What do you think about this ?

[Rainer SLP]

Hi,

A friend found this article ...

http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2015/05/wyoming_law_against_data_collection_protecting_ranchers_by_ignoring_the.html?wpsrc=sh_all_dt_fb_top

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

That is so unbelievable, if true, that it begs to hear the other side.

[Misirlou]

Yes, I'd like to hear the other side too.

About 15 years ago, my brother-in-law invested in a coal bed methane operation outside Gillette, where he lived. He ended up with a new pond that formed from water that had been pumped through the methane bed. Pretty quickly, it attracted water fowl as they passed by during their migrations, so he decided to have the water tested, in case it might be a danger to the birds.

It turned out to be extremely clean, and well within the limits of any measurable contaminant for human drinkability. When the methane operation proved not to be profitable, he started bottling and selling the water, more or less as a joke. Someone unknown stocked the pond with game fish at one point, which seemed fun too.

Then he read a paper by an EPA official who suggested that the coal bed methane fields were generating dangerous contaminates in nearby water bodies, and should all be shut down. Of course, my brother-in-law immediately shipped him a case of the bottled water, along with all of the test results from his pond. The guy refused to talk to him after many attempts, and eventually threatened some sort of federal action if he continued selling the water, regardless of any test results.

So I can understand some local distrust of federal environmental data collectors.

[Peter McLennan]

This legislation is just as bad as the "ag gag" law in Idaho.  Take pictures of animal cruelty or poor farming practices and you go to jail.

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

... So I can understand some local distrust of federal environmental data collectors.

I was initially about to file it under anti-government (federal in particular) nuts, but the article says that you can't share data with state bodies just as well!? So, one branch of the state government (legislative) passes a law that makes it a crime to communicate with another branch of the same government (executive)!? WTF?

[pcgpcg]

Says a lot about the mindset of extreme conservatism. We want our rights and our freedom. We want to be able to display cartoons of Mohammed and anything else we want because this is America and we are free. Wait... don't show pictures of our profitable companies damaging the environment.

[Tim Lookingbill]

Could someone here point to the summary of this "statute" linked to in that Slate article where it doesn't say it's about expanding trespassing law with regard to taking photos on private land but not public?

I keep reading the word "trespassing" all over that summary but I can't understand where it's limiting photographers from taking photos on public land.

https://legiscan.com/WY/text/SF0012/id/1151882

[spidermike]

Could someone here point to the summary of this "statute" linked to in that Slate article where it doesn't say it's about expanding trespassing law with regard to taking photos on private land but not public?

I keep reading the word "trespassing" all over that summary but I can't understand where it's limiting photographers from taking photos on public land.

https://legiscan.com/WY/text/SF0012/id/1151882

That is the problem with cases like this - the lawyers jump in and play a lot of 'what if' scenarios, many of which are seemingly unrealistic and exceed the original intention of the statute. Which actually is not a bad thing because over the years the case law creeps little by little until it is knocking on the door of those examples that were originally htought 'extreme'.

[Misirlou]

Says a lot about the mindset of extreme conservatism. We want our rights and our freedom. We want to be able to display cartoons of Mohammed and anything else we want because this is America and we are free. Wait... don't show pictures of our profitable companies damaging the environment.

Operative word being "extreme." One might flip that argument around on behalf of extreme liberalism. American taxpayers need to pay for the Piss Christ, but it's completely acceptable to publically attack someone, to the point that they're forced out of their job, because years ago they made a private contribution to a religious group that happens not to support gay marriage.

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

...but it's completely acceptable to publically attack someone, to the point that they're forced out of their job, because years ago they made a private contribution to a religious group that happens not to support gay marriage.

Amen, brother!

[Robert Roaldi]

but it's completely acceptable to publically attack someone, to the point that they're forced out of their job, because years ago they made a private contribution to a religious group that happens not to support gay marriage.

That may say more about the silly state of current social media. Be interesting when the first of the unlawful dismissal cases gets to court. I understand that it may be annoying if the interweb targets someone for some reason, but it's not clear why it should be ok to fire that person because they were so targeted.

This was on point today, I thought: http://dilbert.com/strip/2015-05-15

[Misirlou]

This was on point today, I thought: http://dilbert.com/strip/2015-05-15

That is quite good.

[amolitor]

It's not quite clear what the bill actually says.

It's *possible* that it means that going on to public land without explicit authorization to collect certain kinds of data makes you guilty of a new kind of trespass. That is, I think, one way to interpret it.

It suggests that you need:

- to own the land
- have some paper in hand (a contract, written permission from the owner/lessee) to collect data

in order to not be guilty of "trespass to unlawfully collect resource data".

Clearly what they're after is 'Joe Rancher is leasing a billion acres of public land for pennies, and his cows are crapping in the water like nobody's business, you have to stay off the land he's leased'. But it's not obvious to me that they've excluded parks etc.

[NancyP]

Freedom of speech implies freedom to be contradicted or ridiculed, freedom to spout off about a subject about which you know nothing - and be called on the carpet by other speakers, freedom to be completely ignored by individuals who have heard a weak argument dozens of times before.

[pcgpcg]

... It's *possible* that it means that going on to public land without explicit authorization to collect certain kinds of data makes you guilty of a new kind of trespass...
It suggests that you need:
- to own the land
...in order to not be guilty of "trespass to unlawfully collect resource data".
Clearly what they're after is 'Joe Rancher is leasing a billion acres of public land for pennies, and his cows are crapping in the water like nobody's business, you have to stay off the land he's leased'...

Yes, but if it's public land, then you and I own it and Joe Rancher is leasing it from us.

[Tim Lookingbill]

It's not quite clear what the bill actually says.

It's *possible* that it means that going on to public land without explicit authorization to collect certain kinds of data makes you guilty of a new kind of trespass. That is, I think, one way to interpret it.

It suggests that you need:

- to own the land
- have some paper in hand (a contract, written permission from the owner/lessee) to collect data

in order to not be guilty of "trespass to unlawfully collect resource data".

Clearly what they're after is 'Joe Rancher is leasing a billion acres of public land for pennies, and his cows are crapping in the water like nobody's business, you have to stay off the land he's leased'. But it's not obvious to me that they've excluded parks etc.

Thanks, Andrew, for tunneling through that statute to find the specifics for making it more clear and concise.

Living in Texas all my life I've encountered the ill effects of rancher's cattle fecal runoff polluting the Guadalupe River that runs through our state and empties into the Gulf Of Mexico. I don't swim or eat fish caught in it for this very reason. In fact back in Kerrville 12 years ago I once caught a big channel catfish and smelt a strong odor of cowshit while cleaning and filleting it. Never smelt that before cleaning Redfish, Trout and Drum out of the Gulf. I threw the entire catfish in the trash. No way I was eating that.

Now I don't know if any of those ranchers owned the land or were leasing public land but I could never actually see cowshit go into the river during rains so I wouldn't know how photographing it would help.