On Thu, 16 Apr 2009, comex wrote: > On Thu, Apr 16, 2009 at 12:10 PM, Kerim Aydin <ke...@u.washington.edu> wrote: >> Without positive evidence that the purpose of the partnership's existence was >> to violate that responsibility, it should be assumed that such violations >> were >> not R2169 "events proceeding as envisioned". For one party to break that >> responsibility materially harms the partnership in a manner that can, and >> should, >> be dealt with through direct and specific adjustments through the equity >> court; >> at the very least covering salary lost to the PNP due to losing the position. > > I think everyone's forgetting that the PNP is the projection into > Agora of a nomic-- a codenomic, no less, where traditionally, _any_ > technically possible move is legal. As the metarules show, PerlNomic > has strayed somewhat from that tradition and adopted the "here is a > permissive form, please don't abuse it" mentality. But I highly doubt > the real reason for the uproar was some incorrect boilerplate text > which nobody reads anyway-- that was just an excuse to punish me for > the distribution, which people disliked: in part because I was lazy > and didn't make it a full distribution (this I apologize for), but > also because I was able to use the PNP to aid a scam by controlling > the time of the distribution.
I'll first say that I agree with you somewhat, I think it's incorrect to go after you for the technicality of the boilerplate text. Rather, I think that, given Agora's default assumptions about partnerships and equity, it's acceptable to go after you for the scam itself in an equity sense (damages from loss of salary and/or reputation of the partnership as a person). The internal mechanisms of PNP may be nomic, but the outcome is as an agoran partnership with shared responsibilities - when the partnership steps up to take an Agoran officer's responsibilities, Agora should see its internal processes as secondary in the absence of a direct, expressed "shared will to scam Agora". In the absence of that expressed will, if a preponderance of the evidence suggests that the actions of an individual's will were outside the collective will of the contract intents as expected by a sufficient number of members, equity might be assessed. Or if you prefer, if the "purpose" of the PNP was to "nomic loophole scam", then if the scam did not benefit the partnership as a whole, but used partnership abilities hurt the partnership at the attempted profit of a single member, there's potential unforeseen impropriety (not illegality) right there, which could be similarly subject to equity. > The relatively loose controls on making distributions are quite > explicitly part of PerlNomic's "rules". At least one of the authors > of the promotor system desired this in order to aid scams; and the > mechanisms of that system were voted on and enacted in a nomic by > majority consent. Yes, I'm the one that pulled the trigger, but any > scamster, perhaps with a far more dangerous scam in mind, could have > done the same. Being able to control the time of distribution is a > great advantage in several kinds of scams, especially the sort where > something needs to be done just before the close of voting, and the > PNP let me control it. This fact is, at least in part, responsible > for whatever material damage the PNP has suffered, and I don't even > know Perl very well. There are two separate questions: (1) Under the circumstances, do the Agoran equity courts have a reasonable case and legal theory for assessing *some kind* of damages or contract adjustments due to "legal but improper loophole scamming of an officer's accepted duties, which caused greater damage to the partnership through damages to its 'reputation or position (e.g. officerhood)' as a Person"? I accept that this is an interplay of the PNP's right to govern itself versus Agora's interest that can be rightfully asserted when the partnership (a) accepts equity oversight as a second-class person and (b) accepts further responsibilities through selecting to be an officer. (2) What should those damages be? I'll argue for a strong 'yes' on the first, but that's where my arguments will stop. I'd accept a great deal of your arguments as mitigating factors for the second. That's not for me to say, it's for members+judge. Remember, a "better" outcome of equity would be that a shared out-of-court settlement be reached between members under the judge's guidance; perhaps you should try to reach such an agreement based on your arguments for fixing bugs, etc. If the judge doesn't accept (1), you have no reason to bargain and equity is, in effect, over, done, and meaningless forever. If the judge accepts (1) in principle and outlines the material damages done, that's the basis for bargaining (e.g. the damages done versus the court's ability and willingness to collect from an unwilling party) and if bargaining fails, *then* an adversarial imposed judgement. I personally, as a non-member, withdraw any of my previous opinions for what might be appropriate there (kicking out, forgiveness, or something in-between). -Goethe
