Re: [Fsfe-uk] Bromcom undead ?

[Ian Lynch]

On Tue, 2004-11-30 at 21:27, Ralph Janke wrote:

> >
> >Surely the DfES would be interested in setting up a test case to force
> >the issue. 
> >
> I think, DfES is not in the driving seat,

Well they were the ones who took it to court in the first place! All
they need do is say that they will back a legal fight for any school
that is taken to court - Ok, Charles Clarke has backed off verbally but
why did he allow the original challenge then? All we need is lots of
school governors to write to home and say they ar appauled that the DfES
starts this hare running and fails to follow through and they will
advise all the parents to vote for a party that backs its schools at the
next general election.

>  since this is a defense for a 
> lawsuit that has been started against a school. However,
> there might be some way to force the issue by suing yourself or 
> something like that (in US such funny strategies are very
> common). I don't know , in which way the UK legal system would support 
> that.
> In the normal case, the schools are deploying wwireless (802.11) 
> equipment. Either Bromcom is just sitting idle, then nothing happens.
> If Bromcom sues one of those schools, then DfES could come in an support 
> the school with the necessary legal resources
> to defend against the suit.

Yes, but Clarke seemed to be saying it was down to individual schools?

> Another way, DfES could help is to work on configuration that do not 
> violate claim 7 and publish them to the schools. If that would
> happen publicly (i.e. on a webpage) this might push Bromcom to sue as 
> well, otherwise the schools at least have some
> help to deal with this issue. The problem is most schools do not have 
> the expertise to deal with this issue, neither the technical part,
> nor the legal one. I also think a lot of Governors are probably rather 
> hesitent to take risks....

Quite so, see above. Its called leadership - something the DfES keep
going on about for schools with things like the NCSL but seem very
reluctant to do themselves.
> 
> Ralph
-- 
Ian Lynch <address@hidden>
ZMS Ltd