On 01/17/2009 11:32 PM, Ian G:
Disputes are resolved according to the agreement or contract (terms are
interchangeable) between the parties.
So far so good...
So, if the agreement were to say "use this page" then that's how they
are done. If on the other hand, the agreement said "disputes are solved
by 3 wise men rolling dice under a full moon" then that is how it is
done too.
Nice :-)
Now, normally, contracts say "disputes are resolved in the Court of Law
in Mainstreet, Upper Podunk." Which is fine and dandy, but this is
simply an option.
Sure, there are others...
In contract law, forums of dispute resolution is chosen by the parties.
Sometimes, but parties may even disagree on this.
There are all sorts of options: courts (any around the world),
mediation, arbitration, one party, both parties, choose a third party.
It's whatever you want, whatever you can write in the contract (in
general).
Sure.
Now, where it gets a bit sticky is that one of the options is to say
nothing. And this is entirely valid and legal, but does lead to
questions about how to resolve disputes later on. This can be resolved
by mutual agreement, or if you can't agree how to resolve the dispute,
one party can take it to a court.
Indeed.
Then, because the court is not NAMED IN THE AGREEMENT, it has to ask
itself "do we have jurisdiction?" And there are lots and lots of rules
and caselaw and laws about this. Assuming luck, then the court says
"yes, we assert jurisdiction" and then the case is reserved for that
court. If we have negative luck, other things can happen.
Also correct.
In sum, courts may resolve disputes. Others may as well. It all depends
on the agreement. Mozilla can simply state that it resolves disputes ...
by simply stating it. No problem.
But Mozilla hasn't done that so far, nor have the CAs and other parties
agreed to that. Not even Mozilla has raised such an option so far. At
the moment this is fantasy at best and not relevant. That's why I
insisted that your page does assume something which doesn't exist.
(Obviously, Mozo's counsel will have something to say here too, and may
well (a ) disagree with the letter above, or (b ) the spirit, or (c )
the suitability of the idea in the first place.)
"/Something to say/" is good... :-)
I'm not sure from where you got this...which law are you following that
prevents Mozilla from doing so? Which legal requirements? Which
policies? Which agreements?
What happens is that party A gets wind of party B's intended action. So
party A files a dispute into court. Then, it immediately makes an
application to the court for an "injunction" which is an order from the
court to maintain things as they are, while the dispute is being heard.
Things like that can happen, it's just one possibility however.
Now apply to say a root termination. This is a business-threatening
event. If Mozo started thinking about this, then it would very quickly
escalate to court & injunction. In my opinion (not legal advice, of
course) the business would have little option but to sue and file for
injunction.
Ergo, I conclude by the above logic that Mozo cannot drop a root. (OK, I
needed some other steps to get to that point, but they are not germane.)
I think that's just a wild assumption and any CA will check carefully if
it has a case at all against Mozilla. I suspect that if there are real
reasons to remove a root, the expenses for the CA will be too high in
the end - instead it will opt to fix whatever needs to be fixed in order
to get re-added to the pile (as Paul used to say). Hence removing a root
is one option, working with the CA to address the problems another. One
important thing to note is, that CAs will most likely cooperate in
removing their root in case of key compromise.
And besides that, Mozilla reserves the right to remove a root, modify
trust-bits etc. It doesn't have to get into the arbitration business for
that.
--
Regards
Signer: Eddy Nigg, StartCom Ltd.
Jabber: start...@startcom.org
Blog: https://blog.startcom.org
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