texts: Can someone deny cash as the payment method?

texts:
There are a few restaurants in my area where cash payments are not accepted. They only accept electronic payments such as credit cards, local debit cards, etc. Is this legal?
On most currencies, it is written on the note something along the lines of "this note settles X dollars of debt". If a customer offers to purchase a product or settle the bill for a service they have consumed (e.g., food already is eaten, gas already pumped into the car) via cash, can the seller deny it?
On a related topic, must business entities accept cash for invoice settlements? I know that the party receiving the payment can charge a "reasonable fee" for processing the cash (e.g., thousands of coins). Can they, for example, demand the debt be settled by bank transfer only?


texts: What are the consumer protection laws, if any, around closing online accounts?

texts:
Online subscription services like, Netflix, etc. typically make it difficult to close accounts. They make the button hard to find, or force you to click through multiple pages to do so.

Recently I tried to close my Zipcar account, only to discover that there is no way to do so on the website -- you have to call them. Intuitively this feels like a line has been crossed to me, but are there any legal protections here?

Could a company make it arbitrarily difficult for users to stop their subscriptions without legal penalties?


texts: Is it legal for a retailer to modify a product to remove best before dates and batch numbers?

texts: We manufacture and supply to retailers in the US, via a distributor, a trademarked liquid animal feed product. Recently we have discovered that one of the retailers has been wiping off the best before dates and batch numbers printed on the bottles and saying that we did never provided these details. I have been told they are allowed to a wipe these off. Is this legal? What can I do to stop it? Also, can we force the retailer to stop selling the product once it has expired or ideally close to expiry?


texts: Someone else's Python code to create poetry

texts: I have a legal and ethical question. I am in the process of trying to create text processing programming code to generate text that will be used for poetry that I plan to write using Python, while giving credit to the fact that a Python program generated the text, and if using someone else's code giving credit to the original computer scientist. In the process, I found someone else's code for generating the synonym of each word from an original root sentence. Is it unethical and illegal to use someone else's free github program to generate text that will then be used for poetry? Coding seems different than simply using a hammer to build a house without giving credit to the hammer builder. There's something different about code that makes code more than a tool for future expression. Thank you!


texts:
What is the meaning and the implications of Art. 27, GG (German Basic Law)?

  Alle deutschen Kauffahrteischiffe bilden eine einheitliche Handelsflotte.

I suspect it has something to do with maritime law, but I cannot find any explanations of its implications on the internet.

Since I'm not a jurist, this article seems somehow obscure to me as an ordinary German citizen.


texts: Capping your claim in an English small claims court?

texts:
From what I understand, in English small claims courts the maximum claim is £10,000. Above this amount, the case needs to go through a different track.

If you are technically owed a greater sum than the limit, but are willing to reduce the claim in order to go through a less complex proceedure; are you able to claim the lower amount?

For example:

Owed £10,250 for work completed, with well documented evidence that shows this amount
Wish to go through small claims court, despite the limit of £10,000
Is there any issue with raising a claim in small claims for only £10,000 - even though the evidence shows you would have been entitled to more via a different track?


texts:
Google revealed a definition of 'Fact Pattern/Situation' (abbreviate to FP)

A concise description of all the occurrences or circumstances of a particular case, without any discussion of their consequences under the law. The fact situation, sometimes referred to as a fact  pattern [bold mine], is a summary of what took place in a case for which relief is sought. The fact situation of one case is almost always distinguishable from that of another case.
When one case with a particular fact situation has been decided, an attorney may use it as precedent and relate it to another similar case on which he or she is currently working.

but nothing for "Factual matrix", except its use in Canada and England & Wales.

So what's the definition of Factual Matrix (abbreviate to FM)?

Please contrast and compare FM and FP?


texts: Can I legally (but without license) sell merchandise with text and images based on a video game?

texts:
I am setting up an online shop (or, say, a table/kiosk at conventions) to sell merchandise like t-shirts, mugs, etc, and I want to have merchandise with text and images either from or based on popular video game franchises. I would not be using the game logo or title of the game itself, but I would want to use specific images from inside the game (or the silhouette/likeness/"representing symbol" of characters in the game).

For example, a mug with a catch-phrase and logo from Mass Effect that says "I should go..." and "get a refill" on opposite sides with the Paragon/Renegade/Paragade logo on it.

As another example, maybe a headset with the Zelda franchise's Navi on the earmuffs and "Hey! Listen!" printed across the band.

However I highly doubt I would be able to obtain a "merchandising license", or even get any form of response from a company like EA/BioWare or Nintendo if I inquire.

Am I opening myself up to possible lawsuits? Assuming yes, or that I would receive a "cease and desist" (because even on shaky legal ground I have no doubt a company would toss one at someone to hope they just complied), if I were sued (and leaving competency out of it) is there any sort of legal defense?

Clearly I have zero knowledge of parody/fair use/trademark/copyright (other than that the concepts exist), and I cannot afford a lawyer... so I'm sorry if this has been answered here before. I've found this question and these ones (could this one even apply in any way? I dunno, that's why I'm here), but I'm hoping my case is different enough to not get downvoted into oblivion as I am not saying "I want to sell things that say 'Overwatch' and use the trademarked logo" and I don't know if using the content in this manner constitutes satirical/parody purposes of any kind.

Alternatively, can I make any kind of promotional material (a poster, a video, take free pictures of people and digitally insert images, a free phone app) with likeness/symbols/images from their favourite video games? i.e. is there a significant difference between this and directly monetizing?

Sorry again. I anticipate the first comment being "get a lawyer" or "that's illegal", but any kind of elaboration would be amazing.

NOTE: I somehow missed the "Law Stack Exchange is for educational purposes only and is not a substitute for individualized advice from a qualified legal practitioner" part until after clicking post, but if anyone is still able to advise me (educationally, of course) I would suuuuuuuper appreciate it.


texts: Liability for pushing trespassing stock out on the street?

texts:
Bob's land (in an urban area) has been trespassed by Rob's bull which has already caused some damage. Bob has repeatedly asked Rob to keep the bull out, but Rob has not been caring enough. Bob has also informed the local animal control authorities but they are taking time to react.
The fencing around Bob's property is such that if the bull is pushed out on the street (as opposed to back to Rob's property), he is much less likely to come back.
Can Bob push the bull out on the street? Would Bob be liable if the bull causes any trouble there?
I have found that "any person may seize the stock" if "Stock straying or wandering on roads". But can any person (apart from the stock owners of course) do the opposite — push them out?


texts: Anmeldung, how do homeless people solve the German puzzle?

texts:
In Germany, one is legally obliged to register somewhere within 2 weeks of moving in (except for tourists up to 3 months) however, it has proven extremely difficult in Berlin to find a place to live let alone register your address. It appears to me that the German bureaucracy is preventing multiple registrations on the same address, however I have yet to receive clear answers as to why and how.

Given the circumstances, I think I can easily find myself officially homeless even though I have a job, health insurance and pay taxes.

What do people without a home do?


texts: Is the extended State of Emergency and State of Disaster in Michigan legal?

texts:
I live in Michigan and we've been under a state of emergency since March 10th, 2020, as declared in Executive Order 2020-4.  That order cited two statues as authority for this action: PA 302 - Emergency Powers of Governor and PA 390 - Emergency Management Act. On April 1st that was expanded to include a state of disaster in Executive Order 2020-33.

The challenge here (and I'll go into this more later) is that PA 302 and 390 seem to have some overlapping and conflicting portions.

PA 302 doesn't place any specific time restrictions on the length of these declarations, while PA 390, Section 30.403 states that:

  The state of emergency shall continue until the governor finds that the threat or danger has passed, the emergency has been dealt with to the extent that emergency conditions no longer exist, or until the declared state of emergency has been in effect for 28 days. After 28 days, the governor shall issue an executive order or proclamation declaring the state of emergency terminated, unless a request by the governor for an extension of the state of emergency for a specific number of days is approved by resolution of both houses of the legislature.

On April 7th (28 days after the initial state of emergency declaration) Michigan's legislators voted to extend the states of emergency and disaster for 23 days (until April 30th).

On April 30th Michigan legislators decided to not extend the state of emergency.  The governor  extended them nonetheless, issues 3 new executive orders (source):

  "Executive Order 2020-67, which clarifies that a state of emergency
  remains in effect under the Emergency Powers of the Governor Act of
  1945. The order is effective immediately and continues through May 28, 2020 at 11:59pm. The governor will evaluate the continuing need for
  this order prior to its expiration, and if she determines that an
  emergency no longer exists, will terminate or extend the state of
  emergency declared in this order."

  "Executive Order 2020-68, which declares a state of emergency and a
  state of disaster across the State of Michigan under the Emergency
  Management Act of 1976. The state of emergency and state of disaster
  declared by this order will be effective through May 28, 2020 at
  11:59pm, and the governor will evaluate the continuing need for the
  order prior to its expiration, terminate the states of emergency and
  disaster if the threat or danger has passed."

  "Executive Order 2020-66, which terminates the existing state of
  emergency and disaster declarations issued under the Emergency
  Management Act in Executive Order 2020-33."

That's confusing to me - EO 2020-66 terminates the existing states of emergency/disaster while EO 2020-67 clarifies that it's still in effect.

I've also been trying to understand how these (seemingly) conflicting statues (PA 302 and 390) work together.  I can see that PA 390, Section 30.417 specifically mentions how it doesn't limit PA 302 in some capacity (emphasis added):

  This act shall not be construed to do any of the following [...]  (d)
  Limit, modify, or abridge the authority of the governor to proclaim a
  state of emergency pursuant to Act No. 302 of the Public Acts of 1945,
  being sections 10.31 to 10.33 of the Michigan Compiled Laws, or
  exercise any other powers vested in him or her under the state
  constitution of 1963, statutes, or common law of this state
  independent of, or in conjunction with, this act.

But that seems to impact the proclamation, not duration, of the states of emergency or disaster.

So back to my question - is it legal to pull from the authority of PA 302 while somehow sidestepping PA 390? Or is that the point of 30.417 - does that clause prevent the duration restrictions in PA 390 from amending anything in PA 302? In that case I would like to know what the value of those restrictions in PA 390 is.


texts: Do websites need to notify users when PP and TOS are cosmetically changed?

texts:
Websites are supposed to notify their users if the Terms of Service or Privacy Policy are changed. What if the meaning remains the exact same, and only the syntax, spelling, etc are changed?

Here are a few examples to illustrate my point:

"Userz are required to submit a password." => "Users are required to submit a password."
"Information includes your email, password, and username." => "Information includes your email, password and username."
"We will record your IP address so we can track your activity so we can make our services better." => "Your IP address will be recorded so we can track your activity on the Website. This is so we can improve our services."

Would all/some/none of these require a notification to users? My server is located in Minnesota, USA.


texts: Is it legal for an employer to charge an employee for lost equipment?

texts:
I work for a hospital in Alberta, Canada.

As part of our job, we're required to use a walkie-talkie-like device called a Vocera Badge. Over the course of the last few years that we've been using them, we've lost 5 badges, and they cost about $500 each.

Recently we got a new batch of the latest model to replace our old ones and were informed by management that if any of us lose one, we'll be responsible for the cost of replacing it.

Is it legal for an employer to require the use of equipment and make employees financially responsible for it?


texts: Does GDPR cover the collection of data by websites that crawl the web and resell user data

texts:
I have found that a lot of my personal info is now available on a bunch of websites that collect data and resell it.
I'm talking about those 'find anything about anyone' websites.

A lot of the data is also inaccurate.

Since a lot of these companies are American and I have lived my life half US / half EU and I'm now an EU resident, I was wondering:

does the GDPR applies to them?
does the GDPR applies to data they claim was 'public', but I see that this is not really true?
What's the responsibility of search engines, like Google, in indexing and promoting that content. As they seem to have a 'contact the webmaster' approach to it, is it possible to get the content (at the minimum the inacurate one) removed from their index?


texts: Can a school be sued for getting rid of spring break? (Is scheduling classes on Passover or other religious holidays discrimination?)

texts:
In most schools in the US, there's a "spring break" or "spring recess" that coincides with Passover. It is my understanding that under Jewish law, Jews can't attend classes during Passover or certain other holidays. However, there seems to be a trend towards eliminating spring recess from school schedules, and I can't shake the feeling that this is discriminatory and illegal as it would put Jewish students at a disadvantage.

Under United States federal law, would requiring students to attend classes during religious holidays constitute discrimination, exposing the school to liability under civil rights laws? What if the school provided make-up work for students who cannot attend classes but otherwise held classes during such holidays? (Answers that cover this from a federal standpoint are preferred, but if a state is required for an answer, assume New York.)


texts: How to legally distribute the data of all Internet websites?

texts:
We are a humble startup that's very good at Internet crawling and data mining. Unfortunately after 2 years of struggling, we may soon fail.

We have lots of data and we want to release them free before we go under. However as our data collections are so massive, downloading from our servers won't be a good option. Even P2P downloading would cost massive amount of bandwidth and time. It's much more efficient to just send the data in storage devices such as USB drives or discs to the users.

As you can see from here, we currently have 1,287 web sites crawled and mined with all their data semantically extracted and constantly updated in our cloud. An example data set from one of the sites is like this, well structured with both texts and images.

Eventually we would have hundreds of thousands or even millions of websites collected. We would have PBs of data in our cloud which we will need to distribute to the fellow users.

We have to charge for a fee for this, e.g. for the storage devices and shipping, etc.

We are not merchandising the data which are not copyrighted by us, of course, but we have to charge a fee for all other things that went into it. And we will properly attribute each data set to the original website.

My question is can we do this legally? Is it possible at all to distribute all the data of the Internet this way?


texts: How to confer residency rights without tenancy?

texts:
I am buying a large house which has an existing owner who is a very old man and I would like to give him the right to continue to live in the house, but not have the same rights as a tenant (exclusive use). In other words, I would be able to say which rooms he could or could not use and so forth. So, he would be more like my guest than my tenant.

Is there some kind of legal status for a relationship like this?


texts: Is there, in any jurisdiction, an hybrid between the "loser pays" rule and the "american rule"?

texts:
Spawned from this question: is there any jurisdiction which implements an hybrid between the "loser pays" and the "american rules", concerning who pays the legal fees?

I understand it would be very complicated to design a good system to deal with such a situation, but given that both systems have very bad downsides, I'd also be quite surprised if nobody tried to.


texts: What happens to a license if the licensor sells the rights?

texts: If party A purchases a software license from party B, and party B sells all of its rights relating to the software, what happens to the license party A has? Must the new owner still honer the agreement? When party B sells the rights, must they inform the purchaser that such a license exists? For example could it happen that party C, the new owner of the rights, finds party A using their software and considers it stolen, but then party A is able to prove they received a license from party B. What's the best way party A can protect itself?


texts:
I've noticed that Steam has recently added this bit of text to its review and confirm page:

  By clicking the button below to proceed you agree that Valve provides you immediate access to digital content as soon as you complete your purchase, without waiting the 14-day withdrawal period. Therefore, you expressly waive your right to withdraw from this purchase.

To me that translates to "I waive my statutory rights that have been granted to me by the EU", which, to my knowledge cannot be done. So does this paragraph have any legal bearing within the EU (I know this practice is commonplace in the States)?

Thanks in advance!

Note: Steam has recently begun allowing refunds within 14 days for faulty products with a few caveats, whether or not this is a result of a legal challenge or not I don't know.


texts: What to do if seller sends more than ordered?

texts:
I recently ordered one volume of sheet music online from a boutique publisher in The Netherlands that only accepts orders via email (I'm located in Sweden). My email clearly stated a single product title along with the product code.

When I received the order, they had sent me two volumes along with an invoice for both.

What should I do?

Keep both volumes but only pay for the volume I ordered?
Keep the volume I want and return the other, discounting the amount I pay with what it costs me to return the other volume? I'm really annoyed that I would have to go to this trouble.
Something else?

I already emailed them again pointing out their error and asking what I should do (left open without suggesting a solution), but didn't receive a reply. Neither did I receive an order confirmation in the first place. My email records show that I have emailed them twice more in the past inquiring about publications but never received a response to those either...

Two more issues: the volume I wanted is at a higher price on the invoice than on their website (by 49 eurocents), and the shipping was probably more expensive than would have been for a single volume.


texts: Any recourse for a rental under lengthy maintenance that impacts my use of said rental?

texts:
I'm renting half of a duplex, and for the past two-three months the roof, siding, and balcony have been in they process of being replaced. Contractors show up with no warning, including Saturdays. Sometimes nobody shows up for a week, so i have no idea when someone will be here. I came out of the shower one Saturday to find people removing the door in my bedroom to my balcony! I'm also expected to not park in my driveway this entire time, and my garage is often blocked. I have asked repeatedly to be told a schedule in advance, but they never do.

In addition to that, the contractors have  killed most of my landscaping, broke my walkway lights, leave garbage everywhere, and overall make my yard completely unusable. i came home one day to find most everything that had been hanging on my (interior) walls on the floor, mostly in pieces. I still haven't been able to safely hang anything back up.

My windows and glass doors are without insulation, so they block sound and insulate about as well as an open window. The gaps around then have also let in many pests. There are lots of other issues, such as drywall screws that have popped out, no porch lights for months, no access to balcony, knocked out internet, and so on.

I understand that landlords need to maintain their property, and I'm supportive of that. However, surely they have some duty to minimize the impact on tenants? They can't just drag it out for months, prevent using half the property, and expect me to pay full rent all the while, can they?

So my question is how can I get the landlord to finish the maintenance in a timely manner, keep me appraised of the schedule, and compensate me for not being able to use the property I've been paying for? Is it even possible? Am I being unreasonable?


texts: In New South Wales, does the proportion of rent paid by co-tenants affect their legal rights?

texts: If a co-tenant on a property (answers would preferably address residential cases, but commercial cases would be acceptable also) pays more rent than another, are they legally entitled to, for instance, more income from the sale of shared belongings? Would they be legally liable for more, if the tenants were penalised for some private nuisance?


texts: Is Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) classified as an internship or as professional training under US law?

texts: How does US law define "internship" and "professional training"? In particular, are US REU programs considered to be internships or professional training programs?


texts: Canadian Equivalent to 18 USC 1831/1832/1837?

texts:
I was wondering if any of you know the closest act/statute that is equivalent to 18 USC 1831/1832/1837? These sections all relate to the theft of trade secrets and in the US, it is considered to be a criminal charge.

In Canada, trade secrets are a civil offense, and I was wondering what would be the exact equivalent? I know of the Uniform Trade Secrets Act and the Security of Information Act, which are I assume are extremely similar to 18 USC 1831/1832/1837. Would they be equivalent? As in, if you stole trade secrets in Canada, would you be prosecuted under these acts or something?


texts: I'm Irish but have an English birth cert. What are my rights regarding dual citizenship and getting an English passport?

texts:
I'm an Irish citizen and passport holder, and both my parents are Irish, and I've lived in Ireland pretty much my whole life.
But, I was born in London. My parents were living and working there in the late 80's/early 90's, and then I was born. They returned to Ireland within a couple months. Because of this, my birth cert is English.
Around 2015 I smelled Brexit coming and wanted to future-proof my option to live and work in England in the event of the Ireland/UK common travel area ending. I remember ringing some English dept. (Maybe the passport office? I don't remember) and being told that I was not entitled to a passport or dual citizenship on the sole basis of being born in London. When I answered her question about my parents, and told her neither of them are English, she was instantly dismissive.
In hindsight, I'm skeptical that the woman was telling me the truth, because from what I've observed in the media, birth certs are meaningful and powerful legal docs when it comes to being entitled to live and work in a country, getting a passport, dual citizenship etc. But I was only 20 at the time, so I took her word for it and forgot about it.
Now that Brexit has happened, it looks like the Ireland/UK common travel area is to be maintained, so I'll ultimately have nothing to worry about. But I just want to know for sure what my rights are regarding the following:

Getting an English passport
Getting dual citizenship
Was the lady being truthful?
If I were from a 3rd country, would my birth cert be enough to allow me to live and work in the UK? (ex. common travel area)


texts: Can a person start new businesses to compete relentlessly with someone they hate?

texts:
Let's take two people, Alice and Bob. Alice offends Bob in some way and Bob is determined to take revenge. He does this by starting new businesses to compete with Alice, e.g. if Alice owns a restaurant, he starts a new restaurant nearby, sells similar food, and sells it more cheaply (because he's willing to take a loss to get revenge, and he has the resources to sustain the loss). If Alice moves locations, he moves too. If Alice switches businesses, he switches too.
Is it legal for Bob to do this kind of thing? If it violates a law, which one would it be?
This kind of behavior sounds obnoxious enough that I'm guessing it is illegal, but I can't find a law that prohibits it. It doesn't seem like harassment, since Bob isn't humiliating or embarrassing Alice. It doesn't seem like unfair competition, because presumably once Bob achieves his aim of driving Alice out of business, he won't raise prices to unreasonable levels, in fact he'd probably shut up shop too. I'm tagging the question with "harassment" and "competition" anyway, since I can't think of anything else.
If the jurisdiction matters, assume the EU. If the country matters, assume Germany.


texts: Is it possible for a tenant to sue a land lord for harm caused by mold

texts:
Take a case where the mould is caused by an identifiable maintenance issue such as a leaky pipe . The tenant does everything they can to minimise the harm done by the mould. But health issues are caused by the mould

Could damages be claimed? what would be required to claim damages? Are there precedents?

I'm mostly interested in Australia


texts: What is actually provided for by the "automatic additional driver" that a spouse gets in a rental car agreement in Oregon?

texts:
I have seen many sources that mention states (such as Oregon) that automatically allow spouses to be additional drivers on rental vehicles, including this one from Enterprise Rent-A-Car itself:

https://www.enterprise.com/en/help/faqs/additional-driver.html

"Note: State law in California, Illinois, Missouri, Nevada, Oregon and Wisconsin allows a spouse to be an automatic authorized driver provided they meet minimum age and driver's license requirements"

But upon trying to rent a car from Dollar, I was told that spouses had to pay the additional driver fee, like anyone else.

So I tried to find the law, and found:

https://www.oregonlaws.org/ors/646A.140

But this only allows spouses to automatically be added to the CDW for rental cars.  As far as I can tell, this means if you don't get the CDW, then the spouse isn't automatically added, and the if the spouse gets into an accident, the rental contract could be voided, which could mean that the personal driver's insurance they may have may not actually cover the accident.

Am I reading this right, and all the sources about automatic additional drivers on the net (including Enterprise) are wrong??


texts:
I've heard before that some Lawyers in USA offer to defend people against big companies and they ask only for a percentage of the compensation (if they get any), otherwise they don't take any other fees.

Usually that happens (as per the source that I don't remember) for ridiculous reasons because these lawyers are trying to get business.

But for other people who even have good reasons to raise the lawsuit, how can they find a good recognizable lawyer in the USA to do this (if they are not from the USA)?


texts: Would it be a crime to take goods in a supermarket and pay by leaving cash to a random employee?

texts: Let's say you're in a supermarket on the day before Christmas and there's a huge 20-person line to each register. Assuming you knew exactly how much the goods in your cart are worth, would it be a crime to leave said amount of money to a random employee (e.g. the information desk) and then just proceed to leave? By "crime" I refer to a situation where you can be charged with theft.


texts: Do I need permission to perform an academic research on a video game?

texts:
I am preparing myself to get into a masters program, and I will have a video game as the topic of my dissertation. The game will be analyzed in its entirety, i.e., combat mechanics, balance between heroes, player-rating system, and etc..

My question is, do I need the permission of the company that developed the game to perform that research? Or could I perform the research without the permission, granted that all the data, the dissertation, programming code, and etc., are made available?

I will not be using the source code from the game, nor anything related to the product itself. The whole thing will be based on models representing aspects of the game.

Edit to answer comment: the code mentioned above will be a part of the models, it will not be taken from the video game, but written by myself for the dissertation.


texts: After exchange of contracts in property purchase, what happens if someone has COVID-19 on the completion date?

texts:
Say I am selling my home to a buyer and also purchasing a house from someone, and the chain of sales goes no further than this (for the sake of simplicity). All house sales are in the UK, where you agree on a date of completion (date of move) and exchange contracts prior to completion to make this legally binding. If anyone pulls out of the process after exchange of contracts, then there is a contract breach, and this can be particularly problematic for a buyer pulling out. An answer here suggests some of the potential knock-on effects of not completing a property transaction after exchange of contract.
At the current moment in time, the UK government has guidelines that instruct people to isolate for 10 days upon suspicion of COVID-19 symptoms or a positive COVID-19 test. From the government, it suggests you risk a £1000 fine for breaching self-isolation (as far as I can gather from the website. I'm unsure if there are further penalties).
Let's say we get to 5 days before the transaction completion date stated in the contracts, and the person at the top of the chain (the person I am buying from) makes me aware that they have got a positive test for COVID-19 and have to self-isolate for the 10 day period. This would overlap with the completion date set out in the contract and mean that they can no longer complete on that date if they are to follow government guidelines.
Now, I presume that all parties can mutually agree to either ignore the date (complete but remain put where they are) or rescind the contracts and set a new completion date. However, can someone in the chain refuse to do this and force through the completion date despite the COVID-19 guidelines? As an example, could the people purchasing my property just say they don't really care about my purchasing transaction and still want the completion date honoured? Would I have good legal standing to refuse them based on the circumstances, or would I still be liable to a lawsuit if I refuse the transaction?


texts: How to determine if statutory interpretation in a court opinion dictum or holding?

texts:
Recently I was looking at a case in the Federal courts that was appealed, then reversed and remanded back to the District trial court that first heard the case.

I'm interested in a passage from the original (1998) opinion that appears to interpret a statute:

  However, "visitor enjoyment" as used in the statute refers to visitor enjoyment of park scenery, wildlife, and natural and historic objects that are to be preserved. As used in this sense, visitor enjoyment does not refer to visitor enjoyment of outdoor recreational activities.

In the original opinion would this passage be considered legal holding? If so, did it survive the process of being remanded?


texts: Can Landlord Make Changes To Apartment Fee Policy In A Memo?

texts:
I'm running into some difficulty with the new property manager for my apartment complex in Washington state.

I broke one of the rules that weren't ever enforced in the past five years I lived here. I knew what the rule was, it was in the contract. I was notified of the infraction in letter stuck in my door. I was told I had 10 days to correct the issue before I got evicted.

A few months later, I get a call from the property manager "kindly reminding" me that I owed $75. They told me it was part of a "service fee" of $25 dollars that had been accruing since I was originally notified of the infraction. They wanted to "help" remind me so that I could pay it before they had to charge me another fee for not paying the accrued amount.

The fee wasn't mentioned in the original note. Supposedly it had been delivered by the same means at a later date. I did not get this note so the call was a surprised to me. I checked the contract and verified that it didn't mention anything regarding a fee (An accruing fee with late charges would have stood out to me, I read the whole thing). It wasn't until I mentioned the contract that the manager dropped the fee altogether and apologized.

I guess I'm not the only tenant that caught on to this because yesterday everyone at the apartments got a note informing them that they would implement a service fee of $25. Can a property manager circumvent the contract by leaving a memo at a tenants door?

I'm not entirely sure where this question belongs. As they can pretty much hold my credit score hostage I thought I might try posting it here.


texts: How can a country reclaim money held in Swiss bank(s)?

texts:
Suppose, a 3rd world country X had a corrupt/autocratic government in the 90's. Politicians embezzled a lot of public money and deposited them in various banks in Switzerland.

In the 2010's, that government is replaced by a democratically elected and popular government.

How can X's new government bring back that money from Switzerland?


texts: Is the restriction on receiving a "present" in the Emoluments Clause applicable?

texts:
The Emolument Clause:

  No Title of Nobility shall be granted by the United States: And no Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them, shall, without the Consent of the Congress, accept of any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State.

The part about receiving a title from a King, Prince... is clear enough; the question is about the receiving a "present".

Is a "present" a "thing of value" not paid for at fair value?

Is a thing of value a well defined legal concept when dealing with immaterial goods and ideas?

What is fair value? Can immaterial goods ever have a defined, measurable fair value?

Is an honor a "gift"? Can a US President receive the honor (not money) of a Nobel prize?


texts: Can a store take my bag when it contains both my and their property?

texts: I've had my bag snatched from me before I've even got anywhere near till point (cash register). They told me to leave because I'm barred. They won't let me in to get my bag, and they still have it. How can I get my property back?


texts: Is owning leaked databases illegal in the US?

texts: I would like to start collecting leaked databases, but is it illegal to own them, even if they're public?


texts:
I recently moved from a townhouse where I used Waste Management for my trash and recycling pick up. The apartment I moved into takes care of trash so last month I canceled the service, got a phone confirmation, and even took the extra step of removing my payment information from the website.
What I see in the online portal is:

All services are not showing and section is greyed out, autopay shows enroll option showing I unenrolled, and is grayed out to reflect no services available for autopay. And further, probably more importantly here, in the manage payment methods section:

Clearly no payment method saved.
Both of these views on the website have shown me this for weeks. Now in this case I'm assuming it's a software bug. I've already cleared it up with Waste Management (customer service rep looked into it, said it showed me still in auto pay on their system, took it out and refunded the extra charge that let me find out this was happening. Another set of bugs in that even if I was enrolled in autopay, if there are no services scheduled, it shouldn't be billed anyway, but less relevant here). Hopefully not too much background... I assumed when I deleted my saved credit card numbers they were no longer available to Waste Management in anyway, yet clearly they were saved in another capacity to continually be used like this.
Is it legal for a business to store and use my payment information in a way that I can't edit, remove, or otherwise control?


texts: Can a medical practitioner legally charge health insurances a different amount from what it would charge a non-insured patient?

texts:
In the United States, can a medical practitioner legally  charge health insurances a different amount from what it would charge a non-insured patient?

I am mostly interested for in the states of California, Florida, and Massachusetts.


texts: Damage, or normal wear and tear on a rental?

texts:
Our landlord is claiming damage on some cabinet doors, and wants to completely replace them. We're trying to figure out if we can challenge him on it.

Note that the pictures shown here still showed the childproof locks. These were later removed cleanly except for one which removed a bit of finish. Anyway, the landlord isn't complaining about those spots, but about the scuffs you can see in these images—specially the ones in the curved bathroom vanity doors.


texts: How does a preliminary hearing differ from a full trial?

texts:
Apparently "preliminary hearings" are to determine whether or not the defendant should be sent to Superior Court for a "full" trial. (My "source" for this is "Perry Mason.")

What exactly is a "preliminary hearing"? Is it a "halfway house" between say, a grand jury indictment and a trial? Or given the sequence of arrest and "preliminary hearing," is it the grand jury indictment process itself?


texts: How do you interpret: option to break after 12 months with at least 2 months’ notice

texts:
"option to break after 12 months with at least 2 months’ notice"

In my opinion, the sentence above can be interpreted as follows:

1) the agreement can be broken at least 12 months after inception date. In our case, the agreement starts June 1st 2019 and hence the agreement cannot be broken before May 31st 2020.

2) Would we wanna break the agreement, we need to give a 2 months notice before ending the agreement. Example: if we wanna leave Sept 1st 2020, we need to inform you/the landlord latest June 31st 2020.

Both conditions 1 and 2 have to be fulfilled. The two conditions are inclusive.


texts:
This question relates to UK law.

If I have a joint mortgage with another person, is it possible to let out that property without that person's explicit consent?  The specific case that I'm thinking of is where the second party no longer contributes to the mortgage, and does not live at the property.  If so, would I be liable for a portion of the income?


texts: US Criminal law - what if the appeal moves blame from one defendant to another?

texts:
Suppose two people, A and B, are accused of some criminal activity, and the court decides that A is to blame, while B is blameless.

Now, suppose that A knows that B is the one to blame, while he is innocent, and appeals. (B does not participate in the appeal because he was found innocent)

Suppose the court agrees and decides that B was the crime's actual perpetrator and removes the blame from A. Could they both be set free?


texts: Who is to examine the witness who is the self-represented plaintiff or prosecutor?

texts:
Bob is a self-represented plaintiff in a civil case (or, say, private prosecutor in a criminal case). He is also a witness. If the trial is judge-alone aka bench (not jury), he is able to conduct it himself.
At the hearing/trial, Bob (in his capacity as the plaintiff/prosecutor) says:

Your Honour, I call myself.

— and goes to the witness box to be examined by... himself.
Now what? Does he ask himself questions and give answers? Or does he just make statements of fact?
(Any common law jurisdiction)


texts: Is there a way to let users of an audio editor web application upload audio files (music, most likely), without copyright infringement?

texts:
I assume, in case of a desktop app, the author of the software doesn't have to take responsibility for the software being used with pirated music, if all files are stored on the users computer.

However, I don't see how one could create an audio editor in the form of a web application, where people can log in, upload audio files, edit them, and save their work (edited audio), and possibly share their work.

One way of doing this I assume, would be to let users edit the music that authors/content owners upload or allow to upload, which doesn't seem too realistic, unless you are Spotify or Apple.


texts: What happens if husband and wife want to give their surnames to a child and won't compromise?

texts:
What surname child will be given if mother and father cannot compromise on it? Let's say woman kept her surname after marriage.Child was born and now both want this child to carry their surnames. They do not want double surname and don't agree on that (e.g sounds weird , etc). What happens to a child's surname in this case? How would this be resolved?

I am talking primarily about US.


texts: Is it illegal to influence an on-line poll by creating false responses?

texts:
We don't know enough of the details of the current news reports that Michael Cohn hired a contractor to cause an online poll to report incorrect results.

If the mechanism of this deception was the creation of thousands of imposter responses to the online poll, is this illegal?

And if so, is Cohn potentially an accessory?

Linkshere and here

But the focus of my question has nothing to do with elections or possible campaign law violation. Please confine responses to the deception (or rigging) of a poll by creating imposter responses. My question could just as easily be relative to public vote rigging in Dancing with the Stars or similar contests that have some reliance on call-in or internet voting.


texts:
I work for a company based in Massachusetts but I work off site in Connecticut. I rent an office to work from in the town where I live because I don't have adequate space for a home office.

Recently, the town tax appraiser became aware of my existence and concluded that I am a taxable business. The result was they decided I personally had $9000 worth of taxable business assets and sent me an assessment notice. That number is ridiculously wrong but I don't want to dispute amounts. I don't believe I'm taxable at all.

A phone call to the tax assessor's office resulted in the conclusion that my only option is to file an assessment appeal.

Well, my appeal would be something along the lines of "I am not a business. I'm just an employee paying for office space and I'm therefore not taxable."

But when I plow through the CT tax statutes, I can't find the definition of who is actually taxable as a business. There's just too much law there.

How can I figure out whether my intended defense works? Paying for legal advice will certainly be more expensive than the taxes involved, so that's not an option.


texts: India: What happens when flat buyers not interested in claims but in flat's registry? How can IRP help in that?

texts:
A person purchases a flat and pays 100% of the flat's value including all other formalities. In return, the builder provides possession but not the registry.

What's next? The Buyer is not interested in money but registry.


texts: Lawyer forgot to file the paperwork and now has no case: what to do?

texts:
A close friend of mine had a legitimate suit against a large business.  He was directly harmed, the business was caught and punished (for harming him and many other clients), and my friend joined a group lawsuit against this business.

The lawyer running the lawsuit met with my friend and told him, "Sorry but I forgot to file your case in time.  There's nothing I can do.  The statute of limitations is up for you."  It's a little more involved in that but I don't understand legalese.  That is the gist.  The lawyer was nice and apologized but this seems like a real bad deal for my friend.  Everyone else in the case still moves forward, only my friend is out.

Is my friend completely out of luck?


texts: Does this conduct amount to any actionable judicial bias?

texts:
Bob takes Rob to the court which sets a date for the first hearing 12 January 2021.
Rob's lawyer from lawfirm X applies for adjournment of the hearing a few weeks later for reason Y.
Bob objects and articulates why reason Y does not stand. All this happens via email communication with the court's clerk.
Then, a judge, without any advance notice, considers the adjournment application alone in chambers and delivers decision out of the blue in which, although her Honour accepts Bob's reasoning re reason Y failing, nevertheless grants the adjournment application because...

"the officers of X will be closed from December 23rd 2020 to 18th January 2021. The   defendant is entitled to legal representation."

When Bob questions how/when the court became aware of the particular dates for the X's Christmas break, the court clerk replies:

Judge ****** who granted the application for adjournment was already aware of when the defence counsel offices were closing etc from previous matters that she has dealt with.

That is, the judge comes up with a whole new argument in Rob's favour which not only at no point was communicated on notice for Bob to address it, but also was something that the judge knew about Rob's lawyer outside of the proceeding.
Minor magnitude of the matter aside, does the judge's conduct amount to any bias that could be actioned upon (e.g. recusal)?
(Any jurisdiction with adversarial system)


texts: How can I prove that my bike is mine? (Germany)

texts:
I have a bike. I got it as a gift from my (then) girlfriend.

I have absolutely no papers from it.

However, in the case of a later legal dispute, I may need to somehow prove it is mine, both in a criminal and a civil law sense.

What could I do?


texts: Who, at a company, is allowed to release code under (open source) license?

texts:
Suppose I wanted to release some code I wrote for my employer as an open source project, who at the company would be allowed to do that in the eyes of the law?

I ask about open source, but I suppose the question is more general than that: who is allowed to license work that a company owns?

My first thought is that the owner would have to do that, but then I realized that many companies don't have sole owners, and people in the company (such as managers) buy/sell assets that the company owns all the time, so it seems that employees have certain authorities to manage company property. How does that work with intellectual property?


texts: Would writing a contract for two people be considered the "practice of law"?

texts:
Suppose I draw up an agreement between two persons that makes no reference to statutory law.  I'll give some examples below.  Would that constitute the "practice of law"?

Let's say I write a contract for two people that says

Example 1 "Person A will allow Person B to keep his nuisance tree if Person B allows Person A to walk across Person B's lawn to get to his mail box."

Examples 2 "Person A will allow Person B to use Person A's swimming pool if Person B will allow Person A to blast loud music after 10pm."

Suppose I charged a dollar to write these contracts.  Would that constitute the practice of law?

If not, when does it become the practice of law?  When the money becomes bigger?  When the stipulations state that there are penalties?  What?


texts: When can you file a lawsuit against a "parody" website?

texts:
Hypothetically speaking, if someone were to make a website about 4 different lawyers and 2 different firms and promote it as a parody website using elements of breaking bad, better call saul, etc.
Assuming statements are either based on objective facts or in reference to pop culture for comedic reasons:
What grounds would those lawyers have to sue you?
What legal precedent exists on either end?


texts: Who owns the intellectual property of a contractor employed by another company?

texts:
Suppose the following hypothetical situation occurring within the United States of America.

Startup Sam wishes to contract Contractor Bob to invent a widget. Startup Sam and Contractor Bob agree, and state on their contract, that Startup Sam will own the intellectual property rights to the widget upon completion of the project.

Unbeknownst to Startup Sam, Contractor Bob is currently employed by Company X. As part of the terms of employment, Contractor Bob agreed to an intellectual property clause which states that Company X will own the intellectual property of all inventions by Contractor Bob (whether or not they were produced on or off company hours/premises).

In this scenario, would Startup Sam still own the intellectual property rights to the widget invented by Contractor Bob, or would Company X own it?


texts: Comparison portal is allowed to copy the product descriptions from manufacturer?

texts:
For a comparison portal, that just lists and compares the products developed by others, it is allowed to copy the product description and the product tehnical details from the official website of the manufacturer?

Thank you!

Best regards


texts: question regarding contractual liability

texts: suppose company A gets raw material from company B to produce final product which is to be delivered to the company C by company A. if company B fails to provide material because of which company A cannot fulfill the order of company C, will company B be liable for loss incurred by company A because of the repudiation of contract between company A and C? and what the bare essentials used?


texts: Q about consequences of a software license amendment regarding patents: Facebook's open-source "react"

texts:
UPDATE 22 Sep, 2017

"Relicensing React, Jest, Flow, and Immutable.js" (MIT license, PATENT file removed)

https://code.facebook.com/posts/300798627056246/relicensing-react-jest-flow-and-immutable-js/

First, I'm not asking about the actual open source license, the situation is clear enough there. It is about an additional component about patents. It is about Facebook's open source project "react" (but actually all their open source projects, they all share that same "patent text").

You can find license and "patent clause" here (file names LICENSE and PATENTS): https://github.com/facebook/react/ - the important one being PATENTS.

This has already been discussed very thoroughly in many forums and blog posts, for example

Your license to use React.js can be revoked if you compete with Facebook
How do you deal with the React patent / licensing issue?
Why I'm not a React Native Developer (only the small part of the text under headline "Patently daunting")

I have read many of those discussions, but I have two questions that were not answered there. The first one ist just a confirmation of my understanding of a situation that the majority of those who posted in discussions don't face:

Is my interpretation of how this may apply in my situation seems correct?
How does that compare to open source projects without a patent clause?

To 1) (less important, just confirmation)

While the majority opinion seems to be "it does not matter" I think it does matter to some companies. I for example work for a startup that relies on patents (not on software itself but on methods/algorithms, like the MPEG4 patents).

If I interpret this correctly, if we use any of Facebook's open source projects Facebook can violate our patents pretty much with impunity: If we try to sue them we lose the right to patents covering their open source projects. So basically we cannot use their stuff.

To 2) (my main question)

I have read opinions that other open source projects that don't have such a clause, for example those from Microsoft or Google, nevertheless have the exact same problem, only that it isn't explicitly stated. Is that true? Is my situation not any better when I only use open source projects without such a clause?

EDIT: A recent anecdote: WordPress to ditch React library over Facebook patent clause risk. I hadn't known that "the patent clause ... was recently added to the Apache Software Foundation’s (ASF) list of disallowed licenses". Quite a few interesting links in that article too.

Another issue was raised in a comment: If you use React in a product, commercial or free, and you lose permission because of a dispute, how does that affect your users? Will they have to stop using your product now too?


texts: Is revision history (audit/change log) compliant with GDPR's right to rectification?

texts:
Assume, there's a model called CustomerDetails, which contains the following properties:

ContactEmail - an email address for contacting purposes,
ContactAddress - a postal address for contacting purposes,
DefaultDeliveryAddress - default address for delivery when creating orders,
DefaultInvoiceAddress - default address to be printed on invoice, when creating orders,
and other properties.

All entities in the system are by default audited, ie. they contain change log / revisions history.

Any user can change own CustomerDetails data by himself/herself.

If user changes that information via web-interface, then what is correct:

there can be no trace of previous information: no revisions history for the CustomerDetails entity, or
there must be a possibility to delete own revisions for user: extra user interface to view+delete revisions, or
there is only obligation to delete revisions of CustomerDetails, if Right to erasure (‘right to be forgotten’) is exercised?


texts: What does "actual knowledge" mean in the context of DMCA safe harbors?

texts:
According to 17 U.S. Code § 512 - Limitations on liability relating to material online (emphasis mine):

A service provider shall not be liable for monetary relief, or, except as provided in subsection (j), for injunctive or other equitable relief, for infringement of copyright by reason of the storage at the direction of a user of material that resides on a system or network controlled or operated by or for the service provider, if the service provider—
(A)
(i) does not have actual knowledge that the material or an activity using the material on the system or network is infringing;
(ii) in the absence of such actual knowledge, is not aware of facts or circumstances from which infringing activity is apparent; or
(iii) upon obtaining such knowledge or awareness, acts expeditiously to remove, or disable access to, the material;

Is "actual knowledge" the same thing that's detailed in paragraph (3) "Elements of notification"? Or does it refer to something else? In either case, has the interpretation been tested in court?


texts: How do you collect evidence to sue for robocalling?

texts:
What's the best way to collect evidence to be prepared to sue for robocalling like in King v Time Warner Cable, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, No. 14-02018 (conclusion in html / order and opinion denying stay and granting summary judgement in pdf)?

It appears that in this case, there wasn't much dispute as to the facts (still, as a customer, where do you get the information as to the number of missed calls?), however, what if the business objects to the data you provide?  Do you just give your statements under penalty of perjury?

Also, why was this case heard in NYC, the headquarters of TWC, even though they certainly must have had sufficient ties with El Paso, Texas, where the plaintiff is based.


texts: Is exploiting a malfunctioning self-service checkout theft?

texts:
Hypothetically, if a self-service checkout at my local Tesco were to be malfunctioning and selling items for half-price, and if someone were to exploit this to buy cheap goods, would this be considered theft under UK law?
In the Theft Act 1968:

A person is guilty of theft if he dishonestly appropriates property belonging to another with the intention of permanently depriving the other of it.

Does the purchase of goods at half the marked price constitute dishonest appropriation? An argument that it doesn't might be that the self-service checkout has authorized the purchase and the requested amount has been paid, thus there is no dishonesty involved.
However, the checkout is obviously not intended to operate this way, and the price shown by the checkout obviously doesn't match that of the displayed price in the shop. Does this mean that by knowingly still buying goods like this, the purchaser is being dishonest?


texts: A deceased signed a car loan on behalf of a relative with poor credit- what happens?

texts:
Albert signed a car loan on behalf of his son, Bob as Bob had poor credit. Bob drove the car and paid the repayments, though was not mentioned on the loan.
Albert dies.
What rights does the bank have at this point. Can they repossess the car?
What are Bob's options if he wants to keep the car? Can he offer to take on the loan? If the bank doesn't want this to happen, can he force them?
What is the executor of the estate to do? The executor is concerned that the bank will repossess the car, and then pay the car off with the sale of his fathers house.


texts: Can a company take donations in lieu of investments and avoid SEC regulation?

texts:
Can a company issue "shares" that have no right to equity based on donations?

This might sound like a weird question but the application is using the ethereum blockchain to create Tokens which would be given to people who donate to the company and would not be traditional shares as there would be no right to dividends or equity.


texts: Can I use Facebook Chat Plugin without asking GDPR consent?

texts: My webpage has no analytics because I don't want to show the GDPR consent popup to users. Would I violate GDPR if I integrate the Facebook Chat Plugin without adding the GDPR consent popup?


texts: Public WiFi - when do you have to delete stored user data?

texts:
Note: I originally thought of this for germany, but if you have examples from other countries those are also welcome, since im interested in the topic in general.

So lets say im using a public WiFi, no matter where - either at a train station, or a hotel, or a company im visiting. At least in Germany, there will always be a User Agreement presented to you in some way, and it will always say that certain data about the user is stored for a certain amount of time, according to law - but this time is never specified, and i do not know what law is refered to! (example from here, paragraph 6, second block (just google translate it and youll see))

So i want to know - how long is the time period? I already know about certain laws for data storage for the topic of backup (because of work), but i do not know if this is affected by the same law. Any replies to the topic are welcome, thanks in advance!


texts: Can I share IP adresses of machine who attempted logins?

texts:
I started a small experiment. I put up a few servers on digital ocean and I started logging all the failed login attempts. They were numerable.

The dataset after a week is a fun one to play with. I'd love to use it in trainings or even share it on my blog. Is there any reason why I wouldn't be able to do this legally?

The dataset contains a datetimestamp, an ip adress, a username for the attempted login and the location of my server.


texts: How much control can US landlords have over a tenant's personal behavior in and outside of a dwelling?

texts:
I understand why it would be imoportant for Landlords to request certain information about employment and also to be allowed to establish rules like no smoking or no pets allwed in a dwelling. But I've noticed that some leasing advertisements have stipulations that seem to imply that they will not lease to certain people based on specific activities, even if they take place outside of the rental. And many lease applications, will ask for this kind information in advance without specifying how or if it will be used in tenant selection. For example, tobacco and e-cigarette use is often specifically mentioned in leases. I get that this could be justified as tobacco smoke lingers on a user etc. I'm just using it as an example because it's so common in lease agreements. I'm just curious how much control landlords can legally exert over a tenant's personal behaviors, in and out of a rental unit.
I know there is a small subset of protected classes that can't be used for tenant screening, like religion, age, race, family status, and maybe now sexual orientation. But are there any requirements for landlords to justify other exclusionary stipulations or requests for personal information? Or can a landlord legally refuse a tenant for any non-protected reason, including for activities that take place outside the rental property? Like, could they craft a lease in such a way that tenants could be unilaterally evicted if they were seen using a Juul in a public space, or having a beer at the pub? Could they theoretically make a hard and fast rule against all knitting and crochet in rental unit? Just trying to understand the theoretical limits of landlord control over tenants.


texts: Is it permitted to work as a freelancer on Upwork while studying in Germany?

texts:
Next April I am going to start a master program in Germany living on a student visa.

Currently I am working as a freelancer on Upwork. I know that in Germany it is not permitted for people on student visas to work as freelancers, but, to the best of my knowledge, it only applies if the source/destination of income is Germany.

In my case, the source of my income would be Poland and the destination would be Egypt. Does this prohibition apply to me?


texts: When I witness a theft, for example, a pickpocket in a busy RER, am I bound by law to report the theft? Am I required/protected by law to defend the victim/intervene in the act?


texts: What is the point of Devotion of All Working Time clauses?

texts:
In an employment contract I red:
Devotion of All Working Time: During your employment, you shall devote the whole of your work time, attention and abilities to your duties and shall give the Company the full benefit of your knowledge, expertise, ingenuity and technical skills.
I was told this is not to be construed as a non-compete clause.
I've seen similar clauses called Employee’s Devotion of Time, which I guess are the same thing. What's the point of such clauses? Can anyone give a simple example? I think what it's trying to say is an employee can't make money by performing another job at the same time they are on the clock for this job. I think it's rather assumed that an employee takes small intermittent breaks, so would this prohibit things like trading stocks? Or taking a (5 minute) phone call that relates to another job? What if it's passive, for example they bring their personal laptop to work to run a bitcoin miner?


texts: Do boxers have a different legal status if they get into fights in public?

texts: Do criminal prosecutors, or judges and juries, view charges or sentencing for fighting and/or injuring someone in public differently if the person facing the charges is a trained fighter like a professional boxer?


texts: Is it legal to depict public government buildings in a video game?

texts:
At my business, some people are deliberating about adding public government buildings to a level in our game. There are concerns about whether this is legal. I thought for sure I played games in the past which depict the White House, Capitol Hill, and other places in DC, but I can't recall them so I wasn't able to allay my colleagues' concerns.
They wanted to add buildings such as the White House, the Capitol Building, Lincoln Memorial, etc. Does depicting these buildings require some sort of caveat or legal disclaimer? We're not sure if, e.g., adding the White House might denote endorsement from the president. Or if adding the Supreme Court Building would suggest endorsement of the SCOTUS, etc.


texts: Are there any standards on the use of the title "esquire" in the United States?

texts:
For example, consider several cases:

Layperson with no formal legal education
Current law school student
Law school dropout
Graduated law school, but did not pass the bar
Passed the bar, but did not attend law school
Graduated law school, was admitted to the bar, but does not have an active license
Graduated law school, was admitted to the bar, and is an attorney in private practice
Graduated law school, was admitted to the bar, and is e.g. an attorney for the government
Graduated law school, was admitted to the bar, and is e.g. an engineer doing technical work rather than practicing law
Graduated law school, was admitted to the bar in a state other than the state where s/he is speaking (but not in the state where s/he is speaking)
Graduated law school, was admitted to the bar in a state other than the state where s/he is being heard (but not in the state where s/he is being heard)

I assume that only 4 and 6-11 are allowed to use "JD" after their names (but am not sure; answers can clarify that.)  Of the folks described above, who is customarily allowed to use "Esq." after their names?  Under what conditions, if any, would a person choose one or the other (or neither or both)?

If needed, feel free to distinguish between any formal requirements and what others experienced in practice would expect or find offensive.


texts: What is the "equitable rule of reason" in the fair use doctrine?

texts:
In Sony Corp. v. Universal City Studios, Inc., 464 U.S. 417 (1984), the Court decided that Sony's manufacturing and selling of VTR's did not infringe the copyrights of Universal Studios and Walt Disney. Recording TV broadcasts through the device for later viewing (a.k.a. "time-shifting") was considered a "fair use."

An excerpt from the Court opinion says,

  When these factors are all weighed in the "equitable rule of reason" balance, we must conclude that this record amply supports the District Court's conclusion that home time-shifting is fair use.

My question is, what is the exact definition of this "equitable rule of reason" and what is the legal basis for this doctrine?

Furthermore, how is this applied in Sony Corp. v. Universal City Studios, Inc. or other fair use cases?


texts: Illegal to view someone's private social media?

texts:
Say someone has set their  Instagram to private, or their Twitter to protect Tweets, etc.

Assume, somehow, someway I manage to bypass this without hacking their account.

Given that this may be against terms, would anything actually be against the law in doing this, given that I do not hack the person's account or any other accounts/servers in the process?


texts: Does the IRS have authority to extend the filing deadline?

texts:
Granted, they screwed up: yesterday was the deadline for filing income tax returns, and the IRS web site for e-filing crashed for half a day. Because of that crash, the Secretary of the Treasury has announced that the deadline has been extended by one day.

Does the IRS have the legal authority to make this change?


texts: how can civilan security personel do their jobs without risk of being guilty of assult or related crimes?

texts:
As I understand it assult can include the implied threat of using physical force against an individual, such as looming over someone, to compell them to do something.  I believe many US states also have related laws about harrassment, meancing, etc.

However, the job of security personel seems to be primarily to discourage activites by being present as deterent against such crimes.  Their mere presence is not a threat or assult of course, but if they are attempting to deterre someone from acting in negative manner the security personel would likely have to get close to the person and make demands that they leave or stop whatever activity their engaged in in a manner that could be considered a threat of force if they don't comply.

To go with a particular difficult example think of a bouncer at a bar.  More then most security personel a bouncers job is practically defined by their ability to loom.  My father owned a bar, and as he described it to me a good bouncer should be indentifying someone who's likely to cause an incident and basically pre-emptively start looming nearby them to remind the inebirated fellow that the bouncer is ready to use physical force if necessary in hopes of preventing a situation from occuring.  Likewise breaking up a minor fight often involves a good amount of getting between the two fighting and looking meanicing enough that no one want's to try to go around you.  Basically you want your bouncer to be able to meance people when a situation is esculating because it's a far safer way of preventing the esculation then allowing it to degreed to violence.

Is a bouncer, or other security individual, guilty of assult or related crime when they do something like this?  Does the fact that they are employed by a buisness with the explict task of keeping the peace give them any extra leeway with such actions?  Is the fact that they are trying to prevent/discourage other crimes give them more leeway?


texts: Many companies apply for multiple registrations for the same term and similar goods and services, is that worthwhile? For example, Starbucks owns dozens of registrations for "Starbucks" both as standard character marks and as stylized designs. It would seem that a single registration would already prevent others from using the name for related products and services. Why is it worthwhile to apply for many registrations for the same term in reference to similar goods and services?


texts: How to fulfill the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) when receiving emails

texts:
Suppose, a scientist is planning to publish a paper, and his email address will be printed on it. I'm wondering, if the European General Data Protection Regulation would be relevant in that case.

According to Article 13, one has to inform anyone whose personal data is collected:

  Where personal data relating to a data subject are collected from the data subject, the controller shall, at the time when personal data
  are obtained, provide the data subject with all of the following
  information: (...)

Article 4 explains, what "personal data" means:

  ‘personal data’ means any information relating to an identified or
  identifiable natural person (‘data subject’); an identifiable natural
  person is one who can be identified, directly or indirectly, in
  particular by reference to an identifier such as a name, an
  identification number, location data, an online identifier (...)

(Source: http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A32016R0679)

Mail addresses are probably personal data, and if someone writes an email to the contact address that's on the paper, his address (as well as the mail itself) will be stored in the email-account of the scientist. Therefore, personal data would be processed. Does the scientist have to inform about that (according to Article 13)? And how should he do that?


texts: Is it considered "Fair Use" to use multiple TV audio clips in a commercial product?

texts:
Say I take short audio clips from various TV shows and bundle them up into an application, would it be considered fair use or is that not allowed under copyright law or some other law? The final product will in no way resemble the original. (I am not going to be taking clips from a show to reassemble them back into the show. It will be something completely different.)

Is it still legal to make money off this?


texts: Is ”data breach” a correct way to describe the Facebook scandal?

texts:
I’m reading the words ”data breach” a lot in the Facebook Cambridge Analytica scandal context (example). But is this a correct way to describe the scandal?

The definition of data breach from the corresponding Wikipedia page is:

  A data breach is the intentional or unintentional release of secure or
  private/confidential information to an untrusted environment.

The definition of ”data breach” in 38 U.S. Code § 5727 (4) is:

  The term “data breach” means the loss, theft, or other unauthorized
  access, other than those incidental to the scope of employment, to
  data containing sensitive personal information, in electronic or
  printed form, that results in the potential compromise of the
  confidentiality or integrity of the data.

Two questions about this;

The first question is around the word: (un)intentionally. In the case of Facebook, the data was intentionally shared with third-party developers. Meaning that it would be a data breach following the Wikipedia definition but not following the definition as mentioned in 38 U.S. Code § 5727 (4). Which definition should be followed?
What would be the implications for Facebook if this is or isn’t a data breach?


texts: Is it possible for a publicly accessible, personal blog to make use of the personal use exception of the GDPR?

texts:
The GDPR Article 2 defines the material scope the regulation.  Article 2 (2)c states that this regulation does not apply to the processing of personal data:

  by a natural person in the course of a purely personal or household activity;

This sentence is known as the personal use exemption. When this was included in the GDPR, the drafters decided to keep the personal use exemption unchanged from the article 3(2) of Directive 95/46. (There as a lot of lobbying for removing "purely" from the sentence – but drafters wanted to keep it.)

There also an unofficial description in Recital 18, that say:

  (1) This Regulation does not apply to the processing of personal data by a natural person in the course of a purely personal or household activity and thus with no connection to a professional or commercial activity. (2) Personal or household activities could include correspondence and the holding of addresses, or social networking and online activity undertaken within the context of such activities. (3) However, this Regulation applies to controllers or processors which provide the means for processing personal data for such personal or household activities.

This says that you're not exempt for processing that has connection to a professional or commercial activity. But it is very ague on what makes you exempt.  Does "social networking" include maintaining your own blog, or are they only referring to your activities on Facebook and similar "social" media where you obviously are not the controller (the controller is who owns and runs the platform)?

A key question, partly arising from a lengthy discussion thread under the answer by @Greendrake in this related question, is whether this means that
a publicly accessible, personal blog is excluded from the scope of the GDPR?

To answer this question, one need to consider that the GDPR Article 4 definition 1 says that:

  ‘personal data’ means any information relating to an identified or identifiable natural person (‘data subject’); an identifiable natural person is one who can be identified, directly or indirectly, in particular by reference to an identifier such as a name, an identification number, location data, an online identifier or to one or more factors specific to the physical, physiological, genetic, mental, economic, cultural or social identity of that natural person;

We know from EU case law that this also includes IP-addresses, since such online identifiers indirectly makes people who is visiting such a publicly available personal blog identifiable.

Also, note that the scope of the GDPR is processing of personal data. This is defined in GDPR Article 4 defintion 2:

  ‘processing’ means any operation or set of operations which is performed on personal data or on sets of personal data, whether or not by automated means, such as collection, recording, organisation, structuring, storage, adaptation or alteration, retrieval, consultation, use, disclosure by transmission, dissemination or otherwise making available, alignment or combination, restriction, erasure or destruction;

Some critics of the GDPR have objected that such a definition of  ‘processing’ is over-reaching. However, it being over-reaching does not mean that we should ignore it.

In conclusion, I would like to link to two seminal cases heard by the ECJ:

C-101/01
C-212/13

Central to both cases was the question of whether the processing activities of an individual was covered by personal use exemption under article 3(2) of Directive 95/46. In both these cases, the ECJ took an extremely restrictive view, and concluded that the personal use exemption did not apply to the processing done by these individuals.

The questions is: Is it possible for a publicly accessible, personal blog to make use of the personal use exception of the GDPR to avoid having to comply with the regulation? If "yes": What need to be considered by its owner?


texts:
Say I buy a home that is worth 200k and I pay down 100k principal of the loan before marriage. After marriage I continue to pay the mortgage.

Is what I pay for the mortgage considered community property if it comes from my job salary?

At the point when the home is paid off and we're married, what is the division between separate and community property?: 50% or 100k separate property and 50% or 100k community property? -- or -- is it that I bought the home before marriage and the home and its debt belongs all to myself (200k or 100% separate property)?

Additionally, if we go to sell this home and it sells for 400k. Does it get divided based on the percentage of separate property and community property. For example, in this case, 50% separate property = 200k and 50% community property = 200k)? -- or -- only the original 100k is separate property and the 300k community property when the home is sold.


texts:
Sorry keeping some details private as to protect myself, but note I have a calendar log of every event that has happened.

In the beginning of 2018 our HOA and we as Homeowners came to an agreement that we would remove a stump with chemical stump removal - https://goo.gl/TFrKC4 aka Spectracide and plant two new maple trees, however the stump wanted to be stubborn and not die.

Disclaimer in our CCR & Landscaping rules it says, "If a tree dies it must be replaced."  (Note it does not provide a time frame).  In other words, "If a tree dies it must be replaced in 2 weeks, 6 months, 1 year, etc.)  It is open for interpretation.

Since the stump resisted to die we thought it would be foolish to plant a new tree near the chemical as to not kill another tree.  In my Architecture Approval I did state my ESTIMATED time frame was the start time was "End of April" and the end date was "End of May" (Notice I did not include a year as per the CCR, hence a contract is a contract).  We were lucky to replace one tree, but the other has been a problem.  In August the management company started to fine us $50.00 a day which has increased to over 5000+.   After numerous phone calls to the management company and emails with no response to how we could rectify the violation we were breaking again. (Let me re-emphasize replacing a tree does not provide a time frame in the CCR).  I actually tracked the emails sent and saw it was read 50+ times by the management company and the HOA Directors and I have a log of all attempts to contact the HOA Directors and Management Company, in which the only time I got a response was when I called a member at their place of business and then was called within 3 minutes by the management company  and was threated with being charged with harassment if I ever call a member of the board at their place of business again.  When all I wanted to do was to know what violation was being broken in a kind a compassionate tone.

Truly I feel as though this is a shake down and extortion.   I am asking what legal action should I take?  Should I go to my "County Clerk of Superior Courts" and file a small claim of extortion in order to fill the HOA’s coffers with money?  IMPORTANT - Do I file as the Plantiff or Defendent (I simply want to see the fine go away be left alone)   I am even wanting to see the books dating back to 2008 to account for every penny that has been spent by our "Board of Directors".

They are bullies and we are not the only homeowners in the neighborhood with these problems.

I would love to have someone with legal background assist me in this road I have never traveled, but I am willing to be the David against Goliath.


texts: Can a former employer (U.S.) use/withhold owed commissions as leverage?

texts:
I am in "negotiations" with a former employer. There are written (text message: "You will be paid on X and Y when/if they close) agreements in place for 2 of my deals. One just closed, the other in-process. The employer is being very difficult. His lawyer negotiates with me one day then claims I am owed nothing the next. I have confirmed that one deal has closed and I would like to get paid.

Can he/lawyer try to use the payment to me as leverage, for example, offer to give me that payment only if I agree to sign a non-compete or other document? I'd like to know the legal standing of such a move on their part. Thanks.


texts: How likely is it (without the 100s of variables that come into play) that a person gets his J.D from a 2nd Tier University and gets paid $250 an Hour within the first 3 years of working?


texts: What is the maximum allowable building height in Mountain View, California?

texts:
Anecdotal evidence online suggests that the maximum height allowed by city code in Mountain View is 40 or 50 ft. Is there an authoritative source for this (or the correct) figure?

I've looked at Muni-code without much luck.


texts: How to determine the marital status of a UK Citizen?

texts: How can I determine the marital status, and any previous marriages, of a UK citizen living in the UK?


texts: UK — Landlord refused to disclose (in contract) that another tenant is mentally ill and has potential for violence. What are my rights?

texts:
I'm an American living in the UK for a summer internship. I moved in to a room in a shared house, and lived there for two weeks. I found it using a university accommodation portal for summer visitors. On the portal it was stated the house would be filled with other students at the university (which makes sense, because only summer visitors of the university are given access to the housing portal).

The landlord's son, however, also lives in the house. About one week in, he gave me a copy of his autobiography. This autobiography details his battle with severe mental illness. I deeply respect his courage in opening up to give me his book, but there are sections of the book which mention he has been placed into a psychiatric ward for "the most aggressive patients" and has heard voices telling him to kill people before.

This fact alone might be enough to get me to move out of the house. But furthermore, he only gave his book to me and none of the other tenants, after knowing me for only a couple of days. I would not move out of the house if there were no strong indicators of past or potential for future violence in this book.

I moved out, and the landlord sent me an e-mail saying I am still responsible for one month of rent, per the short term tenancy agreement (which I did sign).

My question is this: is there any way I can evade this extra month's rent on the grounds the she did not disclose all of the conditions present in living in this shared accommodation?


texts: What consequences does a business face if money taken and also misapplied?

texts:
As a customer, I made a payment with my debit card for a monthly bill I have each month. The amount sometimes changes so I asked for a amortization of payments. After reviewing I noticed 2 big errors. The first being,on one of these payments the total paid was not all applied. I have proof of what was taken out of bank and with a receipt. The missing  funds are not applied or listed or shown on the amortization anywhere. I'm
The second error is, they took my normal monthly payment and applied it to the intrest portion only, so it looks like I did not make a regular monthly payment. They did not tell me they where going to do this,had no idea until I received the amortization. They now expect me to make another payment in same month for the same amount I just paid to catch up.
Unfortunately, this is a title loan business.  What they say to pay I do as the company favorite saying is "You don't want your car repossessed?" Does anyone know the consequences of taking money and also applying incorrectly without telling me?


texts:
Are there any proscriptions on the custodial interrogation of people who are under the influence of alcohol or other mind-altering drugs?  If not, are there any laws that prohibit offering intoxicating substances to a person in custody?
I am interested not only in the U.S. but also in other countries where coercive interrogation is prohibited.  But to offer an illustration: In the U.S. police may arrest a suspect of a crime who happens to be drunk.  If, following the Miranda warning, that suspect does not invoke the right to silence or to a lawyer is a subsequent interrogation admissible evidence in a trial?  Or, if a suspect is arrested who is not drunk: Police are supposed to provide food and water to subjects in their custody.  Is there any legal restriction on offering subjects alcohol or other intoxicants prior to or during interrogation?


texts:
I use a number of different cookies on my website for tracking and saving preference. I'm very confused about which can and cannot be set with and without consent under GDPR

I'm certain I need consent for personalized ads, but what about these other cookies?

1) Google analytics - To track devices and page views. (I don't link analytics with any personally identifiable information like login or email)

2) Adsense - To server personalized Ads

3) Google re-captcha v3 - I use this because I want to prevent spam bots from completing an AJAX requests and filling my server with spam data. Basically my website lets a user create a map, upload it to my server, and then use a link to open that map again.

4) Preference cookies - I save a cookie on the device that remember which theme has been set for the website so the user doesn't have to change it again on their next visit (This is not linked to any login information, its just a cookie that says theme=darkmode or something)

5) Session login cookies - When a user does login to my website I set a cookie for their Email and session ID


texts: Is a debt owed by an adult who is supported by parents recoverable?

texts: I am owed money by a 37 year old drug addict.  We grew up together and I tried with his father to get him healthy.  Over the years, I lent him small sums that added up over time, which we kept track of on a spreadsheet.  Things got really bad and I had to cut off communication.  Since its become unlikely he will ever be able to repay me, I asked his father to cover the debt; he refused.  The father has been financially supporting his son for at least the last 10 years -- $4,000 / mo rent in NYC, food, spending money, etc.  Is there a legal argument to force the father to repay the debt if he is supporting his grown son?  I don't have a contract but have the spreadsheet and affirmation of the debt from both father and son in email.


texts:
If you get accused of a crime that happened when your were committing an unrelated crime at another part of town, could you use this as an alibi without incriminating yourself? Do judicial procedures contemplate a case when an accused reports information that remains secret?

Or would the only alternative be to confess your true crime to defend yourself from a more serious accusation (like confessing a robbery to avoid a murder accusation)?


texts: Is a driver liable for actions committed by the passenger of his car?

texts:
In a recent question, (Why aren't email providers liable in some way or another for scams operated via accounts on their domains?), the poster suggested that:

  A real life equivalent might seem to be a driver who waits for the hitchhiker they picked up while the latter does a bank heist, and continues on with their passenger after they're done. Surely such a well meaning albeit naive driver wouldn't stand a chance in court if they said that it's because they've a section 230-like protection.

But is the driver actually committing a crime if they were actually unaware that the hitchhiker in the example was robbing the bank (e.g. if he stops in quickly at the bank, and leaves quietly, with the driver completely unaware)


texts:
An interesting situation had just happened to me and made me think about a potential line of defence in case of troubles.

From the beginning: my neighbour asked if I could let him jump from my balcony to his flat one's located below mine as he's lost his door keys. After ensuring that he knew it might be dangerous and was able to do it, I let him go down and fortunately nothing had happened to him but I started thinking about his potential fall and, shame to admit, how would I defend myself if someone would try to blame me for the accident.

My very first thought was the volenti non fit injuria rule. I was pleased to find that this rule is present in English law therefore that would be my first attempt to defend myself as this guy acted on his own will.

Questions:
1) Does this approach make any sense in UK?
2) Would it be different if the situation would happen in Scotland?
3) Does the face that I'm not British (I'm EU citizen) change anything here?


texts: How Does the Compulsoriness of Skipper Licences and Flag State Relate?

texts:
Focused core question
What documents/licences should I get, if any, in case I didn't wanted to have problems with authorities while sailing around the world, on any given type of sailboat having any kind of flag state?
Corollary questions and context to help you think about the nuances while answering
Let's suppose you want to buy a yacht and you don't want to have problems with authorities that stop you while sailing around the world. Let's also suppose that you are from country A, and that you are looking into possible yachts deals from countries A, B and C. What kind of skipper licence would you need to have if any? According to my research, when you are on a vessel that has a state flag from country A, you are under the law of country A. Does that mean that I need to have a skipper licence from country A?

What if I change flag state?
What if you want to buy a boat from country B or C?
How will country A be able to enforce its law on what happens on your yacht with state flag A, if you are on the other side of the world, in the waters of another country or in international waters?
Can I have no flag state and be able to not have any law mandated over me? If so, how do things work in that case?
How does the International Certificate of Competence (ICC) plays into all this? Can it be used in place of a skipper licence? Does it provide any advantage to have it?
If it is true that a yacht with state flag from country A must follow the law of country A, can country B require you to have an ICC for example, when sailing in their waters? If so, how? Moreover, how does the boundry between the laws of country A and country B work when they are in contrast for example?


texts: What are consequences for municipal court judges and prosecutors after appeal?

texts:
What happens to a municipal court judge and municipal prosecutor if a defendant is found guilty at a municipal trial, but the appeal court reverses the decision and finds the defendant not guilty?

Does appeal court decision go on the judge’s record and the prosecutor’s record?

Does anyone review their records?


texts: Reinterpretation of copyrighted work in another medium (film to song)

texts:
I've been reading about derivative works and general copyright, but I'm struggling to understand the scope of what is a derivative work.

Allow me to present my situation.

I have written a concept album, it is a retelling of a story previously told in a movie, let's say Robocop.

At no point is the film tile Robocop referenced, the song titles and plot points are designed to be familiar to fans of the movie. A few character names are referenced, and a few lines of dialogue are referenced but the vast majority (99.9%) is original lyrics describing similar scenes and characters.

Is this a derivative work? Does this require a licence? Would it be an infringement? It is essentially a fan homage in song form.

My understanding is that as this doesn't contain any mechanical part of the original movie it is fine. Sorry if this has already been discussed, I couldn't find anything which covered exactly what I want to ask.

Update: I though I would add some examples.

This House Is Not For Sale - Ryan Adams is very similar to the story of the film Beetlejuice, but at no point directly references it.

Far Gone - Pictish Trail contains the line She wouldn't stop screaming which has been acknowledged as being from the film Fargo and also uses a remixed sample from the Fargo movie soundtrack as the hook.

Are these derivative works? Would they be infringing upon IP laws without some kind of licence? And how would they compare to the situation I have outlined?


texts: Death of one of two tenant parties during notice period

texts:
Scenario
Two parties A, B sign a rental contract in Germany. Only party A lives there, party B merely cosigns the contract, but neither makes any payments nor lives in the propery. Party B adopted party A as their child, this process is completed and is irrelevant I expect.
Party A desires to leave the property, party B is no longer capable of making decisions on their own due to dementia and so party C, procurer for B, agrees to cosign a notice with party A, because neither are interested in continuing to rent the property. Party C has all necessary paperwork to make legal decisions on behalf of B.
The landlord, a large corporate body, henceforth known as D, agrees to the notice and sends a notification explicitely stating their agreement towards contract termination after the notice period.
Party B dies during notice period. The dementia took its toll.
A informs D of these circumstances. A is no longer interested in looking for a new tenant during notice period to get out of the contract faster upon agreement with D, because A is busy with funeral preparations and decides to just pay the one remaining month of rent, despite no longer living in the property.
D ghosts.
There is no further communication from D after being notified of B's death. The landlord, i.e. the corporate body and its representatives have gone completely silent.
Question
What exactly happens, when a tenant contract is cosigned by two parties, yet one of the parties dies during notice period? Can this in any way be cause to nullify the notice that was handed in?
I expect C will inherit from B, but this process is likely ongoing - even so, the notice has already been accepted and rightfully so when done, so is there a reason why the landlord is suddenly silent? Are they expecting continuing rental payments even though no one houses the property anymore and the notice period is over?
TL;DR Version
Two tenants cosign a rental contract. One of the tenants becomes disabled and notice is handed in by one tenant and a procurer of the other tentant. The landlord agrees. The tenant that became disabled before dies during notice period. Landlord ceases to respond upon learning this. The other tenant and the procurer are uncertain whether or not these special circumstances could for some reason nullify the handed in notice.