Diacritiques

After letting Guillermito’s case settle down in my mind (and on the web) for a few days, some final notes (to complete what I wrote in parts one and two).

First, I got to meet Veuve Tarquine, the charming and knowledgeable law blogger, at Paris Carnet. She explained to me that the problem with Tegam’s (the software company’s) lawyer wasn’t that he was bad (as I had written), but given that it wasn’t at all clear that Guillermito had done anything wrong at all and made an excellent impression to boot, depicting him in a very bad light, implying (or implicating) that his motives were less than honourable, and obfuscating the technical issues were a valid legal strategy for Tegam.

Second, Lunar’s curiosity is piqued by something that made me wonder, too, ever since I started reading Eolas. The law professions aren’t very male-dominated any longer, in practice. There are loads of female judges, trial lawyers and even prosecutors. I wrote “even” because I can’t help thinking of a state-sanctioned strict father model at play in the role of the prosecution in France. So the symbolic side is a different matter entirely. All right, addressing lawyers as “Maître” can’t be much helped (yet), since “Maîtresse” already has two meanings#[1]. But the general sluggishness about feminine forms of professional titles makes me wonder what would happen if someone said “Madame la juge” instead of “le juge”.

There’s also the surprising development (surprising for those unused to the jack-booted thugs of the propaganda wars) in the comment sections of the two lawyerly blogs that help the non-legal public understand the case and the trial (Veuve Tarquine and Eolas).

Who, I wonder, benefits from multi-posting, under various nicknames, positive comments on ViGuard, and from making Guillermito look like an irresponsible cracker and copyright infringer, in short, following the same discourse strategy Tegam’s lawyer used? This commenter takes the cake: first the accusation of being a snitch (corbeau, literally raven or crow) hurled at Veuve Tarquine, then (translation mine):

Guillermito must be convicted because he has broken the Law, and the prosecutor was perfectly right in his closing statement. The commentaries directed at the prosecutor are apalling in a society that respects the Rule of the Law. It’s a disgrace!

[praise for ViGuard snipped]

I can’t stand geeks who fuck around.

[more praise]

Veuve Tarquine’s articles are offensive and dim-witted. It’s a disgrace!

(Il faut que Guillermito soit condamné, car il a transgressé la Loi et le procureur a parfaitement raison dans son réquisitoire. Les commentaires à l’encontre du proc sont consternants dans une société de droit. C’est une honte ! […] On a marre des informaticiens qui fouttent [sic] la merde ! […] Les articles de Veuve Tarquine sont insultants et débiles. C’est une honte !)

Er, oops? Dim-witted abuse indeed, but by whom?

It is precisely one of the under consideration whether Guillermito has broken the law at all. There has never been a case like this in France. And even if he has, it’s the prerogative of citizens in a democracy to disagree with the law and to work for its change. All our blog posts are minuscule grains of sand, infinitesimal additions to a body of documentation about the weaknesses of copyright law, as some of us see it. Just because Veuve Tarquine is a lawyer she’s still entitled to think for herself.

As for her finking on poor Tegam because she agrees with everyone including the prosecutor that their software isn’t very good, well, that’s ridiculous.

To finish, I found an image of the very painting of Justice I referred to in part 1, one Veuve Tarquine’s blog! And she has given me permission to use it here. Many thanks!

P.S.: ZDNet Australia has an article today. And so has The Register (thanks, Mookitty).

[1]: Apart from the obvious one, female elementary and kindergarten teachers are called “Maîtresse”.

The French noun rencontre signifies a chance meeting, an intersection of one’s path with that of someone else. Sometimes, the paths run in parallel for a while, often they diverge again quickly. The English quasi-equivalent is “encounter”, but as always, the connotations are just a little different.

This post is about three such encounters. All of them took place in the underground halls of Métro Line 14 in Paris. The first two last Thursday, after seeing off Steph at Gare de Lyon. The other one on Monday. I live near one of the end points of Line 14.#[1] It’s my home line.

• Hostility. I don’t have too many qualms about letting ticketless fellow human beings slip through the automatic ticket barriers with me. It’s the local custom. This case was slightly different, though: I was exhausted and jittery, and only saw the woman on the other side of the barriers when she covered, with her hand, the infra-red light that keeps them open while you pass through. I hadn’t really noticed the second woman.

  The goal of the manoeuver was to keep the barrier open so that the second woman could go through after me, but I hadn’t realized that either. Problem: woman number one was too quick, so the barrier didn’t even open for me. I grumbled at her.

  Once inside the station (with woman number two coming after me, which was when I understood what was going on), I got yelled at. What would it cost me to let some through? Connasse! I shrugged and said a bit pointedly that I didn’t care. Reaction, aggressively (for a moment I wondered if she’d hit me): “[If] you don’t break my balls, I won’t break your balls.” (”Tu me casses pas les couilles, je te casse pas les couilles.”) This converstaion taking place between two women was just so bizarre that I relaxed. I went my way and they went theirs. No balls were broken.

• The sticky cook. I had hardly recovered from the first encounter, descended to the platform and sat down, when a second one was coming my way. A man in a classy suit, tie and cloak, with a briefcase and a huge illustrated cookbook. I was scruffy, sweaty, clad in a pair of old jeans and even more jittery than before.

  I didn’t want to make conversation. He did. Greeted me. When a stranger greets me on the street, I nearly panic because, well, it might not be a stranger at all. Plus, the default metro behaviour of staring everywhere except into another traveller’s face is sort of silly, too, isn’t it? My error was the subject of my small talk. “Ah, is this a cookbook?” Not the most original of conversational turns; worse, it turned out that he was a cook by profession. Member of the National Cuisine Academy or some such. Living right next door to me.

  During the 5min metro ride, an interrogation ensued. I didn’t want to talk about myself, nor about what I do, so I talked about the internet and blogs (which is something I do do, though, but had the advantage that he didn’t know anything about it.) Emerging from “our” station, I barely managed to get away without kissing him goodbye.#[2] Disconcerting.

• The two idiots. Idiot comes from a Greek word meaning private person: someone who doesn’t care about anyone but themselves.

  Example. I’m on the escalator down to the platform at my end of Line 14. A metro train is waiting, doors open, ready to depart. Trains leave every two minutes. So, okay, it’s not strictly necessary to catch this particular train. But I want to. In front of me there are two men, my age or a bit younger. They are comparing their iPods, PDAs, smartphones, whatever. And are proceeding leisurely from the escalator towards the train doors, blocking my path. The bell announces the imminent closing of the doors. They fine-tune their speed so that they will just manage to get in, but whoever is behind them won’t.

  Well, I did, but with a bruise on my arm. Line 14 has modern doors that can’t easily be held open. Oh, the surprised innocence on their faces when I glared daggers at them.

[1]: “Terminus. Tous les voyageurs sont invités à déscendre. Last stop. Would all passengers kindly leave the train. Terminal. Invida a todos los pasajeros a bajar.” [2]: This would be the customary parting ritual between friends who are not both male (or who are really very close, whatever their respecive sex).

The new site design just went live. Some fine-tuning will follow. The new theme#[1] has been tested in standards-compliant browsers. Corrections to take Internet Explorer’s defective CSS interpretation into account will follow when I have time to log into Windows and fiddle with the style. It shouldn’t look too bad even now.

[1]: yes, a real theme for WordPress v. 1.5-beta

Anagram poetry has taken hold. Here are three attempts, and several more are in the works. Each poem is dedicated to an online or offline friend. Should you recognize yourself, you can keep yours. ah bland honey jar ann had herbal joy rehab only had jan oh jan, bleary hand! handy banjo haler heal nonhardy jab posh hebetation hip banshee […]

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GENITALIC WHIRS by A Chisel Writing erica whistling heliac writings citing welsh air a new girlish tic lawn-git cries hi wiling heirs act! angelic his writ within glaciers […]

This is the second part of an article on Guillermito’s trial for criminal copyright infringement. The first part is here. It is not my goal to summarise the entire case: I am not a lawyer, copyright law is different in every country (and my knowledge of it little more than hazy), and I also don’t have […]

The new year started with a bang#[1]: Steph is visiting Paris. The more common tourist attractions aren’t good enough for this Anglo-Swiss star of the francophone blogosphere, so after lunch and some pleasant conversation, we went to a criminal trial. Not any old trial, of course, but Guillermito’s. French blogs are talking about the case […]