[–]rawfan (_) 68 points 5 hours ago (88|17)
I can't begin to explain how outlandish this is. Two stories come to mind:
a) a German computer science prof was arrested for violating US munition export laws when he entered the USA. His name is Klaus Knopper and he was arrested for making his Linux distribution Knoppix available for download from Germany (!) while not prohibiting people from certain countries to download it.
b) US v ELCOMSOFT
On July 16, 2001, Dmitry Sklyarov, a Russian citizen employed by ElcomSoft who was at the time visiting the United States for DEF CON, was arrested and jailed for allegedly violating the United States DMCA law by writing ElcomSoft's Advanced eBook Processor software. A landmark court case ensued, setting precedents and attracting much public attention and protest. On December 17, 2002, ElcomSoft was found not guilty of all four charges under the DMCA.
The guy was in prison for a year. How THE **** can I do something completely legal in my country, far away from US soil and be arrested there? Imagine German authorities arresting US citizens for hitting their children when they were back in the US (corporal punishment is outlawed in Germany).
I can't travel to the US because some published work I've done under freedom of research principles would violate the DMCA.
The US government asking the UK to extradite A KID because of a ****ing website takes this to a whole new level.
A question I ask myself: the content-industry holds a low percentage of the gross national product. How is their lobby powerful enough to make the US government ask for extradition or (in the case of Sweden) threaten with trade sanctions?
Edit: Also I believe I made a thread on this topic a few weeks ago. It was like US laws now apply internationally or something. I forget the actual topic. Anyways this sucks.
edit on 11/4/2011 by drew1749 because: (no reason given)

