Not “Mick” IMO. It’s offensive where I live. It’s less offensive than “spic” or “chink”, because there’s less Irish immigrant conflict and so the usage of the term has declined. I’ve never heard of it as a term of endearment. These days I’ve only heard it in regard to drinking and obstinate drunken behavior.
I think it is more complicated than that. Multinationals do that for tax reduction purposes but it is not as if Apple or Microsoft has actually relocated out of the US. As long as there is an entity within the US that develops PureOS then they are readily within the reach of US law.
As a wild hypothetical, I guess Purism could split in two, with the hardware (manufacturing, repair) operations remaining in the US and the software operations directed, controlled, located and operated outside the US … then maybe they could give the one-fingered salute and just say that PureOS is not to be used in CA (which of course CA-based customers would completely ignore, as there are no penalties on the user).
I don’t care a fig – “bipartisan” simply means the Crips and the Bloods decided to color themselves blue and red so the dummies would think they were different while they rape, pillage and plunder. They don’t bat an eye at casualties on both sides because some collateral damage is acceptable to maintain control.
“Boogymen” are of no interest to me.
Bipartisan is the worst - because it means that there is no genuine debate about the legislation. It will sail through both houses without discussion or argument.
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Since I know you’re on this forum to combat misinformation, I would like to ask: where specifically in this bill does it say that California will not hold an operating system provider liable if they declare their system as “not for use in CA?”
Says the guy who blamed it all on “Lord Gavin” when it was absolutely every CA state congressman and it not even being within the Governor’s authority to create law. Newsom Derangement Syndrome.
It doesn’t say, but it doesn’t need to. It’s a principle of territorial jurisdiction: California can not regulate products which the vendor makes clear that it is not being (intentionally) distributed in California. Witness all of the products that add “not for sale in CA” when they don’t want to meet CA Prop 65 safety standards.
Specifically, it is the “Dormant Commerce Clause”. dormant commerce clause | Wex | US Law | LII / Legal Information Institute … and specifically its “extraterritoriality principle”.
Let me put it this way: Not a single state congressman voted no.
There were several industry groups that opposed the legislation before passage: Chamber of Progress, TechNet, and others. I’m sure there was some lobbying and letters. Overall, though, it was viewed as a “mild” control and a first stab to establish infrastructure so that it could be feasible to institute further legislation (like AUS and the restriction on social media for children under 16). It was a “toe in the water” and those things always seem to pass.
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People always compare this with social media restrictions but it goes way deeper. The social media restrictions couldn’t even properly define the term, ending up banning a list of selected platforms which lead to users picking unrestricted alternatives.
This law here dictates changes in software without any sort of internet connection even required. It’s not even related to certain content or applications. It demands technical changes across the board of nearly every piece of software because all operating systems shall enforce an API while all applications shall talk to this API, regarding further restrictions.
If FOSS developers comply to this here, you can be certain EU parliament politicians will demand chat control on OS level being implemented, pointing towards this feature request here. That is exactly why it’s important to not comply now.
Is this fear-mongering or real? I saw something on YouTube where someone said that Brazil passed a law similar to AB 1043 from California but the Brazil law goes into effect in 13 days and fines anyone who does not comply 9.5 million dollars per child who is able to download an OS that doesn’t identify their age.
I suddenly have an urge to try to web scrape versions of PureOS and other Linux distributions to the extent possible if this stuff is seriously about to be taken down. Does anyone have any advice for scraping?
If Purism is charged $9 million two weeks from now by the world order’s coordinated attack on Linux all around the globe all at once, obviously they’re going to have to make it illegal for anyone to use any version of PureOS older than latest, which wipes out a lot of historical records of available distributions or something.
I find value in stability and being able to run Byzantium for example if Crimson isn’t finished, and so if we suddenly live in a world where all software is illegal if it wasn’t published next Tuesday, I might quickly have to go dark and think about living my own way.
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Take this post with a large grain of salt.
My understanding is that the law in Brazil (and with Colombia coming up behind it) places the obligation on the provider of goods and services in Brazil (/Colombia), where those goods or services are age-restricted, to perform age verification that goes beyond the current absurdity of self-assessment by the end user. (In other words, this is closer to the recent Australian social media ban for children, than it is to California’s law.)
So clearly California’s measure could tie in with Brazil’s measure. If both existed then a web site providing goods and services in Brazil (/Colombia) could theoretically rely on the “signal” provided by the client device in accordance with California’s measure.
It would still be an absurdity for unlocked (open) platforms where the “signal” would likely have no integrity.
Also, while I didn’t verify your suggestion that the Brazil law comes into effect in 13 days time, the California law most certainly does not. So no actual supplier in Brazil is going to be able to use the California law if you are correct about the timing of the Brazil law. So suppliers in Brazil are going to have to cobble something together on their own.
As far as I can tell, the Brazil (/Colombia) law would have no direct impact on Purism. (There is the vague prospect that a forum would be deemed “social media” and someone could introduce the wildly false assertion that adults are making inappropriate contact with children via the forum, which could in theory force age verification on a forum.)
The real push for this kind of crap comes from those who will make a lot of money in providing age verification technology or services.
I recommend reading the law from Brazil. Even with translation tools it seems clear that it’s mostly directed towards service providers, meaning online services in the web or application stores.
The most important difference: Sanctions either are 10% of economic turnover in Brazil or a fine that scales from 10 reais (about 2$ US) up to 1000 reais per registered user of the sanctioned provider. So in case of free software that is mostly nothing. Also you would get a warning first with up to 30 days to comply in case a violation gets reported.
So I think that’s much more reasonable to deal with.
Relevant discussion on Qubes OS forum. Strongly recommended for reading:
Rob Braxman has a video on this -
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Yes, the law text from New York is effectively cementing that age assurance is required meaning a mechanism that’s not simply entering the age, a user feels like to enter. So that is pretty much unenforceable for any free software because it does not have any identification service or commercial registration linked to it (for good reasons).
So if it’s not possible to comply, why should distros even try? Not to mention that these laws also require applications to using this centralized API for filtering content per age bracket. I don’t see any Linux distribution enforcing all FOSS application developers/maintainers to implement that… however they would still be liable as provider/distributor of certain packages since at least the California law does not separate between developer and person who licenses or distributes software.
Therefore it wouldn’t be enough to implement some sort of age bracket service anyway. It’s best to simply agree on the fact that it’s impossible to comply, therefore everyone has put in reasonable efforts thinking of a solution (without compliant result) and becomes not liable.
Meanwhile in prior law
Technically the laws for age verification on OS level still intend to act globally. So now I wonder how that’s supposed to work within Europe if the US has to deregulate children’s privacy for the new rules to function. In the EU the GDPR still applies which comes with very strict terms regarding data collection of children. I assume it would already make sense for Europeans to contact their representatives at this point, so they don’t do the same.
I don’t see that. I take the very first clause as limiting it to people in CA - but it’s not well-worded.
So, as I proposed, some months ago … as part of the installer (where an installer is used), and it already asks you where you are for timezone purposes, straight off the bat for most people in the world you ‘know’ they are not in CA, so you can ignore this crap. If they happen to be in the ‘wrong’ timezone (i.e. they are in US west coast) then you would need to ask as a supplementary question whether they are in CA. If in CA, then you ask for a DOB.
Yes, in theory, they might be better to use geoip than timezone to determine whether in CA but I would guess that at that point in the installer there is no network connection and hence no IP address and hence no geoip. It would be possible to defer asking the age question until after there is an internet connection. (A motivated user could of course subvert that by bringing up a VPN before allowing any traffic from the newly installed computer to the internet.)
A sensible operating system would record the information that was the basis of the decision that this crap does not apply (for audit purposes).
In any case, any of the above should deal with the EU/GDPR issues.
All of the above purports to deal with the case that “account setup” occurs as part of the initial install (as in my experience is the case but it might depend on distro). Additional logic would be required for any subsequently added accounts.
i.e., every underage person targeted by this law.
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