Jeremy Lyman 's Techdirt Comments

Latest Comments (1054)

• On the post: Sen. Feinstein Says Congress 'Ready To Take Action' To Rein In Violent Video Games

  

  Jeremy Lyman ( profile ), 09 Apr, 2013 @ 05:49am

  Re: Remind me again why this is a good idea?

  Because "normal" people don't play video games. It's an easy group to shift all of our societal problems onto, so the rest of us can go about our normal violence glorification in TV, movies, magazines, newspapers, books, sporting events, and historical reenactments.

• On the post: Eric Holder, The American Library Association And Wikipedia Are America's Worst Porn Enablers

  

  Jeremy Lyman ( profile ), 09 Apr, 2013 @ 08:15am

  The lady doth protest too much

  Wow, for being so anti-pornography, they sure do know a lot of places to find it. Did they add themselves to the list of enablers?

• On the post: Wal-Mart Wants Store Customers To Deliver Packages To Online Shoppers

  

  Jeremy Lyman ( profile ), 29 Mar, 2013 @ 01:19pm

  Re: Re: Pass.

  Uh, no. The Internet enables more consumer options in those Industries, bypassing the stranglehold of a single gatekeeper entity that sought to control all aspects of distribution. I'm against monolithic entities forcing consumers into a corner by eliminating choice, not against efficiency and innovation.
  
  And yes, there's a fine line between efficiency and exploitation; but generally if you're screwing someone who depends on you, you've crossed over to the exploitation side.

• On the post: Wal-Mart Wants Store Customers To Deliver Packages To Online Shoppers

  

  Jeremy Lyman ( profile ), 29 Mar, 2013 @ 10:57am

  Pass.

  Pardon me if I don't shed a tear for Wal-Mart's web-competition problems after they eliminate local consumer choices by undercutting smaller competitors using supply chain blackmail and workforce exploitation.
  
  I'll keep paying a premium to have my valuables brought by professional delivery-persons instead of the skeezy minivan that flings those pennysaver newspapers on everyone's front lawn.

• On the post: 'Internet Lawyer' Charles Carreon Has A New Best Friend And He's An SEO Expert Who Hates Anonymous Critics

  

  Jeremy Lyman ( profile ), 29 Mar, 2013 @ 06:14am

  Want higher rankings? Be better.

  Is it just me or is a lot of "SEO" just gaming the system? Making your results land higher up than they naturally should by manipulating algorithm inputs.
  
  Seems like if you tried this stuff in a casino, you'd get your legs broke.

• On the post: EA Labels President: DRM Is A Failed Strategy, But SimCity Didn't Have Any DRM

  

  Jeremy Lyman ( profile ), 28 Mar, 2013 @ 12:23pm

  Darn.

  I am sure we shall never see any form of DRM in your games moving forward. Who wants to take bets on that one?

  
  Too bad I won't find out if they do or not, since I'm done giving EA money.

• On the post: Motion Picture Association: The Cloud Is A Threat To Us And The Best Response Is Censorship

  

  Jeremy Lyman ( profile ), 21 Mar, 2013 @ 08:33am

  Re: Re: You CAN'T disagree that "it facilitates piracy".

  Also, looking facilitates piracy. Shield your eyes people, here comes the MPAA with a rusty spoon trying to reduce infringement.

• On the post: Charles Carreon Claims A First Amendment Right To Make Vexatious Legal Threats Without Consequence

  

  Jeremy Lyman ( profile ), 21 Mar, 2013 @ 04:47am

  Re: Am I the only one that hears Dori from Finding Nemo ?

  "Hey, I've seen a lawsuit. It went by not too long ago. It went... this way."

• On the post: Rep. Gohmert's Record For Stunning Technological Ignorance Is Broken By… Rep. Gohmert

  

  Jeremy Lyman ( profile ), 20 Mar, 2013 @ 12:01pm

  Inconcievable!

  The notion that the government would pay Google for private information about its citizen's communications is laughable. Completely laughable. I mean they already have Subpoenas, Warrants, and National Security Letters.
  
  They'd be more likely to build a gigantic multimillion dollar facility in the Utah desert to surreptitiously collect and store the information themselves. Pay Google; HA!

• On the post: Nielsen Finally Realizes That TV Viewers Are Cord Cutting, Calls It 'Interesting Consumer Behavior'

  

  Jeremy Lyman ( profile ), 13 Mar, 2013 @ 08:39am

  More Nuanced Analysis, Please.

  Whoa! Why do they keep throwing around that "I" word? I do not use a television to get "Information". That big screen is dedicated to Entertainment only.
  
  And the only reason I'm not in the "cord cutter" group is that Comcast charges more for Internet alone than it does to bundle it with "Limited Basic" cable in my area. Do they have a metric for that?

• On the post: The Government Might Want To Legalize Phone Unlocking, But Unfortunately It Signed Away That Right

  

  Jeremy Lyman ( profile ), 13 Mar, 2013 @ 04:37am

  If only there was a provision that criminalized "circumventing" sovereign legislation authority.

• On the post: SimCity: The Backlash

  

  Jeremy Lyman ( profile ), 08 Mar, 2013 @ 05:59am

  Re: Re:

  I share your consternation, I've been playing "sims" (not just The Sims) since they were on green-screen monitors. One of the comments on Penny Arcade pointed me at a kickstarter for "CiViTAS" which looks like a SimCity built with the right principles behind it. Check it out if you want, but I think it would be awesome to throw EA's DRM failure back in their face with a super-successful customer friendly version.

• On the post: SimCity: The Backlash

  

  Jeremy Lyman ( profile ), 08 Mar, 2013 @ 06:09am

  Meta Game

  If EA came out with a "SimVideoGame" where you tried to publish a successful game, the decisions EA has made here would be akin to opening the "disasters" toolbar and wreaking havoc on your city.

• On the post: Librarian Of Congress Shoots Back At White House Over Phone Unlocking: We're Just Doing Our Job

  

  Jeremy Lyman ( profile ), 06 Mar, 2013 @ 05:48am

  Re: Re:

  Copyright can't stop me from painting mustaches on a portrait I bought, why does it have the power to prevent altering firmware? The measures being circumvented aren't copy protection they're change prevention; it's copyright not "changeright".

• On the post: Librarian Of Congress Shoots Back At White House Over Phone Unlocking: We're Just Doing Our Job

  

  Jeremy Lyman ( profile ), 05 Mar, 2013 @ 06:45am

  I'm really not sure why copyright gets to be involved here anyway. They are software locking a piece of hardware and using tangential legislation to keep it secured. People aren't unlocking phones to get at the valuable firmware so they can copy and distribute it. They're modifying or wiping it so that it's different than the original copyrighted version, so they can use their property the way they want.
  
  That's like saying you can't re-use a canvas and frame that contains a copyrighted painting, even if you own this copy completely. Illegal to get rid of the copyrighted part of your property? That's insane.
  
  Once you've sold a copy of something you don't own it any more. You own the right to copy it, but not that particular copy, and you have no say in what happens to it.

• On the post: Chubby Checker Sues Two Companies For $500 Million Over Wang-Measuring App Downloaded 84 Times

  

  Jeremy Lyman ( profile ), 14 Feb, 2013 @ 12:25pm

  Re: If Mr Checker was cool

  Whoops, that's my bad, he's on Amazon, I just don't know how to spell his name.

• On the post: Chubby Checker Sues Two Companies For $500 Million Over Wang-Measuring App Downloaded 84 Times

  

  Jeremy Lyman ( profile ), 14 Feb, 2013 @ 12:23pm

  If Mr Checker was cool

  He would have endorsed the app with two thumbs up and seen a huge surge in his sales on iTunes. Or maybe they would have digitized his albums and started selling them on Amazon.

• On the post: Florida Lawmakers Try To Stop Subsidizing Videogames; Send That Money To Hollywood Instead

  

  Jeremy Lyman ( profile ), 13 Feb, 2013 @ 07:59am

  What now?

  Oh, because a Terminal Sitter (aka an employed resident of your state) won't need to eat and sleep and interact with the local economy. I'm not arguing that EA should get tax incentives, but you'd think a long-term job creating enterprise would be preferable to a movie company renting out hotel rooms for a couple of months for folks who are going to export their pay back to where they really live.

• On the post: If You Want Two-Thirds Of Americans To Agree That Violent Video Games Are More Dangerous Than Guns, All You Have To Do Is Ask The Right Americans

  

  Jeremy Lyman ( profile ), 12 Feb, 2013 @ 11:08am

  Re: Re: Re: As usual, a loaded question...

  I guess my version is an example of the metal gymnastics one would have to do to make the poll question make sense. Am I being blindly optimistic to hope a poll respondent would make a similar translation?
  
  [looks at poll results]
  
  Aw crappers.

• On the post: If You Want Two-Thirds Of Americans To Agree That Violent Video Games Are More Dangerous Than Guns, All You Have To Do Is Ask The Right Americans

  

  Jeremy Lyman ( profile ), 12 Feb, 2013 @ 10:00am

  Re:

  45 year-olds use movies, TV, and music; generally you don't scapegoat something you like.

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