Anthony Towns writes: > I don't think that's meaningful; if I sue you in a court in Australia > for not complying with debootstrap's license, and they find that you've > infringed the license, it doesn't really matter if I'm doing that out > of maliciousness or a genuine. And as far as the actual effects go, > I'm not sure you're going to be any better off without that clause in > your license: if you set foot in Australia, with an Australian judgement > against you, there's a good chance of it being enforced; and if you don't, > there seems to be a practical possibility of your extradition anyway, > based on [0].
Extradition is for criminal cases, not civil cases. I cannot imagine how a choice of venue clause would significantly either help or hurt a criminal defendant. As has been previously discussed on -legal -- several times, I might add -- there are a variety of reasons that the rest your argument is flawed. To summarize: Most of the expense of non-local defense litigation is in advance of any court judgment on the merits. The cost to dismiss a lawsuit for lack of personal jurisdiction is an order of magnitude (or more) less than litigating it through trial. It is harder to set aside a default judgment than to dismiss a complaint for improper venue. Even if the license provides for recovery of costs and attorneys' fees plus interest, a successful non-local defendant has to pay significant out-of-pocket expenses and will probably end up in the red on the whole case due to his time and money being tied up in the lawsuit rather than its normal use. Those are the costs of a choice-of-venue clause. The (apparently one and only) benefit is that it is cheaper for the licensor to sue people and/or the results of lawsuits are more predictable. Is that truly acceptable in a free software license? Michael Poole -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
