Re: shielding from liability
On 21 Aug 1997 john@win.bright.net wrote:
> Bruce writes:
> > However there are negligence scenarios, for example a maintainer who
> > accepts a patch without realizing that it contains a trojan-horse
> > program. I want to shield our developers from individual liability in
> > that sort of case.
>
> Is every maintainer an employee or agent of SPI, then? Or is SPI going to
> purchase liability insurance and name all the maintainers as beneficiaries?
>
> I don't really think there is much risk, though. Where's the duty?
>
> Has there ever actually been a negligence suit over free software?
If it was free you couldn't sue for a refund. I really think you could
only sue a party that intentionally and maliciously damaged you. That
would require a serious effort to instill a false sense of trust in the
software. Microsoft did this to me with a database product called Access.
I should have sued them for my $99 plus damages. Yeah, fat chance. A
smaller entity like SPI is much more likely to be sued than a rich fascist
company like u-no-hoo. It would be a nuisance suit, but SPI doesn't have a
legal department with full-time attorneys to quickly dispose of such
things. Anybody who is breathing US air these days is a potential victim
of unwarranted, frivilous legal actions. Paranoia helps the insurance
companies sell policies. Highly insured defendants means more of the money
awarded by courts is actually collectible. This increases the paranoia and
more insurance is purchased.
There are 2 things which are getting to be worse than any tax: insurance
premiums and the percentage that merchants pay on every credit card sale.
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