response 59 of 203:

Aug 2 22:23 UTC 1999

It is silly to think that the Michigan State government is going to think
that a little, non-commercial, text-only place like Grex is worth the time
and money to go after.   The government no doubt would have limited
resources to enforce this new law, and would concentrate on web sites
offering graphic porno content or pointers to sites that do.   The board
seems to have an exaggerated sense of self-importance about Grex.  Surely
the possibility of them coming after grex are remote at best, so why go
extremely paranoid and make drastic changes or shut down?

Just keep operating Grex as usual, and if they come knocking, either
follow their suggestions for changes, or fight it.  The ACLU or some other
legal advocacy group would probably represent grex pro-bono.  Grex could
also start a legal defense fund and raise contributions for that
eventuality.  Grex need not go into crisis mode over being in theoretical
violation of a stupid law that may *not* even apply to it anyway.  

So why overreact??

response 61 of 203:

Aug 3 18:24 UTC 1999

I think more non board members should attend board meetings.  There was a lot
of well-reasoned discussion about this topic at the last meeting.

response 63 of 203:

Aug 3 22:05 UTC 1999

It seems obvious that the point of temporarily closing should that law
have been enacted was to give board members time to resign if they so
chose.  thus the motion was in the personal interests of the board
members more than anything else.  

Grex should decide ahead of time whether to keep operating, as opposed
to shutting down temporarily and then deciding.  If the consensus is to
keep operating even if it might be illegal, any board member can submit
a "sealed" resignation only to take effect the day the law is enacted.

response 65 of 203:

Aug 4 18:38 UTC 1999

Actually, an organization with nearly no chance of defending itself would
seem a prime target for a government that wanted to send a scare into
everybody.  ("We won!, You're next!")

response 67 of 203:

Aug 5 06:15 UTC 1999

Because of that excellent job of defending ourselves, this issue has become
moot for the time being.  That's a good thing.  If we were to lose this case,
our chances of defending ourselves would be much less.  I don't see that
happening, though.

Dave, so as an attorney, you're asking us to ignore the law?  I don't see that
as responsible at all.  I can see possibly advising us on some things that
would be good faith approaches to trying to comply, which might be
reasonable.  However, that seems very different than telling us, oh, ignore
the law, they're not interested in text anyway.  I'm thinking of a case in
Ann Arbor a few years ago, somebody who if I remember correctly was briefly
a client of yours.  A UM student named Jake Baker posted a story on Usenet,
in which he detailed a fantasy of raping, torturing, and killing a fellow UM
student, who he identified by name, and of whom the story also contained what
was apparrently a fairly accurate physical description.  There was a ton of
media attention, and if I'm remembering correctly, Baker also got thrown out
of the UM, and got in a fair bit of legal trouble with the Feds.  Now,
granted, Baker's text based porn piece could have been very easily construed
as a death threat, but it still doesn't give much credence to the argument
that law enforcement isn't interested in text.

response 69 of 203:

Aug 5 16:12 UTC 1999

But even if they couldn't prove it, they could certainly bankrupt us in the
process.

response 71 of 203:

Aug 5 17:42 UTC 1999

   Agreed--the closing would have been for a minimal amount of time.

response 73 of 203:

Aug 5 18:33 UTC 1999

If this actually goes to a vote, I will vote against it.  Although I'm more
in agreement with dpc about the actual effect on Grex, I think the BoD should
not be hobbled by a resolution that says it can _not_ shut down.  While I
disagree with their conclusions, I will vigorously defend their right to draw
them.  ;-)

response 75 of 203:

Aug 5 21:38 UTC 1999

only the membership should be able to cease operatoins.  If the board
shuts down grex (Im not talking about system shutdowns for maintenance
or anything like that) it is infringing and rescinding the membership
rights of the members.  The bylaws dont give the Board that express
right.

Imagine, for example, that the board supported an amendment to the bylaws
to make some major change.  the amendment vote fails.  Rather than
accept the membership verdict, the board is presently asserting that it
could enforce its amendment by voting to shut down operations unless
the membership reconsiders.  The board can shut down operations at any
time right?  

The Grex bylaws should be amended to say that Grex  is supposed to remain
up and in operation, except in cases of routine maintenance or basic staff
issues like repairs or technical/facility problems, unless or until the
membership of Grex votes to temporarily or permanently cease operations.
This is the issue, in fact the only issue, where it should be spelled out
that the board cannot supercede the authority of the membership.

If grex is funded by the members, than only the members shouldbe able to
shut it down.  

response 77 of 203:

Aug 5 21:57 UTC 1999

I do scg, but thats a different argument-- I think any user choosing
to validate themselves and show committment to grex by being a user
for a certain period of time, should be allowed to become a full voting
member.  The members elect the board, just as voters elect congress.
But congress cannot do two things-- they cannot dissolve the government
and they cannot, by themselves, amend the Constitution.  The board of
Grex cannot by itself amend the Grex bylaws, and they should not, by
themselves, be able to cease this organization's operations.

response 79 of 203:

Aug 5 22:32 UTC 1999

you voted to cease operations until you figured out what do do.  Therefore
you voted to cease operations, which is the same thing whether it is for
three days or three weeks.  Under the terms of the resolution, the Board
could have kept Grex down indefinetly or permanently.  Only the membership
should have been able to decide to do that.  The effect of ceasing
operations even temporarily could have been quite damaging, yet the Board
was saying the membership should hve no say in the matter?  Thats like
the Board saying to a member, "we'll take your money, but unless a board
election is taking place and you can vote us out, to hell withyou, we'll
make our own decisions"

response 81 of 203:

Aug 5 23:23 UTC 1999

suspending public access is tantamount to suspending the service that
grex offers.  maybe this needs re-phrasing:  only the membership should
be able to vote to decline to the members and users grex's service, 
unless technical problems or maintenance is required.  

response 83 of 203:

Aug 6 01:02 UTC 1999

If the courts end up letting this law stand, it's extremely probable
that they won't let it stand unaltered.  It's a bit difficult to predict
how the courts might alter this law's meaning (since they haven't given
any indication of having any interest in doing so), but if they were to
do so, they might (for instance) restrict the law's coverage to only
"obscene" materials, instead of merely "sexually explicit materials", or
they might add additional legal defenses to cover systems such as grex
(perhaps a text-only system will be excluded from coverage, or users
might be required to voluntarily give their age to the system and grex
might be required to provide a mechanism whereby certain conferences
could be excluded from view by people who have voluntarily said they are
not of age.) If the courts were to do this, it's very likely that they
will also give us more specific advice on how we could continue to
operate legally despite the law.  If they did not volunteer such
information up front, hopefully the people we had there representing our
side would have the foresight and opportunity to do so.

If the courts do decide to do this, there is also the question of when
such an altered law might take effect.  The worst case would be that the
courts decide it applies immediately, and retroactively as well.  Since
the courts have so far appeared sympathetic to our mission and cause,
this seems unlikely.  A hopefully more likely possibility is that the
courts would instead set a date some weeks or months after the hearing,
at which the modified law would take effect, and that the modified law
would not be retroactive.  If this were to happen, then we would have
ample opportunity to consider the impact of the law on our operations,
and to make whatever changes were required to continue operation, if
such changes were indeed feasible, or to consider how to dissolve grex
and distribute the assets, if continued operation under the law were not
feasible.  An advantage of being involved in the case, is that we have
opportunity to ask the courts for a more lenient timeframe to consider
our options, if they don't initially give us a reasonable timeframe.

Since we have no idea what an altered law might end up looking like, I
think it would be extremely premature to try to come to any binding
resolution regarding how we should continue to operate under such a law.
Since there is a chance the law could become operative quite quickly,
and since the board would become *personally* liable in this case, I
think it's only reasonable and fair that the board should have an
opportunity to shut grex down temporarily, if they feel this is the only
choice.  I do not feel we have the right to require that the board
assume personal criminal liability, and if the membership were to pass
such a resolution, I think the board would be both legally and ethically
justified in ignoring such a resolution, if they don't in fact simply
choose to resign in en masse in disgust over our handling of matters.  I
believe that if the law were to give the board a "grace period" before
enabling the coverage of an "altered law", that the board would use this
time to give the grex membership a chance to explore our options under
the altered law online.  It is possible the time we might have for such
discussions might be very short before we would have to "do
something"--much less than our customary voting time, for instance.