[okfn-za] Please Sue Me

Mon May 6 19:10:14 UTC 2013

I've given the project a lot of thought and listened to comments both
on- and off-list. I think that this crusade might be a little
premature. Rather than going out guns blazing, it might be worthwhile
to create a dialogue through another approach, perhaps a series of
op-eds with rights to respond in an influential newspaper. I still
strongly believe in the principle of the matter but perhaps this
approach might close more doors than it opens. Also, if it goes to
court, it may stall movement in the open data space for a number of
years which would be counter-productive.

Of course, if anyone else wants to pick it up, they are welcome to
everything I have put into it so far (domain name, website, hosting,
etc) but I think that it makes better sense to get traction using a
slighter less confrontational approach.

Regardless of whether this project is implemented or not, I was very
glad to see the amount of traffic that it generated on the various
mailing lists. The number of people contributing to the discussion was
encouraging. Hopefully we can build on that momentum to create a much
more active community.

Kind regards
Adi

On 6 May 2013 14:24, Rufus Pollock <rufus.pollock at okfn.org> wrote:
> On 2 May 2013 10:56, Adi Eyal <adi at burgercom.co.za> wrote:
> [...]
>>> Right now we need a web site!
>>
>> I've put one up - have a look at: http://www.pleasesueme.co.za. It
>
> Great work on the site!
>
>> really is a starting point, the copy is embarrassing and the site only
>> has three datasets but hopefully it's a start. Anyone who wants to
>> jump in and make any improvements, copy, logo design, data collection
>> etc is welcome. Also, legal advice would be welcome, I'm going out on
>> a limb at the moment, probably fool-hardy and given Leon and
>> Geoffrey's comments, possibly a little too impulsive. It would be good
>> to have a professional give some thought to the practicalities of how
>> to implement this which wouldn't end up costing me a million rand in
>> legal bills.
>
> I've booted a gdoc where we can work on copy etc.
>
> https://docs.google.com/a/okfn.org/document/d/1y1wQcW9WogwFy0GDGVnZTixUfonzNCHvSGw77675Wik/edit#
>
> We can work on the copy there and start listing more datasets to
> include. (I guess we should add them to http://africaopendata.org/ at
> the same time!).
>
> Also we can prepare an announce post for http://za.okfn.org/ and
> elsewhere - we can reuse quite a bit of your intro email :-) (I think
> this is a great project for OKFN South Africa Local Group to be
> involved so no problem blogging and supporting it!)
>
> Re legal Arthur has made a good suggestion re Andrew Rens. If you need
> any help getting in contact let me know!
>
> Rufus

--
Adi Eyal
Data Specialist
phone: +27 78 014 2469
skype: adieyalcas
linkedin: http://za.linkedin.com/pub/dir/Adi/Eyal