PaulT's Favorite Techdirt Posts Of The Week
It’s been a good week for articles that interest me personally, a good thing as I’ve been asked to write this post about my favorites! First mention has to go to Jonathan McIntosh’s great recap of the problems he’s had to go through at the hands of Lionsgate. In short, despite his Twilight remix video having been mentioned by the US Copyright Office itself as an example of fair use, he still struggled to convince YouTube to keep it up since Lionsgate didn’t want to keep it up without obscuring it with ads (despite the current version being ad free and not monetized by McIntosh in any way himself). It’s a nice illustration of how even those who try to keep within the law fall foul of corporate greed if they decide they don’t like something. If something already illustrated as fair use can be treated like this, imagine the problems faced by anyone in a grey area!
On a similar note, rapper Kid Cudi yet again noted how disappointed he was in his label’s commitment to his new single, just one year after having similar problems with his last album. While some were noting that he was silly to have signed for a label in the first place, this was another illustration as to how even successful artists can be let down by the legacy industry and how many artists simply don’t need them.
Something slightly more disturbing to me personally is the story about a gambling software programmer being shut down and raided. The story appears to go that despite offering services that are perfectly legal everywhere that he licensed the software, he fell afoul of the US’s inexplicable anti-gambling obsession anyway because he’s based in the US and people in NY may have somehow touched his software. As someone who working in Gibraltar, a place whose industry is largely built by offshore gaming companies (some of whom were similarly attacked when US authorities suddenly decided that their companies were offering illegal products), this is a worrying trend. It also sadly means that my dreams of being invited to help set up a Las Vegas branch of one of those companies might still be a long way away!
On a lighter note, UK police were arguing about who first thought up their Twitter offers of free iPads to lure the stupidest criminals alive into their arms. Neither of them apparently remembering the episode of The Simpsons where Homer was successfully lured by the promise of a free boat.
Meanwhile, back in the entertainment industry, Sony offered the most naked example yet of profiteering and the back of what should be public domain material when they released a new Bob Dylan compilation entitled the “Copyright Collection Volume 1.” Regionally restricted, of course, and containing rare material that will inevitably be pirated as it’s not available anywhere else. It’s particularly odious because the mere 100 copies they released were openly intended to stop classic material from going back to the public under the original deal made when they were recorded. At least they’ve dropped the pretense of helping the fans, I suppose.
The movie industry also made some wrongheaded moves in an attempt to promote their silly Ultraviolet service (yet another in a long line of DRM that offer customers less than a pirated version under the pretense that it somehow benefits the consumer). The pretense is that by offering free movies with purchases of TVs and Blu ray players, they can convince people to use and love it. Having unfortunately tried it myself (unsuccessfully) on a movie I received for Christmas, I suspect it will just let people know not to bother.
Finally, on a lighter note, it’s nice to see some figures for Kickstarter’s year and their great success in funding a wide range of projects. Over 2 million people funded projects this year (myself included), so here’s hoping that many more independent artists get funded in 2013!
Yeah, he had zero idea of what half the people he fired actually did, and publicly fired people who tried informing him. He's also not paying the people he fired so there's no good will, and that takes care of about 80% of documentation in my experience. A decent tech can work out how things are set up, but the quirks of why are now outside of the company.
What's really sad is that racist morons think that such things are the result of genetics and not generational abuse and neglect... and then whine when "CRT" or "DEI" or whatever the latest boogeyman is mentioned to try and fix the problem. What's needed is less racist morons and more fixes for the problems caused by generational prejudice. Yes, even if you identified a different minority who didn't suffer the same abuse (though I suspect you're the type to change your tune about Asian benefits when Tik Tok is mentioned)
Define "IP". Does that include the fair use provisions contained in the copyright law? If not, why do you not believe in the law as written?
Yet again, they don't care about "free speech". They just want an audience, and are confused about how popular they are. So, they interpret people not wanting to be near them as censorship.
I've said for a few years that the hardest job in the world must be writing for The Onion. You come up with a ridiculous piece of hilarious satire, then just before you submit your manuscript you look at the news and see something way more ridiculous happening in real life...
I assume that because the only thing worse than a fascist is the person who lets them abuse authority without question.
Which ID? How do you confirm that ID online? How do you know the person presenting the ID is the person currently using the computer or phone? How do you account for sites not in the US?
WB's recent business model seems to be "tell people not to buy our products". Bold, but I'm not sure there's profit...
If they feel that, they are free not to put their games on the platform...
That's a truly bizarre way to interpret this announcement. Sports games regularly appear on Game Pass. Game Pass allows games for rental from several years to a few months, though the term is usually not announced up front. Take Two have decided to announce the term up front. That's good for gamers. I don't know where the "freefall" comes in...
I love the fact that even insane people aren't calling it X.
I'm not sure what causes a person to hallucinate competence with the orange con artist and ignore the actual achievements of the current administration, but I will congratulate you on admitting that you're a Nazi. You'll be sorely disappointed at the outcome of the new holocaust you pine for, but at least you're honest about your inability to operate without the fantasy of violence, presumably because you understand on some level that your toxic views can't be tolerate by a decent soiety.
One day, the anti-230 morons might stumble across what it actually says and address that instead of the weird hallucinations they base their world view on. Today, apparently, is not that day.
You claiming that people don't have a right to respond to you doesn't make it true. This seems to be the major issue with morons - you don't understand that when you exercise your free speech other people have the right to exercise their free speech in turn. "Free speech" doesn't mean that you're free from consequences of that speech, and if the consequence is another private actor telling you to STFU, that's their right as much as it was your right to be an idiot in public to begin with.
Yeah, there's very few stories about people doing their jobs properly compared to stories about corrupt idiots costing their employers a million dollars. The reason is that basic competence isn't newsworthy, but expensive incompetence is. The fact that sometimes cops manage to do the right thing occasionally doesn't mean they get away with when they're not.
Indeed. Whenever these things happen, the unspoken logical thing is that the people who didn't try to do the right thing are unaffected. Only the people who tried to pay for their content are affected.
When something is stupid, illogical and way more effort than it should be, the reason is usually licencing. My guess is that Sony either can't do it due to the previous terms, or it would cost too much money to do the sane and logical thing.
Ah, the "this site isn't relevant" fallback for when facts aren't anywhere near your side. Do you hard of thinking people ever consider that when you attack a site as being unpopular and irrelevant, you're just admitting that by your own standards you're wasting your time by obsessively commenting? Literally, if you'r correct about your claims, you're just saying you are deliberately doing nothing of any importance?
So, has "I'll tell you what you people think" ever worked out IRL for you, or are you still confused as to why your strawmen don't work?