Subject: Process vs disclaimers

From: Randy Presuhn <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 4 Nov 2002 14:26:47 -0800 (PST)

Hi -

I'm running across more and more disclaimers like this one
in working group mailing list archives and on the mailing
lists themselves.  Should this WG address this topic?

...
> The information contained in this message may be privileged 
> and confidential and protected from disclosure.  If the 
> reader of this message is not the intended recipient, or an 
> employee or agent responsible for delivering this message to 
> the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any 
> reproduction, dissemination or distribution of this 
> communication is strictly prohibited. If you have received 
> this communication in error, please notify us immediately by 
> replying to the message and deleting it from your computer.
...

 ------------------------------------------------------
 Randy Presuhn          BMC Software, Inc.  SJC-1.3141
 [email-masked]  2141 North First Street
 Tel: +1 408 546-1006   San José, California 95131  USA
 ------------------------------------------------------
 My opinions and BMC's are independent variables.
 ------------------------------------------------------
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https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ipr-wg

---

From: John Morris <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 4 Nov 2002 18:03:41 -0500

>lists themselves.  Should this WG address this topic?

This kind of disclaimer emerged after lawyers started to use e-mail, 
both among lawyers and between lawyers and their clients (including 
between in-house lawyers and in-house execs/engineers).  Now some 
in-house counsel suggest sticking the disclaimer on all corporate 
e-mail, "just to be on the safe side."

The function of the disclaimer is to give a lawyer or a company a 
small chance to un-ring the bell in the event that an actual 
attorney-client privileged e-mail is inadvertently sent to the wrong 
addressee.  In a litigation, it might also (mildly) bolster a claim 
that a given e-mail should not be produced in discovery.

In the context of a posting to a public e-mail list, it is 
meaningless.  Assuming an e-mail posting was intended to be sent to 
the public e-mail list, nothing in the disclaimer would in any way 
counteract the effect of the IETF's "note well" or its IPR policies. 
It can and should be ignored, both by you and by this WG.

My 2 cents....

John

>  Tel: +1 408 546-1006   San JosÈ, California 95131  USA

---

From: "John R Levine" <[email-masked]>
Date: 4 Nov 2002 18:05:32 -0500

> lists themselves.  Should this WG address this topic?

In the U.S., these disclaimers are utterly meaningless.  If both the
sender and the receipient are lawyers there might be some effect, since
I gather that there are long-standing rules about what lawyers do when an
opposing counsel sends them something by mistake, but for the other 99% of
us, they're just wasted electrons.

> > and confidential and protected from disclosure.  ...

Regards,
John Levine, [email-masked], Primary Perpetrator of "The Internet for Dummies",
Information Superhighwayman wanna-be, http://iecc.com/johnl, Sewer Commissioner
"I dropped the toothpaste", said Tom, crestfallenly.