Spelling corrections are now export-controlled

[Peter Gutmann]

Looks like the USG is going to outdo its ITAR silliness of a few years ago
with something even more ridiculous: Grammar and spelling corrections now
require an export license.  The following was forwarded to me by Clark
Thomborson:

-- Snip --

Dear colleagues,

If I'm reading http://chronicle.com/free/2003/10/2003100201n.htm correctly,
any US citizen must get a license (from the US State department) before
providing editorial services to any citizen or resident of any country
embargoed by the US.

...

The Treasury Department's response on Wednesday, in a letter to the IEEE,
affirmed its position that editing scholarly papers provides a service to
authors. "U.S. persons may not provide the Iranian author substantive or
artistic alterations or enhancement of the manuscript, and IEEE may not
facilitate the provision of such alterations or enhancements," wrote R.
Richard Newcomb, director of the Office of Foreign Assets Control. Trade
policy prohibits "the reordering of paragraphs or sentences, correction of
syntax, grammar, and replacement of inappropriate words by U.S. persons,"
according to the letter. The institute may apply for a license to edit papers,
Mr. Newcomb wrote.

...

I guess this embargo would apply to professors as well as to editors of
technical journals headquartered in the US, although I'm not keen to ask the
State department for a ruling on this!

Apparently this embargo on editorial services applies to Iran, Cuba, Iraq,
Libya, and Sudan.  I guess I must check
http://www.ustreas.gov/offices/eotffc/ofac/sanctions/index.html frequently, if
I wanted to be a really obedient US citizen.

Wow.

I have to laugh, but of course it's not really funny unless you look for the
humourous side.  For example I have tried to infer the public-policy
objectives that might be (in some bureaucrat's mind) served by this regulatory
decision.  Perhaps one of the objectives is to make it easier to recognise
terrorists -- some terrorists will have bad grammar when they speak English,
and no US citizen will dare to help them improve it!  (This could be good new
for the Kiwi English-education industry I guess, but if NZ did this in a big
way there might be diplomatic repercussions or even trade sanctions.)

Of course there'll be a lot of "false positives" in any terrorist recognition-
by-grammar scheme but hey, it's apparently good public policy (from the
perspective of the US Congress) to hassle (or maim, kill, or whatever seems
appropriate at the time) a large number of non-US citizens if this might save
a few US lives?

Anyway I don't have to worry about being falsely recognised as a terrorist
becuz my grammer and speling is alwys good.

I don't think I'll bother to apply for a license to supply editorial services
to citizens of embargoed countries.  Still... it occurs to me that the State
department is setting itself up for a DOS attack -- what would happen if 10%
of all US academics were to apply for one of these licenses?

Clark