Scientology vs ISP XS4ALL
p2p news / p2pnet: On Friday the Dutch Supreme Court gave its long-awaited decision in the lawsuit between Scientology and ISP XS4ALL. The legal battle that had the (tense) relationship between copyright an freedom of expression at its centre, ended somewhat disappointing.
On the right is the "Final Victory"-shirt XS4ALL gave away to 5000 of its subscribers. The 0-4 refers to XS4ALL’s legal victories over Scientology. The latest (0-3) was in the Court of Appeals (2003), which recognized the copyright of Scientology on the texts of its founder L. Ron Hubbard that were included in a witness account used in an American court.
Writer Karin Spaink published the account on her website, hosted by XS4ALL, leading to a copyright infringement claim by Scientology in 1995. While recognizing Scientology’s copyright, the Court of Appeals found that Spaink’s publication should be allowed on the basis of article 10 ECHR (freedom of speech), especially since it has an informative, non-commercial character, and the Church of Scientology shows anti-democratic objectives.
Scientology appealed the decision to the Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court’s legal counsel advised that the appeal should be rejected, not so much because copyright had to yield for the freedom of speech, but because with the initial submission of the contested texts to the American Court’s library, where it was available to the public, the Church can no longer prohibit the "further communication to the public or reproduction" under provision 15b of the Dutch Copyright Act [English Version].
After this advice Scientology asked the Supreme Court to grant a withdraw of the appeal, if not to avoid another condemnation. In a reaction XS4ALL wrote that "It’s in line with Scientology’s strategy to withdraw itself from lawsuits it has started. XS4ALL hopes that the Supreme Court will not accept this tactic."
The Supreme Court has accepted the tactic, and dismissed the appeal as requested by Scientology [decision, Dutch]. While this means that the decision of the Court of Appeals stands, it also means that the case has not really been judged by the highest instance.
For XS4ALL this may not have brought the broadest "Final Victory" they hoped for, but final it is and its sweetness must take away some of the bitterness of the last ten years.
Rik Lambers - CoCo
[Lambers is a former researcher at the Institute for Information Law, Amsterdam, who's now in transition to a new full time job in the field of IP/Internet law. He's also an associate member of the European INDICARE project, which researches consumer issues related to DRM]
December 19th, 2005 at 11:53 pm
Congratulations. I am just sorry that it took so long for justice to be served.
December 20th, 2005 at 12:42 am
Below is a link to Karen Spaink’s site. What she did that the cult objected to was publish their top-secret “sacred” writings. Cult members have to pay thousands of dollars for “auditing” treatments to be allowed access to these texts. Spaink was able to publish the writings because they became items of evidence in a lawsuit and therefore part of the public record.
http://www.xs4all.nl/~kspaink/fishman/home.html
This is bizarre, nutty stuff. It is pretty much like very bad science-fiction.
December 20th, 2005 at 9:28 am
“bad science-fiction” Ron L. Hubbard is known for
December 21st, 2005 at 6:30 pm
Scientology is an underhanded cult, plain and simple.
December 21st, 2005 at 10:09 pm
In chrurches all music can be played without a license. This is a concession that was made in the copyright law.
This above concession was not given to educational or non profit institutions. Incredibly, not even the federal government gave itself this concession, so to favor the copyright holders. In essence the message was: The copyright holders are not above religion but are above the people as a collective (government).
But should not religions reciprocate by not claiming copyrights as the USA government (but not states) is prohibited from doing?
Rafael Venegas
http://www.gvenegas.com
December 22nd, 2005 at 11:28 am
“I am just sorry that it took so long for justice to be served.”
In justice, lawyers have to be fed first. They own the judicial system.
The only branch of government that belongs to a profession is the judicial system. And the other branches of government are practically run by lawyers. That is why it took so long.
A single day of judicial work takes about five year.