[geeks] Three heads

[joshua d boyd]

On Tue, Aug 07, 2001 at 11:22:49PM +0100, David Cantrell wrote:
> A signature on a piece of paper is not necessary to make a contract.
> Contracts can be verbal, for example.  The difficulty comes when you
> try to prove in court that the contract ever existed.

We have verbal contracts here to.  I believe that the weight of proof
falls to the plaintif.  Further, for some things, verbal contracts are
invalid reguardless of proof of their existance.  For instance, purchasing
land doesn't count.  I would imagine that anything that could cost as much
as a house also might not count.

I wonder how effective it would be to argue that digital signatures would
have the weight of verbal contracts.  If so, they would be a heck of a lot
harder to prove.
 
> BTW, digital signatures have legal basis (that is, the courts will
> treat them as if they were pen and ink signatures) in most of the EU.
> I laugh at you silly backward Americans and your brownouts and analogue
> phone switches :-)

What is the UK definition of a digital signature?  Normally, I believe it
is the defendentss job (in the US at least) to prove that a pen and paper
signature is false.  Is the UK the same way?  If so, does the same apply
to digital signatures made using just an email address and password over
an unencrypted connection?

PS, very few phone switches are still analouge in the US to my
understanding.

-- 
Joshua D. Boyd