bhull242 's Techdirt Comments

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  • On the post: ICE Airport Deployment Shows Officers Only ‘Need’ Masks When They’re Kidnapping People

    bhull242 ( profile ), 02 Apr, 2026 @ 09:21pm

    Before we get to the lie exposed here, let me just offer a correction of my own.
    Always appreciated! I just wish Geigner could do the same. I’m still (mildly) annoyed at him for when he posted an article about some controversy involving Epic Games’s exclusivity deals with indie or low-budget games, particularly ones involving Kickstarter, and he got the makers of Oddworld mixed up with this other dev team, misrepresenting both of them. It’s probably still there with 0 corrections posted.

  • On the post: Greater Than Zero: The Anti-AI Pushback On Gaming Preservation Efforts Makes No Sense

    bhull242 ( profile ), 29 Mar, 2026 @ 07:16am

    No, it was not called “AI” a decade or two ago.

  • On the post: Black Man Shot By Cops Dies After White Cop Suffering An ‘Anxiety Attack’ Snags Ambulance

    bhull242 ( profile ), 29 Mar, 2026 @ 07:08am

    Meanwhile, Officer Perrotta’s employer only seems interested in outlasting this news cycle:
    A spokesperson for Bridgeport police, Shawnna White, declined to comment Wednesday when asked about Perrotta taking the first ambulance. She said in an email that the police department’s Internal Affairs Division would conduct its own investigation.
    Sometimes the lack of direct response says more than a direct response would.
    I’m not sure I entirely agree in this case. Honestly, this seems more like they know better than to comment on this until the internal investigation is complete (possibly because of their lawyer’s advice), and that probably is the best thing they could say.

  • On the post: Black Man Shot By Cops Dies After White Cop Suffering An ‘Anxiety Attack’ Snags Ambulance

    bhull242 ( profile ), 29 Mar, 2026 @ 07:04am

    If you have a gun in your hand and are in any sort of conflict with a cop then yes, you are a threat and are highly likely to get shot.
    Does “running away” count as being “in any sort of conflict”? Most people would probably say “no”. Though I will agree that many cops will say that a person running away from them with a gun in their hand is a threat, and such a person is highly likely to get shot by cops. And having the gun in his hand makes the shooting at least slightly more justifiable and/or understandable than a number of other shootings where the victim doesn’t even have or own a gun, doesn’t have any explosives or sharp objects, and is running away, wheelchair-bound and facing away from the cops, or restrained, but that really isn’t saying much since that is not justified really at all.

  • On the post: Deep Breath: Okay, Let’s Talk About That Controversial DLSS 5 Demo

    bhull242 ( profile ), 28 Mar, 2026 @ 11:10pm

    Personally, I don’t think the AI faces look better, but I also don’t like higher-fidelity faces in general, and these are even more uncanny and less realistic than those. As for faster frame-rates, I legitimately don’t care. If it consistently hits ~60+ fps with minimal slowdown, that’s good enough for me. In fact, a consistent framerate is more important than a high framerate if only because I can adapt to a low framerate. (It’s why, when the option is available, I always cap the FPS.) Seriously, AI doesn’t objectively improve these things, and these aren’t necessarily things that need improvement.

  • On the post: Trump Is Helping Elon Musk’s Starlink Get Billions In Taxpayer Dollars With No Oversight

    bhull242 ( profile ), 03 Feb, 2026 @ 09:22am

    Eh, not necessarily.

  • On the post: Trump Is Helping Elon Musk’s Starlink Get Billions In Taxpayer Dollars With No Oversight

    bhull242 ( profile ), 03 Feb, 2026 @ 09:21am

    You’re all about socialized internet.
    Subsidized infrastructure for internet connectivity ≠ socialized internet. They’re not opposed to locally provided socialized internet and support it when it’s more affordable than existing options or when there are no other options, but that is separate from what is being discussed here.
    You get super upset when socialized internet is provided by the one guy who has consistently been able to provide it,
    Elon has been very inconsistent about providing internet. He also asks way too much for way too little.
    instead of all the gov run projects that have mostly failed.
    Which ones would those be, exactly?

  • On the post: Sen. Joni Ernst To Constituents Regarding Medicaid Cuts: We’re All Going To Die, Someday

    bhull242 ( profile ), 08 Jun, 2025 @ 05:04pm

    You misquoted the Bible. The Good Samaritan saw the person dying on the side of the road, so he stole some money from another passerby, paid for a medicine man, and took credit for helping the dying man himself.
    Why would you lie about this? Not once does the Bible even imply the Samaritan from the parable stole money from anyone or sought to take credit for anything.
    The moral of the story is that forced wealth transfers do not make you compassionate.
    Given that the story ends with a Q&A meant to draw attention to how the Samaritan was the compassionate one, I don’t see how that even remotely follows.

  • On the post: Illinois Lawmakers Ban Police From Ticketing And Fining Students For Minor Infractions In School

    bhull242 ( profile ), 04 Jun, 2025 @ 05:31pm

    Don’t you have anything better to do than to encourage lawbreaking?

  • On the post: A 23-Year-Old Crypto Bro Is Now Vetoing NSF Grants While Staring At His Water Bottle

    bhull242 ( profile ), 03 Jun, 2025 @ 03:43pm

    The personal details of the official who voted down the project are irrelevant.
    They aren’t “personal details”; they’re qualifications and experience (or lack thereof). An official’s qualifications and experience are extremely relevant. I don’t want some guy who knows and cares nothing about science to make decisions about funding scientific research. He doesn’t even have financial experience that might be relevant to deciding how money can or should be spent. And it certainly shouldn’t be up to just one person who’s not even from the department and who wasn’t elected. It should be a panel that decides, possibly overruled by an elected official (namely the president), and the panel should be made up of those focused on this specific task of funding scientific research. It should never have been up to one singular, unelected official to begin with.

  • On the post: A 23-Year-Old Crypto Bro Is Now Vetoing NSF Grants While Staring At His Water Bottle

    bhull242 ( profile ), 03 Jun, 2025 @ 03:36pm

    This is one long ad hominem screed dressed up as an article.
    It’s not an ad hominem if there is no argument to address instead of the person. Not every personal attack is an ad hominem. In this case, the attack is on whether he has the temperament or qualifications to have the power he does, so a personal attack regarding those issues is not a fallacious ad hominem.
    If you think projects that deserved funding were inappropriately cut, make that argument and support it with facts.
    They did. They pointed out how the guy refusing to fund them paid zero attention to the case and so had basically decided before the meeting. That is, in itself, inappropriate. His lack of qualifications also means he has no reason to hold that position. Sometimes, a personal attack can support a logically sound argument.
    Or is your position that every project funded under the previous administration is perfectly fantastic and they all should be paid for by taxpayers forever?
    First, you clearly didn’t read the article. This was about funding new research, not extending funding for something approved by the previous administration. Second, the position advanced here is that the process is important, as is who is making the decisions. Even if I didn’t think this specific research should be funded, I wouldn’t want some unqualified hack to refuse to fund it without even actually listening to and understanding the proposal or explaining why it shouldn’t be funded.

  • On the post: A 23-Year-Old Crypto Bro Is Now Vetoing NSF Grants While Staring At His Water Bottle

    bhull242 ( profile ), 03 Jun, 2025 @ 03:28pm

    I stopped reading at "bro"
    Really, dude? You’re gonna get butthurt over “bro”?
    The suffix “bro” is a mysandrist ad hominem (and a tired one, at that).
    Is it an ad hominem? Maybe if this was an argument against something the guy said, but it’s not. Ad hominem is only a problem when you dismiss someone’s argument based solely on who they are rather than the strength of the argument they made. Since there is no argument or claim being advanced by the “bro” at issue, ad hominem doesn’t apply here. “Ad hominem” isn’t simply interchangeable with “insult”; it has a specific meaning, and it’s simply inapplicable in this context. Is it misandrist? I wouldn’t say so. Yes, it’s an insult generally reserved for men based on a stereotype, but it’s not all or even most men, and it’s only used to describe those who fit that particular stereotype. The fact that it is used as least as much by men to refer to other men as it is by women to refer to men, it doesn’t appear to be particularly based on gender-based stereotypes. Not every gender-specific insult is sexist. Is it tired? I guess that’s a matter of an opinion. It’s been in use long enough that some people could reasonably tired of it, but it’s not so objectively obnoxious or even old that it’s widely agreed to be out-of-style. None of this is a very good reason to stop reading so quickly. If anything, this whole thing is more of an ad hominem than the word you complain of since you’re being dismissive of the arguments being made based solely on a single word.
    If Terrell were simply a recent grad of an Ivy, would you refer to him as an “Ivy bro?”
    If there was some stereotype or common tendency among Ivy League graduates to behave in a certain way that was considered undesirable or foolish, and Terrell behaved according to that stereotype, then probably. However, since there appears to be no such trend, there’s no real reason to. I’m not even sure what your point is here. Whether the answer is “yes” or “no” doesn’t seem like it would bolster or weaken your argument or theirs. The point of using this term is to indicate his lack of relevant qualifications, experience, and interest for his position, and “Crypto bro” does this perfectly well.
    It’s low IQ stuff.
    Calling something “low IQ stuff” after admitting that you can’t be bothered to read more than half the title to an article and expecting more sophistication and politeness in the title of an article in a blog is low IQ stuff.

  • On the post: Appeals Court: Yeah, Of Course Ken Paxton’s Investigation Into Media Matters Was Bullshit

    bhull242 ( profile ), 03 Jun, 2025 @ 03:03pm

    Not only did he already get away with it; this is also merely a preliminary injunction, which means this ruling explicitly allows him to continue to get away with it for however long the lower court chooses to drag out the case.
    What did you expect to happen at this point?
    The only thing the court said was that he probably won’t get away with officially punishing them.
    Yeah, that’s the authoritarian BS they’re talking about.

  • On the post: This Week In Techdirt History: May 25th – 31st

    bhull242 ( profile ), 01 Jun, 2025 @ 09:48am

    Lawsuit you might be interested in.

    This one guy (McNally) who makes videos about opening locks without the key/code (whether by lockpicking, shimming, bypassing, or percussive force) has either been sued or threatened with a lawsuit by a lock company (Proven Locks) for defamation and, apparently, copyright infringement after he made a video where he used an empty pop can to make a shim to force it open. He has since made multiple videos (such as this one, where he talks about being sued) where he shims their locks. Seems like a pretty decent example of the Streisand Effect.

  • On the post: Copyright Absurdity: School Play Canceled Over Copyright Due To Minor Performance Changes

    bhull242 ( profile ), 31 May, 2025 @ 09:47am

    There’s some irony (or something) in the fact that the dancing scene that was meant to be the catalyst for the whole Witch Trial thing that followed was criticized for being “demonic”. As I recall, the premise is that the residents (incorrectly) interpreted the dancing as demonic, which was a reason they suspected witchcraft in the first place. I feel like the woman completely missed the entire point of the play.

  • On the post: The Baldoni/Lively Case Is Still Going And Getting Much, Much Sillier

    bhull242 ( profile ), 24 May, 2025 @ 01:28pm

    Y’know, I feel like we should call such an intentional attempt to use the Streisand Effect something… How about the Baldoni Gambit?

  • On the post: Trump Admits He Could Get Abrego Garcia Back, But Angrily Insists Non-Existent Tattoos Are The Reason He Won’t

    bhull242 ( profile ), 05 May, 2025 @ 11:30pm

    Wanting due process for those accused of a crime or who are to be deported is not being a champion for criminals. Also, given the complete lack of any real evidence supporting these accusations, these are just bald accusations not worth taking very seriously at this stage.

  • On the post: The Untold Story Of How Ed Martin Ghostwrote Online Attacks Against A Judge — And Still Became A Top Trump Prosecutor

    bhull242 ( profile ), 29 Apr, 2025 @ 12:17pm

    “Every day, they are diminishing the reputation and value of Phyllis,”
    Because her reputation and value was soooo great to begin with. /s

  • On the post: Gavin Newsom Has Lost The Plot

    bhull242 ( profile ), 27 Apr, 2025 @ 09:50am

    Remember how Republicans would often use Gavin Newsom as an example of what liberals want, even though Newsom has been repeatedly criticized by liberals?

  • On the post: Intelligence Assessment Shows Trump Admin’s Venezuelan Gang War Claims Are Lies

    bhull242 ( profile ), 24 Apr, 2025 @ 04:41pm

    That law was repealed in 1920. FDR couldn’t have cited it.

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