Mike Brown 's Techdirt Comments

Latest Comments (91)

• On the post: FTC's Overzealous Attempts To 'Protect The Children' May Do Serious Harm To The Internet

  

  Mike Brown ( profile ), 20 Dec, 2012 @ 02:01pm

  What, this only covers the internet? If you want to protect the children, PROTECT THE CHILDREN! If you subscribe to Playboy Channel, you should be forced to use a cable box with a keyboard, so you can enter your drivers license number every time you tune to that channel. Heck, if a story on the news could potentially be disturbing, you should have to enter it then, too--but be quick about it or you'll miss the story. Oh yeah, if you get naughty magazines like Playboy or National Geographic, the mailman should have to card you before he can leave in in your mailbox. /s

• On the post: Why Google Should Encrypt Our Email

  

  Mike Brown ( profile ), 19 Dec, 2012 @ 04:24am

  Re: "Encrypt" is not magic word

  Well, it's true that there are some super-paranoid privacy freaks out there (what are you hiding??!!).
  
  But to be fair, I don't particularly like that email is about as secure as a postcard. I book travel for politicians and celebrities, and its not unusual that they email me their credit card numbers, and I email out their travel itineraries.
  
  On that subject: this same information is passed back and forth when people book on my agency's website. It has strong encryption, and people would freak out if it didn't. Why the double standard?

• On the post: Pundits And Politicans Very Quick To Blame Video Game & Movie Violence For Newtown

  

  Mike Brown ( profile ), 17 Dec, 2012 @ 02:14pm

  Re: Re: Re: Simple retort

  "However, even with divorce, Japanese parents are more involved in raising (and disciplining) kids than American parents."
  
  Nail hit squarely on the head.

• On the post: MPAA: Millions Of DMCA Takedowns Proves That Google Needs To Stop Piracy

  

  Mike Brown ( profile ), 17 Dec, 2012 @ 12:21pm

  Re:

  Exactly. I wonder how many new pages their webcrawler digs up. Probably a lot more than the takedowns. How many hits to non-infringing content doe Google facilitate? The *AA's just want to throw the baby out with the bath water.

• On the post: MPAA: Millions Of DMCA Takedowns Proves That Google Needs To Stop Piracy

  

  Mike Brown ( profile ), 17 Dec, 2012 @ 12:14pm

  Re:

  Ever read this site? It's littered with alternative approaches.

• On the post: MPAA: Millions Of DMCA Takedowns Proves That Google Needs To Stop Piracy

  

  Mike Brown ( profile ), 17 Dec, 2012 @ 12:11pm

  Re: Megaupload Mike supports symbiotic piracy, NOT copyright.

  Sorry, OOTB, you don't get to blame all your woes on Google for facilitating piracy. What you're seeing right now in the movie industry is the direct result of disregarding the age-old wisdom: "don't shit where you eat." Your industry has crapped all over itself in some of the most disgusting money-grabs of all time.
  It is absolutely unacceptable that George Lucas became a gazillionaire off of Star Wars, yet the guy who played Darth Vader hasn't seen a dime because the movie hasn't profited yet.
  
  THAT'S why you can't make a profit on your $100M project. It's doomed from conception because of the toxic environment you would perpetuate.

• On the post: The FISA Amendments Act Is Clearly Unconstitutional; And Congress Doesn't Care

  

  Mike Brown ( profile ), 14 Dec, 2012 @ 06:59pm

  Re: Re: Re:

  Year after year, voters do the same dumb stuff. We spend all year pissed off at what's going on, and then we vote for incumbents because we don't know any better.
  
  If you don't follow politics, it's okay not to vote. I'd rather have abysmal numbers at the polls, as long as those who DID vote, knew what the heck they were doing.
  
  Pro tip: If you have no other clue who to vote for, choose the candidates you've never heard of. Odds are good it's because they're not as deeply indebted to special interests.

• On the post: Live By The Patent, Die By The Patent: Apple Loses Patent Lawsuit Over Sony & Nokia Patents

  

  Mike Brown ( profile ), 13 Dec, 2012 @ 07:43pm

  Re:

  In my best "Dad voice": It doesn't matter who started it. Apple, Nokia, HTC, Samsung, Motorola, stop arguing and play nice!
  
  All of their bickering, right or wrong, ultimately hurts the consumer. Sure, the lawyers on both sides come away happy, but all of us consumers are the ones paying for it.

• On the post: Infographic: People Will Pay To Support Creators, Even When Free Is An Option

  

  Mike Brown ( profile ), 12 Dec, 2012 @ 04:00pm

  Well, that is sort of like asking "how much money did you make." Not very polite. Not that I'm not curious myself, of course.
  
  Mike and Tim would never say this, but 51% paid nothing? For shame. Have you read this blog? Oh nevermind, I'm sure it was AJ, OOTB, and Bob, downloading tons of copies in order to skew the results in their favor.

• On the post: DMCA Copyright Takedowns To Google Increased 10x In Just The Past Six Months

  

  Mike Brown ( profile ), 12 Dec, 2012 @ 01:36pm

  Re: Re: "over 10 million takedowns per month"

  Exactly! How many people is Google paying to sit around and watch these videos, looking for infringement? See, piracy creates jobs! /s
  
  But seriously, I am completely shocked that they only reject 2.5%. If I thought for one second that the other 97.5% must be infringing, then I would want to invest my life savings on the company that developed the software that finds all that infringing content. Of the billions of vids on Youtube, it somehow managed to discern parody and criticism from other forms of verbal expression with 97.5% accuracy. Impressive. I know people who can't do that. many of them comment here.

• On the post: ICE Seizes 300 More Sites; Can't Have People Watching Super Bowl Ads Without Permission

  

  Mike Brown ( profile ), 02 Feb, 2012 @ 02:20pm

  Blame the advertizing

  Commercials that air on network TV can be both National and local. The cost for National advertizing is a heck of a lot more expensive than advertizing at the local level. Honda (for example) will be paying big bucks to advertize nationally. Joe's Pizza Shack in rural Idaho will only pay a fraction of that to advertize in their local market. If they allow some kid in Idaho to stream the Superbowl, Joe's Pizza's ad reaches people all over the globe. So in a sense, Honda and other National-level advertisers are being "hurt" because they are being charged more for the same global coverage.
  
  How many peopl ewill watch that kid's stream? The NFL and the network don't know, and can't monetize it, so sorry kid, no stream for you.