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Comment by rlpb | Hacker News Reader

AIUI, the only people who could claim damages in a civil suit are ones that could demonstrate actual costs as a consequence for Lenovo's action.

Maybe the cost of a security audit required as a consequence of this issue might qualify - I don't know. But there would have to be actual costs involved.

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> AIUI, the only people who could claim damages in a civil suit are ones that could demonstrate actual costs as a consequence for Lenovo's action.

So, basically what you're saying is that I can secretly take nude photos of you (when you're not in a public place), and "enjoy" them (in whichever manner) but not share them with the public, and you can't sue me unless you can demonstrate my actions actually costed you money?

In general, that's correct.

However, depending on your jurisdiction that may be a crime. In that case, I or the state might be able to prosecute you under criminal law. I don't generally understand that to be within the meaning of "sue" though. And, again in general, criminal conviction leads mainly to punishment rather than reparations to the victims.

Oh, and exceptionally, if I'm your "model" then without me signing an appropriate release I own copyright on your photos, so I may be able to sue you for losses (probably to the value of you buying an equivalent market-rate DVD or something).

> if I'm your "model" then without me signing an appropriate release I own copyright on your photos

You sure about that? AFAIK the copyright is with the creator, i.e. the photographer. Model release is required on for privacy purposes, not for copyright.

That is correct, at least in the USA. Photog owns the copyright upon creation. Model release is required for (certain) uses in publication, but not all - for example, newspapers do not have to get model release from people in photographs used for editorial purposes.

In the United States it's actually the photographer who owns the copyright not the subject. Not positive if this is the case everywhere but I believe it is.

You don't own the copyright without a model release, but, in many (but not all circumstances), you can sue for renumeration if your likeness is used without your permission. With the exception of some work-for-hire scenarios, copyright is always with the creator (but the creator must be human; monkeys don't count[1]).

1.http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/aug/22/monkey-bus...

There's a distinction between civil and criminal law, and the post you responded to was only talking about civil law.

I'm no lawyer, but as I understand it, you sue people under civil law for some kind of compensation - for financial loss, loss of reputation, psychological consequences, etc. Your voyeur example would hopefully fall under criminal law, which deals with the things society considers morally wrong. But a criminal trial would be prosecuted by the government, not by you suing.

What about knowingly putting consumers at risk? Suppose you buy a new car from GM and you later find out they've installed worn-out second hand brakes (on purpose, knowingly, and for profit motivation). But you're an old lady that only used the car to drive once a week, at 15mph to a church five blocks from home, so no damage happened. You're telling me that GM couldn't be punished for anything?

In the US, at least, you must have "standing" to sue someone. That means that you have to demonstrate damages.

Those damages may be minor -- you don't have to have killed anyone -- but they have to exist.

If, in your example, GM only installed the worn out brakes on that one car, and the worn-out brakes never caused any damages, then no, GM cannot be sued for it.

Note that "I had to pay a mechanic to replace the brakes" is damages.

I am not a lawyer, this is not legal advice, I may be wrong, etc.

Since you mention cars, there is a lot of regulations and laws regarding the production, selling and importing of cars. As such, producing unsafe car is likely a criminal offense, and it would likely be NHTSA who would go after GM.

But in this case, there is good precedence for claim of damages. People has used time it have taken a engineer to investigate, clean, and fix a computer system after a computer intrusion. Even a few hours work will result in several thousands, much more than the laptop itself is worth.

"AIUI"? What's that now?

Ok, googled it, wait for it... "As I understand it".

Whew!

Thank you. IRDUTPOTOA (I really don't understand the point of these obscure acronyms).

That's because you find them obscure. If your community used them more frequently you would just read them in place, like people do with IANAL, LGTM, AFAIK, etc.

Incidentally, I didn't understand this one, but I don't blame OP (oops, I mean 'original poster') for misunderstanding the linguistic norms of HN (hacker news).

Just spell it out!

Incidentally, first time I've seem LGTM, had to google it.

.lgbt as a gTLD? LGTM.

I agree. Nowdays I read things like "IANAL" or "AFAIK" as words, not acronyms. When one reaches this point, such acronyms are pretty convenient.

They're faster to type, and I suspect I find them more pleasant to read (this is hard to test). AIUI, IIRC and similar are good disclaimers to make, but they're basically boilerplate, and don't need to take up lots of space.

IIRC you don't need any of this, you will still hold copyright to what you have produced. This is just a friendly reminder to your readership.

IANAL but I believe you are correct although you get some extra legal protections by including the notice (which only need include the word or symbol and the name and year). Namely, an infringer cannot claim they did so accidentally... or something like that. FWIW.

Correct. The Berne Convention did away with 'formalities' like having to register your copyrights in order to hold them. You still need to have a registered copyright to sue for statutory damages in the USA, though.

No, you do not. Any work you do is automatically under copyright as long as that is a reasonable expectation (given a site's TOU, etc.)

They're a significant indicator that you're reading a message from someone who doesn't mind inconveniencing an unknown number of people to gain a negligible benefit for themselves. :) Or, at least, this is what I remind myself when I catch myself using them. Typing is not a hardship. I spend time trying to come up with the absolute clearest way of writing what I'm trying to say, so why would I then take a step backwards (potentially) in clarity just to save myself three seconds of typing?

fgsfds!

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