
US blogger fined 8,000 Euros by France for criticizing Société Générale - jstalin
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2013/11/mish-fined-8000-euros-for-quoting_20.html
======
epsylon
The comments here are atrocious. I expected more from HN than senseless
French-bashing and _' Murica_ flag-waving.

A few informations for context:

\- Two bloggers were fined, one French, and the American one for quoting the
French.

\- The fine emanated from the Commission des Sanctions (sanction committee) of
the AMF (Autorité des Marchés Financiers), the French stock market regulator.

\- It's supposed to be independent, but they are notoriously in bed with
banks, with most members of the commission being former higher executives of
major banks. Therefore, it's no surprise that they will do this kind of stunts
in order to protect their interests.

\- It's been talked about in several (right-wing) publications like Atlantico
or Les Échos, where journalists have pointed out that this is one more action
that proves the absence of credibility of the AMF.

~~~
marknutter
Funny, I expected more from HN than people using the term "Murica". Also,
before complaining about the quality of comments one should give the system
time to correct itself as people vote on them. Otherwise you may end up with a
highly visible comment that refers to outdated information..

~~~
epsylon
Well, I apologize for having gotten a bit carried away; of course not all
comments in this thread are worthless.

That being said, I stand by my opinion that reddit-style pun threads [1] or
random and unrelated politically biased ramblings [2][3] really shouldn't
belong to HN discussions.

[1]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6775262](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6775262)

[2]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6775363](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6775363)

[3]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6775474](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6775474)

~~~
jackmaney
For attempting to tell HN what belongs on HN, I hereby fine you $500,000 USD,
payable in solid gold Dungeons & Dragons miniatures. Any response must be
written in Morse code while cooking a souffle.

------
gnu8
I hereby fine Société Générale 8,000 bitcoins for violating the American
constitution (never mind jurisdiction since they don't care for it either),
notice duly served by posting this comment in a public forum and witnessed by
whoever happens to read this.

~~~
Tloewald
Yeah the United States never does anything outside its jurisdiction that
anyone else finds annoying.

That said, the level of institutionalized corruption in France is pretty
outrageous. If I recall correctly, the president of France receives a truck
load of cash every year which can be used with zero accountability (and that's
_legal_ ). Of course the French (and pretty much any democratic country) can
look at our electoral system and laugh.

~~~
cobrausn
_Yeah the United States never does anything outside its jurisdiction that
anyone else finds annoying._

Except we aren't talking about the US right now, we are talking about one
particularly boneheaded action by France.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism)

~~~
Tloewald
This is what appears to me to be an American (or USian to be more precise)
complaining about France fining a US Blogger, so a direct comparison of the US
to France is highly apropos.

~~~
PhasmaFelis
Except that Mike Shedlock is not personally America and has no control of the
actions of the American government.

Also, there's only one nation in the world called "America," so it's plenty
precise. The continents are "North America" and "South America," or jointly
"the Americas." Posturing aside, I don't believe that a reasonable person is
likely to confuse them.

~~~
Tloewald
I was responding to someone who was cheerfully making anti-French statements
because a US citizen was mistreated by some piece of the French government.
This is no different (except in degree) from an Pakistani citizen (say) being
killed by the US government, also outside its legal jurisdiction.

~~~
jlgreco
Both are bad _(although obviously there is a discrepancy in seriousness
here)_. We should not fail to criticize one because the other also happens.

~~~
Tloewald
Yes but to make sweeping complaints about the _French_ as an _American_ is
absurd. (And note that I myself pointed out that France has a serious problem
with institutionalized corruption, not that the US has anything to crow
about.)

~~~
jlgreco
> _" Yes but to make sweeping complaints about the French as an American is
> absurd."_

I'll repeat what I've said elsewhere in this dicussion:

 _" Insane laws in one place do not make laws in another place any less
insane. If we universalized your attitude towards criticism, then only those
blessed to live in utopias would have the privilege of leveling complaints at
other systems."_

Americans _do_ get to criticize the French government. Americans get to
criticize the American government. French get to criticize the French
government. French get to criticize the American government. Zimbabweans get
to criticize the Portuguese government. The Portuguese get to criticize the
the Swiss government.

Everybody gets to criticize any government they please, no matter what
government happens to lay stake to the place that they live. It is absurd to
think otherwise.

------
camus2
Not surprising, there is no free speech in France.

Especially when it comes to crooked banks or politicians. France is a strange
country that likes to give lessons about democracy to the rest of the world,
but when you look at things closer, France is closer to a monarchy than a
democracy.

Everything is so centralised that information usually comes from an single
source of truth, that journalist dont even bother questioning since they are
all married with politicians (literally).

~~~
baby
> Not surprising, there is no free speech in France.

Entirely false, except if you mean ABSOLUTE free speech. In this case I would
argue no country has one. I guess you come from the US? See :
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_free_speech_excep...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_free_speech_exceptions)

> Especially when it comes to crooked banks or politicians.

Weren't we talking about the 1% recently where you live?

> France is closer to a monarchy than a democracy.

I like those empty statements.

Furthermore, who is upvoting your comment? It's just plain bashing with no
real arguments.

~~~
antimagic
You know what, I'm willing to bet that camus2 is either French, or at least
French-speaking (sorry camus2, your English is awesome, way better than my
French, and I have been living in France for 10 years, but still, you make
mistakes sometimes...). Which makes your comment rather ridiculous, seeing as
it is one big ad-hominem based on nationality...

~~~
samolang
Yes. He is.
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6757165](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6757165)

------
declan
This judgment is unenforceable in the United States as a matter of public
policy (thanks to our First Amendment). So it's merely an attempt by Société
Générale to muzzle critics.

If Mish were a multinational company with operations in France, it would be
different. But he's not. So he can gleefully ignore it, as he is, correctly,
doing.

~~~
Xylakant
> So he can gleefully ignore it, as he is, correctly, doing.

Ignoring it would mean "never base your action on that decision". However, now
he can't travel to France or any of the french territories (Martinique etc.).
That's not what I'd call ignoring. It's a shitty situation: Fined for invalid
reasons in a trial where you never had a chance to fight.

~~~
declan
Yes, other countries have silly laws. I'm sure if you set up a blog
complaining about the king of Swaziland, for instance, and his predilection
for selecting an additional wife, willing or not, every year from the
selection of bare-breasted virgin teenage girls paraded before him[1], you
might not want to visit that particular corner of Africa.

But the reach of Swazi or French laws is limited unless you visit Swazi or
French soil. And in the case of the French libel law in question here, I'm not
clear it would even preclude a visit to Paris. Do you have any citation for
the proposition that a visitor would be arrested for what would be a civil
tort?

BTW, if he fought it in France, he would lose. See yesterday's "due process"
discussion. If it's a bad law, due process helps you not one whit.

[1] True:
[http://www.theguardian.com/world/2005/aug/30/aids.andrewmeld...](http://www.theguardian.com/world/2005/aug/30/aids.andrewmeldrum)

------
csmuk
UK banks are just as bad. A company I worked for previously gave a bank's
investment products a high risk rating because of poor investments/compliance
and they sent all sorts of nasty shit out.

Every bank has a "send people nasty shit" department by the looks.

The answer is as always: "fuck off".

~~~
tombrossman
I think the better answer is to not reply at all or ever acknowledge receipt
of said 'nasty shit'. Make every step a challenge for the opponent, it's a war
of attrition. And never get mad at the lawyer, s/he usually bills by the hour
and they are delighted to send out useless letters all day long. Informing the
bank that this is a waste of time is bad for job security.

~~~
Joeri
It's perfectly fine to get mad at the lawyer for abusing their skill doing
such people-hostile work. They can choose a more honorable line of lawyering.

~~~
logfromblammo
...such as ambulance-chasing.

~~~
nealabq
...or running for political office.

------
HeXetic
I don't understand how this court system can be so silly as to fail to
recognize that it has no jurisdiction over someone. Isn't the question of
jurisdiction one of the first steps in any court case?

~~~
Xylakant
What do you mean by "no jurisdiction over someone?" If a crime was committed
in france they can ask for extradition. That would probably not result in
anything in this case, but as long as it's a crime by french law committed in
france the case may as well be valid. So all the court will check whether a
punishable crime was committed in france.

They could collect the fine when the blogger enters france or maybe, depending
on the case, the european union or an associated state.

~~~
declan
France has no jurisdiction. U.S. courts will not enforce this civil judgment.
Our 1A precludes them from doing so. And the blogger in question said he's not
going to France.

(BTW, a civil judgment is not "a crime by French law.")

~~~
aktiur
It was not a civil judgment but a _public_ one handled by an independant
administrative authority with the power to pronounce sanctions (French
_public_ law is separate from both criminal and civil law and includes
administrative law).

It is not so much about free speech: the two guys have been fined for
publishing incorrect information about the financial situation of a bank. It
is more about financial regulation than free speech. I'm not so familiar with
american law, but I'm pretty sure you got related situations (for example
concerning the handling of sensitive financial information, or insider
trading, etc.)

Disregarding the question of the reality of what they've been accused of, the
fine against Mish is illegal considering the right of defendants to
translation and an interpretor has not been respected. This decision will be
very probably striken down by any real judge that get her hands on this case.

~~~
Dylan16807
>I'm not so familiar with american law, but I'm pretty sure you got related
situations (for example concerning the handling of sensitive financial
information, or insider trading, etc.

We have laws that apply to stakeholders and insiders. As far as I know third
parties are free to say or even make up anything they want, as long as it's
not fraud or libel.

------
witek
Hilarious. It baffles me how this country continues to operate given the
massive public spending/benefits, delightful reforms (e.g. proposed 80% tax
rate for high-earners) and pretty xenophobic view on immigration. ALL of my
(highly-skilled) French friends do not plan to return in the foreseeable
future.

~~~
simias
While the situation in TFA is spectacularly ridiculous and shameful for me as
a french I don't think it warrants this kind of gratuitous french bashing.
Unless of course you want to explain to us what the french taxation laws have
to do with this particular court decision.

Also it's 75%, not 80%. That might not be very significant overall but it
makes me doubt you really know what you're talking about.

~~~
witek
I guess my comment wasn't strictly limited to this court decision but I
wouldn't consider it as French-bashing. I have nothing against your country
and compatriots, and I have enjoyed many fun moments there. However, I and my
two French flatmates are genuinely curious how France can continue on its
current public-spending/entrepreneurship-throttling trajectory.

~~~
simias
It's an interesting discussion and I have mixed feelings about the current
french "trajectory" as you put it. However I don't think this is the place to
discuss politics so I'll refrain from engaging in this debate.

However I think from a hacker perspective it should be interesting to see a
country that tries to do things differently from what appears to be the norm
in most of the western world and whether it'll succeed or fail utterly. I know
that most people on HN are big on "laissez-faire" and business deregulations
but it's a bit disingenuous to present it as the solution to all problems.

We value thinking out of the box for engineering, why not for politics? "Look,
a new economic system in 30 lines of socialism!".

I wish people were less adamant and more level-headed when it came to politics
and economy, it's hard to have a reasonable discussion on those subjects.

------
cinquemb
This might be pretty meta, but from looking at some of these comments makes me
wonder how in the age of the internet, which give us a de facto global commons
onto exchange ideas/information/currency and securely for those who take the
steps to do so, some people still have an an affinity for whichever line drawn
around them the sand in which one had no say in personally. Can we form
something better through the aforementioned means? And what will it take for
more people to start looking outside the box for solutions? More increased
hardships of whimsical imposition?

~~~
tokenizer
If I understand you correctly, I think it has to do with the fact that their
narratives don't align with the information. And that's only if the sources
are credible (to them), the bias isn't obvious/against the readers bias, and
the facts are presented clearly to them (presentation).

So the major barrier to what you & I enjoy as the internet for people to adopt
in my opinion, are the communication barriers we all face everyday. You and I
most likely are somewhat uncommon because more people are more apt to do their
socializing in real life.

That said, we are seeing global communication at it's best. For instance, I'm
an anarchist. But more specifically, and libertarian-socialist. One of my many
hobbies is to argue with other political theory enthusiasts. More
specifically, other Anarchists.

For such a small group of people, it would make more sense to band together in
common ideology to become stronger (like the internet), but humans have a way
with creating division where there ought not to be none IMO.

Would love you opinion on if removing this division in ourselves is possible,
or if you don't believe that's universally true.

~~~
cinquemb
I think I would have to agree with your opinion about banding together in
common ideology, but I'm not sure about the stronger part (what that means to
me).

What I mean by that is that I haven't (nor do I think I will ever fully)
decide(d) if that becoming stronger is to exert that influence over other ways
of thinking/being or to become stronger so that me as the individual can live
and move about the earth as freely as I choose understanding the danger that I
may present upon myself and that upon other human beings trying to do the same
or something else. So I guess whether the division in ourselves can be removed
or not, It will ultimately come down to the individual or small group of
people to make it so either way. And that's where I am now: working on
something with a friend (maybe people more in the future) that will help
explore what that means to me.

~~~
tokenizer
All the best!

------
sebkomianos
I would be more happy to read something like "Human blogger fined 8,000 euros
by the french justice department for criticizing a bank".

Now it sounds like the people of France decided to fine just an American
blogger.

~~~
renang
Looks like a bad choice of re-title. But I don't think it was intended to
highlight the fact the blogger was American.

> Human blogger fined 8,000 euros by the french justice department for
> criticizing a bank

You missed the point where they were fining a non-French blogger that was
giving straight facts and practicing his free speech.

~~~
bausson
Well, those are both bad title, since french justice has nothing to do with
it.

"Human blogger fined 8,000 euros by the french assholes for criticizing a
bank" is the closest to reality.

"Human blogger fined 8,000 euros by the french independent authority for
criticizing a bank" is close enough to reality and politically correct.

------
grecy
The hypocrisy of the comments here is hilarious.

This is exactly the same as the MPAA shutting down websites and fining people
all over the world. All the people here crying "they have no jurisdiction!"
are really just getting a taste what their own government has been doing to
people all around the world for decades.

Never mind 'Murica going around the world enforcing their laws and ideals with
their armed forces.

~~~
scarmig
Hacker News is certainly a hotbed of pro-MPAA activism.

------
salient
Can I just say how much I _hate_ that Google automatically turns blogspot.com
into the TLD of your own country? Who the hell wants that?

~~~
iSnow
Google does (or did?, I only use the browser search field) that to the search
page URL as well.

~~~
marcosdumay
And that's maddening. If I want to search some english terms, the easiest way
to get meaningfull results it by tunneling my query through some computer at
the US.

Google just assumes that everybody can only speach one language, and is only
intersted in one country, even when explicitly told otherwise.

~~~
DanBC
...and I want it to work the other way. I want to be able to enter English
terms, and have pages from other languages returned.

I have no idea how that would work, but it's frustrating finding my www
experience stuck in a UK/US bubble.

As for Google, does /ncr (no country redirect) still work?

------
themodelplumber
This coverage is going to get him more than 8KE worth of blog visitors.
Particularly the "hey, this little blogger was sharp enough to uncover some
real weird stuff on the part of SG" angle. Blog readers eat that up.

~~~
RyJones
While Mish isn't as well known as Drudge, he isn't a little blogger. Just
because he doesn't write about growth hacking his angular startup into YC
doesn't mean he has no reach.

~~~
wpietri
I suggest you add "growth hacking my angular startup into YC" into your HN
bio. That's beautiful.

------
eliteraspberrie
_The AFM has no jurisdiction over me, so they won 't collect. As a US citizen
living in the US, I am not subject to the absurdities of French laws, or
French witch hunts. All they get from me is a vow to never go to France._

This was likely the desired outcome: a chilling effect. However, there is no
need to be intimidated, Mr. Shedlock can still travel freely to France without
worry. There are no debtors prisons, no credit rating agencies, and assets are
difficult to seize outside of a criminal conviction for violent crimes. At
worst, he will receive more letters in French.

------
salient
These stupid short-sighted governments are going to ruin the Internet for the
rest of us through their greed for money (like in this case) and power (NSA
mass surveillance).

~~~
logfromblammo
Some might argue that they already have ruined the Internet. National
firewalls, massive endemic surveillance, and political-industrial shenanigans
involving the telecoms controlling the backbones are a significant threat, and
not trivial to route around. When powerful parties begin aggressively policing
the content on the network instead of just controlling the infrastructure,
that is just the evidence that we have already lost.

Viable efforts to decentralize, universally encrypt traffic, and support true
identities alongside pseudonyms and anonymous users started too late to avoid
stepping backwards on service quality while moving forward on network
freedoms.

------
agilord
I think Tim O'Reilly or Jeff Jarvis or Clay Shirky (unfortunately I don't have
the bookmark anymore) already addressed this:

The case is a prime example that what you write is not only the jurisdiction
_where you write it_ , but also the jurisdiction _where people read it_. (And
the jurisdiction where it stored and where it is going through as network
traffic.)

~~~
tbrownaw
_what you write is not only the jurisdiction_

I think you a word there.

It's fairly absurd to say anyone who posts anything online should follow the
laws of _all_ places where whatever they posted could be read.

~~~
agilord
If you publish something, it can be read everywhere. There should be no
surprise that people will judge your words based on their customs, on their
laws, on their terms, and they will act within their jurisdiction.

But that goes both ways: if a "Nigerian prince" scams you, you will not stop
just because you were originally out of his jurisdiction.

------
nraynaud
Note that this stupidity from a French independent administration didn't end
up in droning a whole family and in the end everybody is good for a laugh and
life carries on. This case has absolutely no chance of passing any legal test.

------
iSnow
>The AFM has no jurisdiction over me, so they won't collect. As a US citizen
living in the US, I am not subject to the absurdities of French laws, or
French witch hunts.

Just you wait till the transatlantic free-trade association is in place...

------
PythonicAlpha
I don't see so much difference in France, the US or other countries:

Money has not become king in our society, no! It has become God and the money-
people are the priests of our religion! We are not so much better as the
middle ages where.

------
xacaxulu
At least Commission des Sanctions didn't send drones to bomb the guys with
hellfire missiles. I'd say the US doesn't have much moral authority on
extranational law enforcement, fiscal or otherwise.

------
amercade
Please stop playing their game. The 1%, or maybe the 0.01%, wants the rest of
us to fight stupidly over which country is better. "My laws are better", "your
banks are crap" etc

This is a world wide class warfare we are living. Don't play the countries
confrontation games. Don't be their pawn.

We the people should be together against the powerful ones and demand our
rights everywhere, not just in our country.

We need to globalize justice, not just the economy.

<slightly demagogic and rushed rant/>

------
Mithaldu
That guy managed to instantly go from slightly above zero respect to negative,
when i copy-pasted stuff and noticed that his site saw fit to add spam onto
that in the buffer.

~~~
thekevan
So you copied his content and were mad that he included text which noted you
copied his content?

~~~
rvkennedy
Ctrl+C means copy the text, with optional formatting. It doesn't mean "run a
script", and this little trick implies two things: first, that the author is
going to assume that anyone who copies text is trying to steal the content
without attribution; secondly, that having been corrected in your naughty
ways, you'll blithely accept the link he's pasted in there.

It's a web faux-pas, the equivalent of having your whole site in Flash, or
trying to disable right-click for fear that someone might steal your precious,
precious content.

~~~
thekevan
"his content"

It's not yours. He can do what he wants with it.

------
lasermike026
So much for Liberty, Fraternity, and Equality.

------
pjc50
Compare American "product defamation" law:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_libel_laws](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_libel_laws)
and the UK "Trafigura" lawsuit.

------
lifeisstillgood
"Hey France! you can't possibly borrow more than 27 times your house's value,
that's crazy. Look at the US, they only borrow 17 times their houses value -
that's prudent fiscal behaviour."

yeah I feel so much happier

------
vernie
I hereby fine Société Générale for overuse of acute accents.

------
bwb
lol, fuck the french :)

I say that in complete jest, but that is hilarious.

------
ffrryuu
Freedom is dead.

