Laroquod 's Techdirt Comments

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  • On the post: UN Wants Multi-Stakeholder Discussions On 'Rethinking Copyright' — Ignores That The Only Stakeholder That Matters Is The Public

    Laroquod ( profile ), 09 Nov, 2012 @ 07:41pm

    Re: Beware of Harper's Gambit

    By the way, circumventing DRM carries criminal penalties now. Whereas infringing copyright by itself only carried civil liability. So while the law now says you can remix, if you circumvented DRM in any way, you can be put in prison -- even if it is for educational purposes or to quote one screenshot. It's a sleazy way to do a draconian copyright overhaul while appearing to give out more rights. You just invent a second layer of crime with heavier penalties.

  • On the post: UN Wants Multi-Stakeholder Discussions On 'Rethinking Copyright' — Ignores That The Only Stakeholder That Matters Is The Public

    Laroquod ( profile ), 09 Nov, 2012 @ 07:17pm

    Beware of Harper's Gambit

    I feel like saying, we should give them credit for at least moving an iota, but seeing how the copyright consultations play out in Canada, I am extremely skeptical. In fact, I expect them to proceed exactly according to the Canadian model (i.e. a complete farce in which nominally certain rights were given mentioned by various swaths of the public, while overwhelming the most common complaint, DRM, was completely ignored; in fact, if a file has DRM on it, all other fair use rights in Canadian law are now cancelled and fair use is not a defence against a charge of circumventing DRM, not even the fair uses we had *before* the Conservatives passed their actually quite regressive law in 'consultation's clothing).

  • On the post: Cisco VP Threatens To Stalk Memo Leaker… Driving More Attention Than Original Memo

    Laroquod ( profile ), 09 Nov, 2012 @ 02:09pm

    Quinn's next move will be to create slightly differently worded variations of each internal memo for different departments, hoping to narrow down where to search for the leaker. Much manpower and resources will be pointlessly expended on this.

  • On the post: Why Do Both Major Parties Suck So Badly On Civil Liberties?

    Laroquod ( profile ), 05 Nov, 2012 @ 01:12pm

    Re: Re: Re:

    That's an arrogant assumption that one candidate deserves to have your vote already, and if you do not give it to him, you are 'taking something away'. A vote must be earned! Not assumed. Stop counting 3rd party voters as if they are failed two-party voters. If someone is voting third party, that means they don't like either of the major candidates, therefore their vote CANNOT be assumed to have gone to either one of them. No one has a prior claim on anyone's vote: period. End of story.

  • On the post: Why Do Both Major Parties Suck So Badly On Civil Liberties?

    Laroquod ( profile ), 05 Nov, 2012 @ 01:09pm

    Re: Re: Re:

    I wouldn't hold my breath on that. This is the kind of 'wisdom' nobody ever seriously defends; it ranks up there with things like 'Obama is a socialist' and 'The French are pussies.'

  • On the post: Richard Stallman: Legislate That Using Software On General Purpose Computers Is Not Infringing

    Laroquod ( profile ), 02 Nov, 2012 @ 01:48pm

    Re: Re: This is a poison pill for walled gardens

    Walled gardens that aren't 'implemented in hardware' will become so immediately, the moment Stallman gets his wish.

  • On the post: Richard Stallman: Legislate That Using Software On General Purpose Computers Is Not Infringing

    Laroquod ( profile ), 02 Nov, 2012 @ 11:08am

    This is a poison pill for walled gardens

    If Stallman gets his wish, patents will only be leveraged on dedicated devices intended to set up walled content gardens; this will, of course, drive big corporations more forcefully toward the walled garden approach, so they can 'protect their IP' -- this is no great loss, since big corporations are already running in this direction as fast as they can, in order to achieve anticompetitive things like user lock-in. On the other hand, if general purpose computing is excepted, then there will be a much stronger business case for eschewing the walled garden approach, should any upstart competitors choose to go there.

    Not a bad compromise; however, precisely because it seeks to turn general purpose computing into a place where competitors can flourish, there is no way the oligarchy will let this happen.

    Here's the way it works as far as I can tell: any proposed solution will either fundamentally fail to address the problem, in which case it has a chance of being accepted, or else it will actually address, in which case, short of a far-reaching democratic revolution in the West, it is sure to fail.

  • On the post: DailyDirt: The Unquestioned Benefits Of Chocolate

    Laroquod ( profile ), 01 Nov, 2012 @ 08:57am

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

    Never mind -- just heard about the moderation bug. Anyway thanks for your responses.

  • On the post: DailyDirt: The Unquestioned Benefits Of Chocolate

    Laroquod ( profile ), 30 Oct, 2012 @ 08:47am

    Re: Re:

    In fact, you have unwittingly proven the scientist's point.

  • On the post: DailyDirt: The Unquestioned Benefits Of Chocolate

    Laroquod ( profile ), 30 Oct, 2012 @ 08:45am

    Re: Re:

    You made an oblique reference to the actual point of the study, but you still trumpeted its conclusions, when the whole point of the study was for you NOT to trumpet its conclusions. The point of the study was to produce such an ABSURD result that it would be impossible for the media to trumpet that conclusion. The scientist who did the study expected it to be so ridiculous that chocolate produces Nobel winners, that it would clearly spark a discussion about correlation and causation. But you (and the source article) instead portrayed the conclusion as non-absurd, and relegated the correlation lesson to a footnote.

    I hope that you can see how completely backwards and wrong it is, what you have done here.

  • On the post: DailyDirt: The Unquestioned Benefits Of Chocolate

    Laroquod ( profile ), 28 Oct, 2012 @ 01:18pm

    Cripes Techdirt do you even read this stuff before you link it? The first link specifically says that this was a study designed to demonstrate the *fallibility* of common statistical methods in science. The conclusion that more chocoloate equals more Nobel prizes was intended to so absurd as to demonstrate to the flaws in the methodology. And here you are publishing it as fact and unwittingly proving the scientist's point. LOL!

  • On the post: Scientist Refused Permission To Call Hominids 'Hobbits', Even Though Word First Used In Print In 1895 — And Not By Tolkien

    Laroquod ( profile ), 26 Oct, 2012 @ 01:35pm

    His first mistake was asking for permission and assuming good faith.

  • On the post: The 'Final' Sony PS3 Hack

    Laroquod ( profile ), 26 Oct, 2012 @ 10:43am

    "Let's hope, when the PS4 comes out, that Sony will give up on trying to lock out jailbreakers..."

    Bwahahahaha! Er... sorry. Yes. Let's hope. Excuse me I have to wipe the tears out of my eyes.

  • On the post: It Takes Jon Stewart To Finally Ask Obama About Civil Liberties… But Lets Him Off The Hook On Bogus Answer

    Laroquod ( profile ), 25 Oct, 2012 @ 01:43pm

    Re:

    So how do you explain civil liberties like habeas corpus and due process to have lasted as long as they did without being legally, officially destroyed the way they're doing now?

  • On the post: It Takes Jon Stewart To Finally Ask Obama About Civil Liberties… But Lets Him Off The Hook On Bogus Answer

    Laroquod ( profile ), 25 Oct, 2012 @ 01:39pm

    Re:

    You've never heard of the verb, to him off? Meaning to hone, or to sharpen? Thus, "let's him off the hook on bogus answer" -- as in, upon hearing a bogus answer, let us sharpen the hook with which we will hold the President to account. See? You've just misinterpreted it.

  • On the post: Cybersecurity Never Sleeps, Except In Canada

    Laroquod ( profile ), 25 Oct, 2012 @ 08:04am

    I am perfectly happy with this situation and I hope it continues for the foreseeable future. However, any news from the current Canadian government that makes proponents of internet freedom feel more comfortable, should be treated with the utmost skepticism.

  • On the post: How Would Twitter Handle A Crackdown On Free Speech In Saudi Arabia?

    Laroquod ( profile ), 23 Oct, 2012 @ 11:43am

    With country-specific censorship in place, it seem highly unlikely that we will ever again see Twitter at the centre of a movement like Arab Spring -- at least, not for long.

  • On the post: Is It Ethical For The American Bar Association To Claim Copyright On Its Ethics Opinions?

    Laroquod ( profile ), 22 Oct, 2012 @ 12:45pm

    You might even say that this decision by the ABA, while legal, is unethical.

  • On the post: School Suspends Students For Finding 'Racy' Photo Teacher Accidentally Put On Their iPads

    Laroquod ( profile ), 21 Oct, 2012 @ 06:19am

    Re: Re: Re: The reaf WTF

    Yes I too learned how to program on an Apple IIe in school. Unfortunately, however, nobody is going to learn to program on an iPad because they are locked down consumer-only machines that are totally enslaved to Apple's wishes and Apple doesn't wish anyone to program on an iPad -- end of learning!

  • On the post: Google To French Media: We May Have To Cut You Off

    Laroquod ( profile ), 19 Oct, 2012 @ 09:38am

    The problem with the whole 'cheese eating surrender monkey' is not that its offensive, it's that it dragged an irrelevant cultural battle into the issue, thereby derailing all the commentary (even winning the top 'blessed' spot below the article) and entirely blunting the effectiveness of the article in highlighting its point.

    Want to be an effective writer? Don't do this sort of thing. I am not offended, just unimpressed.

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