Bobson Dugnutt 's Techdirt Comments

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  • On the post: Montana Passes Laughably Unconstitutional Law Banning TikTok

    Bobson Dugnutt ( profile ), 17 Apr, 2023 @ 12:42pm

    "Jyna." -- Former president and currently indicted suspect Donald Trump

  • On the post: Montana Passes Laughably Unconstitutional Law Banning TikTok

    Bobson Dugnutt ( profile ), 17 Apr, 2023 @ 12:37pm

    Scotusbait

    Back when Twitter was a thing, I read some attorney commentators who describe these really constitutionally sus laws as bait, often promulgated by Republican attorneys general and legislatures, in the hopes of getting a hearing and favorable ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court. There are enough of these that Scotusbait is a kind of legal genre. These are genuinely awful laws, both from a trial perspective and dangerous to civil liberties, but there is an insidious internal logic to them.

    1. These are deliberately incendiary laws that are politically unpopular and if lawmakers would have to answer to voters, they would be ousted.
    2. They are authored by lawmakers who are big on enforcement and little on law. They are both overly broad (so prone to abuse) and difficult to interpret (apply the law and make the lawyers and judges beta test it in court).
    3. The law will inevitably be challenged and work its way through the appeals process.
    4. Lawmakers are playing the legal gambit of having the law survive the appeals challenge. The odds are in their favor, since the judiciary is stacked in favor of Republican appointments, and there is a clear partisan lean in rulings (a GOP-appointed bench tends to issue rulings that favor Republican policy prerogatives).
    5. Lawmakers hope that the U.S. Supreme Court chooses their case for a hearing because they know the justices are ideologically coherent (you know how at least 5 Republican justices will rule and how 3 Democratic justices will rule). They also know that the GOP justices take a textual approach to cases -- they only care about the process and the form of the law.
    6. They get a favorable ruling, and the law now gets to be enforced broadly and destructively.
    This is all intentional.

  • On the post: Apartment Broadband Monopolies Still Exist Because The FCC Has Been Lobbied Into Fecklessness

    Bobson Dugnutt ( profile ), 17 Apr, 2023 @ 11:36am

    No, not racist .. just corrupt.
    ¿Por qué no los dos?

  • On the post: Substack CEO Chris Best Doesn’t Realize He’s Just Become The Nazi Bar

    Bobson Dugnutt ( profile ), 16 Apr, 2023 @ 06:14pm

    Excuse me, but do you have a map that shows me where to find your point?
    You might have to know how to interpret a colonoscopy.

  • On the post: Substack CEO Chris Best Doesn’t Realize He’s Just Become The Nazi Bar

    Bobson Dugnutt ( profile ), 16 Apr, 2023 @ 06:06pm

    I think Substack is going to land in the same spot as Facebook, pre-Musk Twitter, Reddit, etc. and have to go through the adolescence phase of "I'm for FREE SPEECH TURNED UP TO 11!" and then going "How low can we turn the free speech volume down and still keep it close to 10?" As a subscriber to a few Substacks, I've had a positive experience because I can subscribe and pay the writers I enjoy and sidestep the content that is the reading equivalent of a stomach ulcer. I like reading newsletters both as websites and email because the basic font is clean and uncluttered with ads or Taboola-like garbage. Substack does have a few bulkheads in place to reduce troublesome interactions. Publishers can choose to allow comments by all, by subscribers, by paid subscribers only, or turn them off altogether. Publishers are given latitude to set house rules for their newsletters, and don't have to platform anyone. The Twitter clone is too new, but it will need some quality control aspects like mute, block, ignore (post a Note but not view all replies), yellow flag (one where a community of users can report something that is problematic but not an imminent TOS violation) and red flag/report (imminent TOS violations like CSAM, incitement, doxxing, presentations of criminal activity, self-harm, etc.). Each user should be able to set their own boundaries on what content they can tolerate to consume and how others can engage with them. This is still free speech, since every participant as communicator and recipient has both the right to transmit and receive and the right to refuse unwanted communication. Also, as a warning to both Patel and Best: There Will Be Nazis. Like cockroaches, Nazis are prepared to survive anything from a can of Raid to nuclear annihilation to the heat death of the universe. Nazis have bad intentions. They relish confrontation. Not only do they love to break the rules and exploit weaknesses in communities, but they also love to play the rules and how tendentiously they can argue the rules interpreted in their favor. Nazis will find a way into the community. But non-Nazis (and a trust & safety team) must have tools to pound Nazis like the Home Alone villains.

  • On the post: Substack CEO Chris Best Doesn’t Realize He’s Just Become The Nazi Bar

    Bobson Dugnutt ( profile ), 15 Apr, 2023 @ 07:47pm

    What Substack did/does is bad but forgivable. Substack could release its slate of paid contributors, or it could be leaked, but however the information gets out there, would it hurt Substack as an institution or the quality of its paid vs. voluntary creators? What is extremely unethical? Well, Fox News by the nature of its very existence. It leaves the word "News" in its business name ironically, like a trucker hat and Pabst Blue Ribbon for a hipster. Functionally, Fox News serves the same function to the Republican Party as the Grand Inquisitor does for the Vatican. Something else that's extremely unethical: Forbes. This is something that horrifies journalists. Lewis D'Vorkin pivoted Forbes from a business magazine with some cachet into an SEO play. D'Vorkin was the one who brought the Forbes contributor model to fruition. The less polite term journalists call this is "credibility whoring." A contributor could write about a sphere of expertise, usually something they have a vested interest in (like a PR person specializing in alcohol brands who writes about trends in the beverage industry). Most of Forbes traffic comes through its contributor network, though it still maintains a traditional reporting staff and editorial control in house. However, anything published under the Forbes masthead, contributor or staff writer, is credited to Forbes. "A Forbes article," "as seen in Forbes," "Forbes said", etc. What gets worse is that there's an industry of web and social marketing that charges thousands of dollars for a "Forbes" piece (always by a contributor), and SEO experts who use these Forbes contributor articles to get a top ranking position on search engines. Forbes knows about this and encourages this flim flam because it's good for its bottom line.

  • On the post: Twitter Suspends User For Sharing Washington Post Story About Pentagon Docs Leaker

    Bobson Dugnutt ( profile ), 15 Apr, 2023 @ 12:21pm

    Hope he doesn’t crash now that he’s removed the brakes, turn signals, mirrors and headlights.
    I surmise that you must be a Tesla owner.

  • On the post: The AI Doomers’ Playbook

    Bobson Dugnutt ( profile ), 14 Apr, 2023 @ 10:59pm

    Sure enough, Doctorow has AI criti-hype in a Pluralistic article from last month. https://pluralistic.net/2023/03/09/autocomplete-worshippers/#the-real-ai-was-the-corporations-that-we-fought-along-the-way

  • On the post: The AI Doomers’ Playbook

    Bobson Dugnutt ( profile ), 14 Apr, 2023 @ 10:57pm

    Don't believe the (criti)hype

    Cory Doctorow, in addition to coining the concept of enshittification, also pointed out a concept though he didn't coin it. Criti-hype is a kind of narrative that on the surface appears to attack a person, a technology, etc., but tacitly serves to further the attacked's agenda (by building street cred, overselling features, etc.) "AI will wipe out most jobs on the planet" is one specimen of criti-hype. As much as the specter of a planet of unemployables sounds painful, there are people in C-suites that go, "So you're AI is so good I never have to put a cent into payroll? I'll take 10!" There have been major publications that put this logic into practice by replacing copy editors with Grammarly. You could imagine how well this went if you look at a newspaper owned by a hedge fund (which is about 60% of them in the U.S.). On LinkedIn, I did see a copy editor post "The definition of Irony: Grammarly is hiring a copy editor." Keep in mind that most AI stories you read are criti-hype. One of the key purposes of AI doom thinkpieces is actually to get VC and investors' "churn and burn" money thrown at companies to develop these doomsday devices, not to actually deliver one.

  • On the post: Try Fedi Friday: Just One Day A Week, Experiment With Alternative Social Media

    Bobson Dugnutt ( profile ), 14 Apr, 2023 @ 02:10am

    Memeito ergo sum

    At this point, assume he operates under the first principle of "I meme, therefore I am."

  • On the post: Time Warner Discovery Execs Are Excited About Their Plan To Distance Themselves From The Popular HBO Brand And Further Dumb Down Their Streaming Service

    Bobson Dugnutt ( profile ), 13 Apr, 2023 @ 02:02pm

    Can't lie. HBO was one of my favorite premium channels. So many great stand-up comedy specials. It usually landed the most watchable theatrical movies and a lot of their original movies and series are worth watching. And the Starship Intro is a musical masterpiece. I thought it was cool that HBO had filmed the making of the music and the logo way back in the early 1980s before DVD-like extras were a thing.

  • On the post: Time Warner Discovery Execs Are Excited About Their Plan To Distance Themselves From The Popular HBO Brand And Further Dumb Down Their Streaming Service

    Bobson Dugnutt ( profile ), 13 Apr, 2023 @ 01:55pm

    Life imitates 'Ow My Balls'

    One more signpost that life is imitating "Idiocracy": There is a real-life "Ow My Balls"-like show. And wouldn't you know it, a Warner Bros. Discovery channel (TBS) runs it. No, there isn't testicular trauma turned into sport, but this is merely less worse. UFC head Dana White branched out into a professional slapping league. That's the sport. Two men just stand there taking turns slapping each other until one falls or loses their balance. It appears the show is on hiatus -- ratings were atrocious -- but the league is probably not formally dead. It didn't help the league that Dana White gave a demonstration of it by slapping his wife at a New Year's party. Plus, traumatic brain injury experts say the league is a CTE factory.

  • On the post: Fox Hit With Sanctions For Withholding Information In Dominion Libel Lawsuit

    Bobson Dugnutt ( profile ), 13 Apr, 2023 @ 01:33pm

    Ubermensch goals

    I think Rupert Murdoch's mens rea is not a question of a cagey legal strategy but something more in a demonstration of the will to power. Murdoch, and by extension Fox, lied and defamed to show they are impervious to the laws, customs and morality of mere mortals and yearned to get away with it.

  • On the post: Fox Hit With Sanctions For Withholding Information In Dominion Libel Lawsuit

    Bobson Dugnutt ( profile ), 13 Apr, 2023 @ 01:22pm

    The Fuchsvölkisch

    Fox viewers aren't unwitting, naive pigeons coldly manipulated by sociopathic propagandists. Fox viewers are eager and willing enablers and participants in their own manipulation. From Rupert Murdoch, to the talking heads, to their viewers, Fox is a culture. A völkisch. Fox's 24-hour content are the load-bearing bricks that form the architecture of the rightwing worldview. The perfect description that captures the essence of Fox News comes from YouTube music reviewer Todd in the Shadows. It's television for people who like having their thoughts repeated back at them.

  • On the post: Stifling Free Speech Is Now A Core Plank Of The Republican Platform

    Bobson Dugnutt ( profile ), 17 Feb, 2023 @ 03:40pm

    aboard trains that run on time.
    [Ron Howard narrator voice:] In Italy, the trains never ran on time. The context: It was a Mussolini-era boast that was confabulated into something that seemed to be an actual policy. The unreliability of Italian trains owed to a combination of decrepit trains and infrastructure, as well as a widely held European stereotype against Mediterranean ethnicities of laziness and flakiness.

  • On the post: Stifling Free Speech Is Now A Core Plank Of The Republican Platform

    Bobson Dugnutt ( profile ), 17 Feb, 2023 @ 03:26pm

    You're telling on yourself

    WaPo and CNN wouldn’t exist anymore but for NYT vs Sullivan.
    Using your Cui prodest? logic, that Washington Post and CNN condition their survival upon NYT v. Sullivan. If the Supreme Court nullifies NYT v. Sullivan, presumably it voids the actual malice standard of defamation law and Washington Post and CNN could face an avalanche of vexatious litigation. The vexatious litigation was always the point.

  • On the post: Stifling Free Speech Is Now A Core Plank Of The Republican Platform

    Bobson Dugnutt ( profile ), 17 Feb, 2023 @ 12:26pm

    Libel/slander/defamation lawsuits are torts. The courts are not merely there to prove a disputed truth. There must be something tangible at stake. The plaintiff must show: 1. A provable falsehood. 2. That they were identified. 3. That the information was published or broadcast. 4. The false information led to harm (i.e., lost a job, a business failed, led to a divorce, etc.)

  • On the post: Stifling Free Speech Is Now A Core Plank Of The Republican Platform

    Bobson Dugnutt ( profile ), 17 Feb, 2023 @ 12:17pm

    Not true

    It's not true. Media don't have a privileged status. Any pro-free-speech laws (shield laws, open records laws, FOIA, etc.) are available to all Americans, not the professional press specifically. The U.S. courts and UK courts treat defamation differently. In the U.S., burden of proof is upon the plaintiff to show a statement was false or damaging. In the UK, burden of proof is upon the defendant to attest that a damaging statement is true.

  • On the post: Stifling Free Speech Is Now A Core Plank Of The Republican Platform

    Bobson Dugnutt ( profile ), 17 Feb, 2023 @ 12:09pm

    No the media enjoys high standard is defamation cases, no one else.
    The burden of proof rests upon the plaintiff. It's the wronged party that must prove the claim is intentionally false, that they were identified, and that the information harmed them in some way. There's also the private figure vs. public figure vs. public official test. Public figures (celebrities, athletes and the like) and public officials are treated by courts to have expectation of scrutiny in the public sphere. Public officials (politicians, leaders of government agencies and the like) have an even higher standard because they are expected to have legal experts and subordinates to advise their decisions and actions.

  • On the post: Stifling Free Speech Is Now A Core Plank Of The Republican Platform

    Bobson Dugnutt ( profile ), 16 Feb, 2023 @ 02:41pm

    You do realise, of course, that the right wing mediaspace as it is couldn’t exist without these protections, right?
    If they claim not to realize it, they are being strategically disingenuous. The rightwing wouldn't press for a Supreme Court ruling if they didn't already have a fully formed plan to weaponize such a ruling the moment it's handed down. Furthermore, Steve Bannon and Curtis Yarvin are advancing a civilization-scale project to do exactly this -- FTZWS and neoreaction, respectively. You could dismiss them as fringe kooks, but both have actually wielded power. In Yarvin's case, he serves as the court philosopher for Peter Thiel and serves at his indulgence. Thiel does have political ambitions, and the victory of JD Vance in Ohio is a toehold into legitimize Thiel's (and Yarvin's) influence.

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