Litigation vs. free software conferences (S5E16, LRL USA)

[Aq]

Is American culture too litigious, and is this affecting the free software community's ability to do things in the USA? The fear of falling foul of the legal framework affected
the organisation of LugRadio Live, and may be affecting similar open source conferences: is there anything that we, as a community, can do about it?

[Ryan]

How did this become a segment? What does the fact that it was an open source event matter to US bureaucracy? It simply affects all low budget events, assuming there is a money cost to permits etc and not just time. What can the open source community do? Not much other than petition litigation,which won't affect it in fairness because that's how it's done and people need to cover their backs otherwise if something bad happens a legal team will rip you a new one.

This seemed to be more a rant rather than a segment.

[BigRon]

I think that this segment/rant came about because it was the most obvious difference between organising the UK event and the USA event

[Aq]

What can the open source community do?

One suggestion made in the segment by a member of the audience was to have someone like the Software Freedom Conservancy handle this for events, which was a useful idea. Certainly more useful than just throwing up our hands and saying "well, it's all fucked, isn't it?".

[mrben]

This seemed to be more a rant rather than a segment.

I'm not sure LugRadio has ever made a distinction between rants and segments.....

I think that to say "that's just the way it is, live with it" is not the most valid of arguments. I agree that the fact it was an open source event is, to all intents and purposes, irrelevant. But I think there is a valid question there in terms of how we can make it easier (because events like LRL are important to the growth of the community, IMHO), and an additional underlying question of what the UK event can learn from the US event, and vice versa.

Additionally, I suspect that there is a chunk of the question that is based on "do we want to be bothered doing this again?".

[manuelgodavis]

Hi, I am new to this forum. I would like to point something out that may not be obvious to those outside of the United States. It is best, from a European or British perspective, not to think of the United States as a single country like Germany or France but as an equivalent of the European Union - at least when it comes to issues such as this. For these types of issues a majority of the laws are on a state or local level rather than a national level. California is wonderful in many respects but it is also a state that has more regulations than the vast majority.

[davee]

The fear of falling foul of the legal framework affected
the organisation of LugRadio Live...

Can you explain how?

[Allix]

It certainly was a diary moment. Nevertheless a good segment because through complaining stuff gets fixed, if it was never brought up by anyone open source conferences or not , nothing would ever change.

Its good the guys have used democracy for what it is, getting changes into peoples minds is the first step to getting changes on the agenda.

Would a free software party be a good idea? although many political views exists in the free software world that infighting would be sure to happen.

[davee]

The fear of falling foul of the legal framework affected
the organisation of LugRadio Live...

Can you explain how?

Hmm, maybe I just need to listen to the episode

[mrben]

The fear of falling foul of the legal framework affected
the organisation of LugRadio Live...

Can you explain how?

Hmm, maybe I just need to listen to the episode

That might help....

By way of summary, there are quite a lot of rules and regulations that you must obey in order to run an event like LRL in the US (or specifically in SF). In particular there's a lot of stuff about unions that we just don't need to worry about here. One of the examples I remember is that an exhibitioner is only allowed to bring in stuff that he can carry on his own. Anything requiring two people means you have to hire union people to do it for them. Anything that has wheels is regarded as having them because it's too heavy for a single person to carry. (I'm paraphrasing a little, but you get the idea).

[davee]

By way of summary ...

I get the idea. What a palaver...

[jezra]

speaking of litigation.... has ASCAP come knocking yet demanding their licensing fee for the public performance of "Happy Birthday" at LRL USA?

[Spike the Dingo]

Fucking California.

[manialix]

I m also a new one and i 100% agree with manuelgodavis