allengarvin 's Techdirt Comments

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  • On the post: Scumbag Revenge Porn Site Operator Arrested… But Many Of The Charges Are Very Problematic

    allengarvin ( profile ), 12 Dec, 2013 @ 08:36am

    Re:

    "That STILL doesn't necessarily describe identity theft. You have to use the information to IMPERSONATE the person for an unlawful purpose for it to be identity theft."

    It may not describe identity theft in the popular imagination, but it describes it well under California statutory law: obtaining personal information and using it for an unlawful purpose.

  • On the post: Judge Halts Sentencing After Feds Admit They Failed To Reveal Use Of NSA Data

    allengarvin ( profile ), 28 Nov, 2013 @ 08:24pm

    "bomb a Portland Christmas tree lighting ceremony" ..."as the entire "plot" was created with undercover FBI agents."

    And O'Reilly hasn't picked up on this as the latest salvo by the Obama administration in the war on Christmas?? Seems like a great opportunity to enlist Fox News against the NSA.

  • On the post: School Suspends Student Indefinitely For A Drawing Of A Cartoon Bomb He Made At Home

    allengarvin ( profile ), 17 Oct, 2013 @ 12:41pm

    It's a reasonable assumption

    Also, every time one of their old macs crash, they have to evacuate the school.

  • On the post: The Good And Bad In Chaotic eBook Pricing

    allengarvin ( profile ), 08 Oct, 2013 @ 07:06pm

    There are more variables to the equation than simply the lack of publication costs. People with e-readers tend currently towards the high end of the income spectrum. And at least a measurable minority, including myself, are willing to pay just as much or more for an ebook.

    I've managed to reduce my book collection from 7000+ to a few hundred, and I absolutely do not want the clutter of another physical book. I don't want to wait for it to be shipped to me, and I don't want to deal with it after I've finished reading it. I strip Amazon's DRM with calibre and keep around 800 books on my Kindle.

    So, I'll happily pay equal price or even more for an ebook copy. Multiple times in the last few years, I've forgone reading books that sound interesting because they're not in an ebook format. Blame me, and people like me, if you wish.

  • On the post: Yes, A Facebook 'Like' Is Protected By The First Amendment

    allengarvin ( profile ), 19 Sep, 2013 @ 01:06pm

    What if you like fire in a crowded theater?

  • On the post: Awesome Stuff: Reclaiming Classic Culture

    allengarvin ( profile ), 14 Sep, 2013 @ 09:40am

    It's hard to get even slightly excited about a new Chopin recording. His works have been recorded dozens of times. A year never passes without indistinguishable new Chopin CDs being cranked out.

    Meanwhile, vast, vast amounts of worthy sixteenth and seventeenth century music sits around, never having been recorded and most never even performed in the modern era.

  • On the post: What The Continuous Flourishing Of New Cocktails Can Teach Us About Intellectual Property

    allengarvin ( profile ), 13 Sep, 2013 @ 07:14pm

    Sorry, but I think...

    SMBC covered this pretty well:

    http://www.smbc-comics.com/?id=2951

  • On the post: Canada's Copyright Board Shuts Down Industry's Request For 'You Must Be A Criminal Tax' On MicroSD Cards

    allengarvin ( profile ), 05 Sep, 2013 @ 09:08am

    Wow, so every CD-R sold in Canada is an "audio CD-R"!

    Remember those, in the last days of record stores? Sold near the cash register, marked up because of the royalties paid to music industry? They had great little descriptions on them "Designed for premium audio experience" and "bit-perfect recording for when it matters for your sound experience".

  • On the post: DailyDirt: Can We At Least Agree On The Meanings Of Words?

    allengarvin ( profile ), 29 Aug, 2013 @ 05:54am

    Re: Re: Re:

    "You are asking us to accept a meaning which is the opposite of the original meaning."

    So? Such things are already common enough that we have a word for entire class: contranym. You can run fast, or you can be stuck fast. You determine what is meant by context.

    The figurative use of literal (which is NOT new--it's almost as old as the word itself) is most often used in the context of hyperbole. There's the context needed.

    Words naturally accrue other meanings as time passes. "Truly", "really", and "actually" for a brief time meant in a true, real, or actual manner. They still can mean that, in context. Or, in other context, like hyperbole:


    It's been such a dismal day I'm really dying for some amusement," said Meg

    (from Alcott's Little Women).

    Anyway, partisans for literal literally's lost the fight before it ever began. It's been used that way for over 300 years now. No one objected to it for two centuries. If you wanted to stop it, you should have started trying in the late 17th century.

  • On the post: DailyDirt: Can We At Least Agree On The Meanings Of Words?

    allengarvin ( profile ), 28 Aug, 2013 @ 06:48pm

    Re: "grinded"

    "Grinded" was not uncommon 2 centuries ago:

    http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=grinded&year_start=1797&year_end=2000&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=

    Clicking on the examples, they look like typical well-edited text of the period.

  • On the post: The Deeper Meaning Of Miranda's Detention And The Destruction Of The Guardian's Hard Drives

    allengarvin ( profile ), 28 Aug, 2013 @ 07:51am

    "2^16 = 65536 possible password combinations"

    Man, I knew it was a bad idea to adopt a binary alphabet.

  • On the post: People Who Got Shorter Sentences Than Bradley Manning: Spies Selling Secrets To Russians & Active Terrorists

    allengarvin ( profile ), 22 Aug, 2013 @ 08:14am

    Lindh

    Of course, a lot of the evidence against John Walker Lindh was obtained after he was repeatedly denied access to a lawyer, and when he was threatened with denial of pain medicine and treatment for agonizing wounds. He was kept in the conditions that make Manning's solitary treatment look positively generous and humane (completely restrained, blindfolded, locked in a metal container in near-freezing conditions, subjected to sleep deprivation).

  • On the post: Manning Faces Lifetime In Jail, While The Wrongdoers He Exposed Are Free

    allengarvin ( profile ), 31 Jul, 2013 @ 06:17pm

    Of course they're free

    Words spoken four centuries ago: "Treason doth never prosper: what?s the reason? Why, if it prosper, none dare call it treason."

  • On the post: Internet Catches Texas Senate Fudging Time-Stamps On Abortion Bill

    allengarvin ( profile ), 26 Jun, 2013 @ 10:27am

    Whitehouse petition to veto bill

    I didn't realize Obama had replaced Perry as our governor.

  • On the post: American Bankers' Association Claims Routing Numbers Are Copyrighted

    allengarvin ( profile ), 25 Jun, 2013 @ 08:55pm

    Re: Re: (Dewey Decimal)

    "The OCLC made the news a decade or so ago when they sued The Library Hotel in New York for numbering their hotel rooms using it."

    I remember that story! It looks like they weren't successful in their lawsuit:

    http://www.libraryhotel.com/dewey-decimal-system.html

  • On the post: Horrifying Supreme Court Ruling Lets Police Collect DNA Because You Might Just Be A Horrible Criminal

    allengarvin ( profile ), 04 Jun, 2013 @ 09:51am

    Re:

    "When they passed the seatbelt law it was stated they would not pull you over just because..."

    Who stated that? 51 seatbelt laws were passed in 50 states plus the district of Columbia. I remember when it passed in Texas--I had been driving 9 months. The law had a 4-month grace period where you would only be granted a warning, but on Dec 1 1985, everyone was told if they weren't wearing a seatbelt, they'd be pulled over and ticketed. My dad was ticketed twice within the first year of the law.

  • On the post: Funnyjunk's Lawyer Charles Carreon Just Keeps Digging: Promises He'll Find Some Law To Go After Oatmeal's Matt Inman

    allengarvin ( profile ), 23 Jun, 2012 @ 10:32pm

    Re: Dawkins

    "not just fake gnostics like Richard Dawkins."

    I'm just curious about this response. I've seen a couple reports in the mainstream media that Richard Dawkins is an "agnostic". It's pretty clear, after reading, that none of the authors have ever read any of Dawkins' books, or anything more than the most basic summary.

    But to accuse him of being a gnostic, an adherent to one of the mystery religions prominent around the east and south regions of the Mediterranean basin in the second and third century C.E., that believes in secret knowledge delivered by divine forces... that seems beyond the pale. What evidence do you have to accuse him of such ... outright, frank irrationality?