OT: US Supreme Court: Litigous open season on P2P File Sharing
Dont like getting into political issues but this has an effect on software development...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/27/AR2005062700471_pf.html
Big ramifications I am sure, looking at the broader picture here - the US Supreme court has said that software developers can be held liable in the case their software/service is used in an illegal manner, regardless of your purpose or intent in development and the provision of the service.
Sad...
The problem is with one's interpretation of intent, Souter says that someone who distributes something..."with the object of promoting its use to infringe copyright..." is liable for the acts performed with the software. Fine but who decides what the object promotes, once again lending vagueness to a ruling which can and most certainly will be abused by lawyers everywhere.
Couple this with the outrageous eminent domain decision that gives the government power to seize your private property for purposes other than the 'public use' and we have fulfilled the fear of Lincoln and resigned our government to an eminent tribunal.