BBV: Attn. GA Lawers and Friends of Lawyers

[John_H]

I've been talking to a local copyright lawyer about DemActivists hack challenge, and I'm really getting pissed.

The way it sounds to me and my lawyer buddy is that Cathy Cox's acceptance of the challenge was pure PR--now she's trying to get out of it.

If you are a lawyer or know one--you need to help DemActivist get a copy of GA's contract with diebold. The reason they won't give it to her probably is that it authorizes them to perform security tests on the hardware and software. Of course that would put the onus of accepting the challenge on them.

If you help her, you will be helping to save the american electoral system and your party. I'm not being melodramatic--after fighting rethugs every day for a long time, I am convinced that they will use any means necessary to gain power since they understand a majority of americans disagree w/ them.

Diebold is their chance to use election fraud without getting caught.

[joanski01]

1. This needs a kick

to the front page.

[DEMActivist]

2. Thanks, John_H!

Let's keep it kicked and see if we can get some help here!

[RedEagle]

3. The Machines were Purchased with PUBLIC funds, right?

The citizens of Georgia paid for those machines.

Shouldn't they get to look at the contract?

[DEMActivist]

5. NOT in Georgia

The Georgia Open Records Law

50-18-70 G
*** CODE SECTION *** 01/23/01

(b) This article shall not be applicable to:

(1) Any trade secrets obtained from a person or business entity which are of a privileged or confidential nature and required by law to be submitted to a government agency or to data, records, or information of a proprietary nature, produced or collected by or for faculty or staff of state institutions of higher learning, or other governmental agencies, in the conduct of or as a result of, study or research on commercial, scientific, technical, or scholarly issues, whether sponsored by the institution alone or in conjunction with a governmental body or private concern, where such data, records, or information has not been publicly released, published, copyrighted, or patented;

http://elpuente2001.tripod.com/schools/openlaw.html

[AP]

7. The contract itself is not necessarily a trade secret.

You'd have to make a pretty specious argument to claim that it was.

When you pitch an idea or a product, you give away some of your trade secrets. That's why you enter into a confidentiality agreement whey you're pitching your wares, and a good lawyer will make sure that that contract has attached to it a list of exactly what the trade secrets are so the divulging party doesn't clame later that something was the subject of the agreement when it wasn't.

That's the confidentiality agreement.

Once you buy the product, you enter into a different agreement for, in this case, the license of the machines and the softward and for services the licensor has to provide to the state (and it may have a confidentiality clause within the agreement, which refers to an trade secrets and other confidential information which will be attached as a schedule, just as it should have been to the separate, stand alone, preliminary confindentiality agreement).

If you look at the SEC website you see these kinds of contracts in companies filings. If you're a publicly traded company, you're obligated to provide to the public details of your commercially significant contracts. So, you'll see contracts with a price term here or there removed, or the confidentiality CLAUSE (and attached schedule of confidential information) redacted.

These are major corporations deathly afraid of disclosing confidential information, and anyone can still read 98% of the contract on line.

So, there's no way in hell the state of Georgia can claim with a straight face that the ENTIRE license for the machines, softward and services is confidential. That's outrageous. You may have asked for the before, and they may have acted like the confidentiality agreement was the only thing, and that it was under lock and key. Well, that's partly true, but it's mostly a lie, because they know there's a separate contrat that lists all the terms and conditions, and they don't want you to see it. That is VERY suspicious.

[AP]

8. For emphasis, let me summarize:

this section of the state code refers ONLY to "trade secrets". "Trade secrets" are a tiny fraction of the entire contract, and they're usually referred to in a single clause, and attached schedule.

You should be able to see all the rest of the contract, ie, all the warraties and covenants, the price terms, the payment schedule, the scope of the license (which is what you need to know to perform your test), the governing law clause, the effective date clause, etc. etc. etc.

Incidentally, I'm not a lawyer licensed to practice in the State of Georgia. You should talke to someone who is. Don't rely on my advice.

[Vadem]

4. Right on, John!!

:kick:

[AP]

6. The reason they won't let you see it is probably because itgave away the.

farm to Diebold. It probably doesn't have a single warranty the breach of which could trigger termination of all GA's obligations (specifically, the obligation to pay).

I would LOVE to see this contract. It would probably result in a few GA state lawyers disbarment for wanton disregard of the best interests of their clients, the citizens of the state of Georgia.

Oh yeah, and it may give the state a license to the state and the state's agents to examine the software and decompile and reverse engineer in order to test for security flaws. (But if it does, I bet it doesn't provide for a single remedy if the software is insecure -- the state probably can't terminate the contract, and I bet Diebold doesn't even have the obligation to provide secure software).

I just bet this contract is a totall fucking mess and will be a political nightmare for the politicians who negotiated it.

[dusty64]

9. The People have a right

to see what they are paying for.
:kick:

[AP]

10. Amd like I said, it would be crazy if the state of GA

could keep more details of their contracts confidential than for-profit capitalist corporations are allowed to keep secret in their SEC filings.

[hang a left]

11. Why don't we just hire a lawyer

Let's start a fund, or we can send the funds directly to the attorney.

[hang a left]

12. and a kick

[hang a left]

13. keepin it on the first page

[DEMActivist]

14. We're working on some fundraising...

for this purpose.

[hang a left]

17. Ok, do you need some

donations?

[DEMActivist]

19. As soon as we can get set up to take them, yes.

But, for today, Bev is preparing for her meeting with a congressman and we won't be able to get this accomplished.

Frankly, the meeting with the congressman is just more important at this point.

We will work on Cafepress, PayPal and Amazon donations soon.

[Yupster]

15. Lawyers have friends?

n/t

[dusty64]

16. Even though like

everyone else I'm hurting financially, I'd be willing to help with what I could afford. I'll bet if enough $$$ is available the lawyers will come running.

[hedda_foil]

18. Count me in too.

Dollars for Democracy.

[AP]

20. I wonder if you get a law firm to set up a PayPal to a client

account through their law firm web site. They'd accept donations up to whatever amount they need, at which point they'd stop accepting donations (so that you don't have the problem of having to return client funds which aren't used to 100s of people).

For example, they'd tell you what the retainer fee was. They'd have the pay pal thing set up. Once you got up to the full amount, they'd do the work, and it would keep progressing like that.

That way, you could get a really good lawyer, and, if it were done on the firm website, it would have be very legitimate (I'd be more likely to put in $20 if I knew I were paying right into a client account, rather than some fund which I had no idea about how it was managed).

[DEMActivist]

21. Good idea!

We may be able to work on this approach. It would solve a lot of problems (accounting, etc.) for US as well.

In the meantime, if there are any DU accountant types, we could use a volunteer to manage the accounting side of all this. Anyone want to step up and volunteer?

[dusty64]

22. Kick.

:kick:

[TacticalPeek]

23. Kick KKKarl. Georgia lawyers, defend our country.

:kick: