, which they sent to my correct address, and I did receive, with $1000 bail amount. I then appeared in court, showed the judge the court messed up (the court found their letters to a wrong address), and she quashed the warrant and removed any bail payment. However she gave me various release conditions, removing various rights (e.g. no firearms). I then asked the judge, if you remove these rights, can you show me the basis for the charges, the discovery evidence against me. She could not, and had no idea of how to get it, even stating this is an unusual request. Perhaps this is because of the way their address mess-up resulted in a warrant for my arrest. To me this is wrong -- my rights should not be removed in a situation like this, alleged harassment, without providing me any evidence against me.

My question is, how would it have gone differently if they sent the misdemeanor complaint to my correct address, and I appeared, and the state had requested certain release conditions while filing the complaint (which they did, at time of filing the complaint). What typically happens at the first appearance of a complaint? Are they allowed to remove your rights, without providing you any discovery evidence?

--- I added two comments, that ideally help advance the discussion ---

misdemeanor complaint, state requested release conditions, discovery evidence


Al Capone was convicted of failing to file a tax return.

According to [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_Capone):

>
> Assistant Attorney General Mabel Walker Willebrandt recognized that
>  mob figures publicly led lavish lifestyles yet **never filed tax
>  returns**, and thus could be convicted of tax evasion without requiring
>  hard evidence to get testimony about their other crimes.
>
>
>

These days, if you file late, you get penalized financially, not go to prison.

Would Al Capone's crime merit imprisonment today?

Would Al Capone be convicted today?


I live in Florida, U.S. I recently purchased a math book that I really like, and I am thinking about making a video series or a blog where I would succcessively resolve the exercises from the book.

Of course, to do so, I would have to reproduce the problem statements in their entirety. Is this a problem?

I am aware of another question on this site which asks the same thing, except it is about translations of Greek manuscripts. However, I think my case is a little differet, for at least one reason: I am not sure how many of the problems are really the author's original work; in math, there are some very "classic" problems that are given by many authors; also, some problems are very fundamental to the theory, and were surely considered by people who first came up with the theory. Additionally, math books are notorious for not citing where they got their problems from, so again one really cannot be sure which, if any, are the author's truly original work.

Is it legal to include verbatim exercises from a book in videos/on a blog?


>
> [§§](http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/jun/08/google-search-results-indicate-right-to-be-forgotten-censorship) — The decision by Europe's highest court allows people living in Europe to ask for links to "inadequate, irrelevant or no longer relevant" material to be removed from **search results**, although it will still be available on the **original web page**[.]
>
>
>

Google Search might be unambiguously considered as a "search engine", but what about other websites **like** Blogger, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Quora, StackExchange, 4chan, Reddit, etc?

Are news websites which store their **own** archives of *old* news considered a "search engine", or "**original** web page", or both? (Notice that material must be removed from search results yet is allowed to remain available on the original web page.)

Let's assume that John Doe (either an imaginary student, salaryman, politician, [etc](http://marketingland.com/10-people-want-forgotten-google-83853)) exercised his right to be forgotten. Then, :

* Does a blogger have the right to list links and prior search results of John Doe's past on his **personal** blog which is **public**ly available?
* If the blogger also writes about John Doe's past (i.e. the blogger creates [**original** material](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derivative_work#When_does_derivative-work_copyright_apply.3F)), would the blogpost now be considered "original web page" and allowed to be available?

Regarding "Right to be Forgotten", what's the definition of a "search engine"?


I've been looking for what is considered illegal if you have a vm in different geographical area.

For example, if there is a blocked website in my geographical area, can I access it from the vm in another geographical area?

If I created a website and wanted to test it in different geographical area, would that be legal?

Streaming a free service provided in a certain geographic area from another geographic area would that be legal?

What is legal and what is illegal when accessing a virtual machine in another geographic area?


In various nerdy gaming communities, it's common for folks to produce higher quality tokens, play mats, and such containing artwork from the games. And some people will sell some of their works to basically pay for their hobby.

Question 1: If someone digitally copies an image and prints it on a play mat without permission that's obviously not legal for them to sell, but is it legal for personal use under Fair Use?

Question 2: Would it be illegal to use symbols from the game on tokens you create and sell? See links for an example of what I mean. The first link is actual card board images from the game. The second is the higher quality tokens someone produced. The reproduced drawings are ever so slightly different. What if they were identical? Does that matter? Or how different would they need to be?

<https://images-cdn.fantasyflightgames.com/filer_public/7a/47/7a474142-dd1a-4eb1-8c42-1f8e1e18efe1/l5c01_rings.png>

<http://www.brokenegggames.com/media/catalog/product/cache/1/thumbnail/960x/17f82f742ffe127f42dca9de82fb58b1/2/0/20170825_115514.jpg>

Reproducing game art in various forms for personal use and/or selling to friends


['reduced into possession' isn't just worded for animals.](https://www.usingenglish.com/forum/threads/204909-(Legal)-reduced-to-possession)

1. 'reduce' here doesn't feel like ordinary meaning. What does it mean? I quote [Etymonline](https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=reduce) because legalese can deceivingly use common words today but actually aim for some bygone meaning.

[![enter image description here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/xZfs3.jpg)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/xZfs3.jpg)

2. Why not just use 'possess'?

Herring, [*Criminal Law: Text, Cases, and Materials* (8 edn, 2018)](https://global.oup.com/academic/product/criminal-law-9780198811817?cc=ca&lang=en&). p. 493

>
> ### Wild creatures
>
>
> These are dealt with by section 4(4) of the Theft Act 1968, which provides:
>
>
>
> >
> > Wild creatures, tamed or untamed, shall be regarded as property; but a person cannot steal
> >  a wild creature not tamed nor ordinarily kept in captivity, or the carcase of any such creature,
> >  unless either it has been **reduced into possession [emboldening mine]** by or on behalf of another person and
> >  possession of it has not since been lost or abandoned, or another person is in course of **reducing
> >  it into possession**.
> >
> >
> >
>
>
> The key distinction drawn in this section is between tamed creatures (e.g. pets), wild
>  creatures kept in captivity (e.g. wild animals kept in a zoo) or **reduced into possession** (e.g.
>  wild animals which have been trapped), and wild creatures not kept in captivity. Tame
>  animals are treated as property and can be stolen. Similarly, wild animals kept in captivity
>  or **reduced into possession** can be stolen.8 However, wild animals not kept in captivity are
>  not property and cannot be stolen.
>
>
> [....]
>
>
> 8 *Cresswell v DPP* [2006] EWHC 3379 (Admin) held that wild badgers were not property.
>
>
>

reduce into possession


We had a verbal agreement 15 yrs ago that my family would live in the house and Maintain and improve the home and property. With the promise of it being given to us at some point.
 These are long time family friends and I know I should have gotten it in writing. They have now decided to sell the property and although they have offered first chance at it if I cannot secure financing do I have any real recourse.
 I have improved this house and land over the years. Which has increased its value by 80,000-100,000
Am I screwed?

I was verbally given a home yrs ago in N.H


Status/Status date:12/19/2014: Continued use not filed within grace period, UN-REVIVABLE

In US does that mean registrant can never register this trademark?

Can another entity register this mark for the same purpose?

UN- REVIVABLE in Trademarks


I don't grok the emboldened hypothetical. I simplified the math in the title; dividing prices by 1000 doesn't change factual pattern.

If car = 3K if of the age repesented, then Alex got a bargain of 500 = (3 – 2.5)K.

1. Thus why would Alex get "an award of £800 (£3,000 less the £2,200 value of the car received)"? Alex wouldn't get anything!
2. What's his "contractual loss of bargain"? Why give him it "rather than returning each party to their starting positions"?

[Prof Richard Taylor](https://www.uclan.ac.uk/staff_profiles/richard-taylor.php), [Damian Taylor](https://www.slaughterandmay.com/who-we-are/partners/damian-taylor/). [*Contract Law Directions* (6 edn, 2019)](https://www.amazon.co.uk/Contract-Law-Directions-Richard-Taylor/dp/0198836597/ref=dp_ob_title_bk). p 189. All sections refer to [Misrepresentation Act 1967](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misrepresentation_Act_1967).

>
> ### Damages in lieu of rescission
>
>
> Alex buys a car from Phillippa for £2,500, but due to a misrepresentation about the car’s
>  age, the car is only worth £2,200. If Alex rescinded, he would return to Phillippa the
>  car worth £2,200 and get his £2,500 back from Phillippa. So he has his £2,500 back in
>  his hands.
>
>
> If the court decides to award damages in lieu of rescission under s.2(2), such damages
>  would have to achieve the same result. Since no rescission is being ordered, Alex keeps
>  the car worth £2,200 so he needs another £300 to bring him up to the £2,500 he could
>  have got under rescission. What these damages should not cover, however, is any other
>  items of loss, for example suppose Alex has purchased £100 of accessories which only
>  fit models of the year he thought he was purchasing and which are now useless to him.
>  Such losses would have been left equally uncompensated if rescission plus indemnity
>  had been awarded and they can only be recovered if Alex establishes some other right
>  to damages, for example under s.2(1), which is considered later. **[1.] Similarly, if the car
>  would have been worth £3,000 if of the age represented, there should be no question
>  of getting an award of £800** (£3,000 less the £2,200 value of the car received) since that
>  would be to give him **[2.]¸his contractual loss of bargain rather than returning each party to
>  their starting positions**. To gain such loss of bargain damages, Alex would have to prove
>  that the age of the car was a term, not just a representation and that there was therefore
>  a breach of contract.
>
>
>

If you paid $2.5 for a car that's worth $3 if of the age represented, why would you get (1) an award or (2) loss of bargain damages?


A standard way to license something under the GPL, is to grant a license to the "GPL version 3 or later", meaning that the recipient receives a license under the license terms of the GPLv3, or at their choice any later version of the GPL.

I have been told that in the EU, or at least Germany this is impossible because the license constitutes a contract, and it's not lawful to enter into a contract that has terms that are unknown to you at the time of entering it. Is this correct?

Legality of "Version x or later" licenses


The NFL's copyright statement for today's big game, and presumably for other football games, contains language like "Any other use of this telecast or any pictures, descriptions, or accounts of the game without the NFL's consent is prohibited".

How can they prohibit someone from making their own "descriptions or accounts" (or, indeed, their own pictures - if someone brings a camera phone into the audience they may be violating some stadium policy, but they're not violating copyright) under copyright law?

How can the NFL assert copyright over "any pictures, descriptions, or accounts of the game"?


I recently learned that it's not the first person to register a mark that gets ownership, but rather the first person to actually use the mark in commerce that gets ownership.

So what's the best way to establish *first use in commerce* for an online business, like a blog, where the domain name of the blog is what needs to be registered?

For example if my blog is called *bloggd*, and the site is up and running, but someone else registers *bloggd* before I do, what is the best way to prove that I was using *bloggd* in commerce first?

How to establish first use in commerce?