Josh in CharlotteNC 's Techdirt Comments

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  • On the post: Why Adversarial Hearings Are Important: Rulings Change When The Other Side Is Heard

    Josh in CharlotteNC ( profile ), 06 Dec, 2011 @ 10:34am

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Justice Delayed = Justice Denied

    I'm assuming that the judge considered the accuser's claim and deemed the circumstances proper to order a seizure prior to a hearing in order to preserve the accuser's rights.

    How can you assume that when there is irrefutable evidence that he did not? When the judge was presented with all the facts, the ruling went in the complete opposite direction. You're being willfully blind.

  • On the post: Why Adversarial Hearings Are Important: Rulings Change When The Other Side Is Heard

    Josh in CharlotteNC ( profile ), 06 Dec, 2011 @ 10:29am

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Justice Delayed = Justice Denied

    Does that matter?

    It matters a great deal.

    If someone is charged with a crime, then there has been some level of scrutiny gone over the evidence, and multiple parties (for example, the police and district attorneys) agree that the evidence is sufficient to arrest and hold him.

    On the other hand, accusing someone of a crime requires no evidence (and under SOPA, it doesn't even require someone swearing under penalty of perjury). I could call up the police and say "There's this guy Willton commenting on Techdirt and he deals drugs. Arrest him, seize all his property, then throw him in jail until he gets a trial. And after the trial, if he's innocent, he can have his stuff back." Sound fair to you?

    Oh give me a break. Selling ads is not free speech worthy of 1st Amendment protection.

    Not according to the Supreme Court. They ruled in effect that money equals speech in regards to paid advertisements during political campaigns.

    ICE is acting at the behest of a court order, which was issued to preserve the rights of an aggrieved property holder. If the defendant has a problem with that, it should take it up with the complainant.

    Since we're referring to ICE's domain seizures here, the court order was ex parte. Also, it took months of effort for Rojadirecta to even find anyone they could complain to about the domain seizure.

  • On the post: Red Cross Wants Real Life Laws Enforced Within Virtual Worlds

    Josh in CharlotteNC ( profile ), 05 Dec, 2011 @ 10:33am

    Re: Re:

    Lets ban the Iliad because they slaughter animals too.

    Wow. If you think slaughtering animals is the worst thing in the Iliad, I suggest you read the non-Disneyfied version. Frankly, the level of barbarity in the poem outstrips just about any modern video game, movie, or book you could name. But I guess the same could be said for most of the bronze age myths as well.

  • On the post: The Value Is In The Relationship, Not The MP3 File

    Josh in CharlotteNC ( profile ), 02 Dec, 2011 @ 06:39am

    Re:

    there are a lot of people in this digital age who are selfish beyond belief.

    I'll take your made up statistic of 50% of selfish people in the digital age and contrast it to the 99% of recording label executives who are selfish beyond belief, use shady accounting to cheat the artists, then publicly lie that manipulating and corrupting our political system is all for the artists.

  • On the post: As SOPA/PIPA Still Loom, Techies Already Creating Workarounds

    Josh in CharlotteNC ( profile ), 01 Dec, 2011 @ 06:18pm

    Re: Re: Sigh

    Look up DeCSS on Wikipedia if you want the story.

  • On the post: Data Shows: Removing 'Rogue Sites' From Search Won't Make Much Of A Difference

    Josh in CharlotteNC ( profile ), 30 Nov, 2011 @ 02:03pm

    Re:

    TPB isn't listed on the first page results. Know what the top spot is for? A paid ad link to... Netflix, a 100% legal, paid service.

    TPB barely makes it into the 2nd page at #20. Know what comes up well before it at #13? publicdomainflicks.com - which, guess what? - has public domain movies.

    Most of the other links in the first 2 pages have variations on free/movie/downloads in their addresses. I'm sure many are fine, but I avoid clicking on these type links out of habit since you rarely know in advance which might be sites trying to turn my system into a zombie.

    You have any other stupid questions?

  • On the post: The Hypocrites Of Congress: Who Voted Against Net Neutrality, But For SOPA/PIPA

    Josh in CharlotteNC ( profile ), 29 Nov, 2011 @ 02:36pm

    Re: Re: Re: "Hyster"

    While I'm aware of the origin of the word (SAT root words FTW), I'm with Mike on this. I have never heard any modern usage of the word that was specifically gender based.

  • On the post: Ubisoft Director Backtracks On Piracy Complaints After Public Lashing

    Josh in CharlotteNC ( profile ), 29 Nov, 2011 @ 08:05am

    Re: Re:

    All of those people could be assigned to more productive projects.

    Or, they could hire more people and do both. And make even more money. But that's just crazy talk, right?

  • On the post: The Definitive Post On Why SOPA And Protect IP Are Bad, Bad Ideas

    Josh in CharlotteNC ( profile ), 22 Nov, 2011 @ 09:27pm

    Re: Re: Re: Why it's right!

    How would you know? They haven't even tried.

  • On the post: The Definitive Post On Why SOPA And Protect IP Are Bad, Bad Ideas

    Josh in CharlotteNC ( profile ), 22 Nov, 2011 @ 04:52pm

    Re: Why it's right!

    So what do we do about the ISOHunts? What do we do about the USENET sites? What do we do about the Torrent sites? They're making money selling access to content and they're sharing NOTHING with the people who do the real work. If not now, when? If not the SOPA or PROTECT-IP, what?

    It is utterly simple. Out compete them. The content companies could have a tremendous advantage and nearly put torrent sites out of business in a few days if they were willing to pull their heads out of their asses and compete.

    You want to get me to stop torrenting my favorite TV shows each week? Let me download them in a good quality format the moment they start airing and charge a reasonable price straight from the network's home page. You put it up, I'll get my credit card.

    You want to get me to stop torrenting a movie that's still in the theaters? Let me download it in a good quality format on release night for a reasonable price.

    Music? Well, I don't really torrent music very much anymore since I started using Pandora, but I'll stop altogether if I can (again) get a good quality mp3 or flac download of a band's entire catalog (and please decide on a standard format for file names and all the meta data tags) for a reasonable price ($1 per song is 10-20 times too expensive).

    There is no technical or economic reason why what I've mentioned is either unreasonable or unfeasible. So, get on it, and I'll get my credit card.

  • On the post: How Do You Promote A Bad DRM Scheme? With A Bad Movie Of Course

    Josh in CharlotteNC ( profile ), 22 Nov, 2011 @ 08:24am

    Worst?

    As bad as Batman Forever was, Batman and Robin was worse by an order of magnitude. Clooney as Batman? Arnie? Alicia Silverstone?

    Though I guess it could be worse. They could give away the movie Ultraviolet along with the DRM of the same name.

  • On the post: Extra Kudos To Senators Willing To Stand On Principle Against PROTECT IP

    Josh in CharlotteNC ( profile ), 21 Nov, 2011 @ 08:39pm

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

    What percentage of the content that is being looted is 5 years old?

    So you're admitting that even a 5 year copyright term is too long to make any difference in the bottom line for content companies?

    Thank you.

  • On the post: Extra Kudos To Senators Willing To Stand On Principle Against PROTECT IP

    Josh in CharlotteNC ( profile ), 21 Nov, 2011 @ 08:02pm

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

    All of the piracy apologists will oppose any measure that will impede infringing.

    When the entire idea behind the law is wrong, and provably wrong, opposition is the only rational choice.

    I've given my suggestions many times on how to fix copyright law. I've admitted that my view is not mainstream, but where I can compromise to find common ground.

    For instance, I start at zero year for copyright length, and you start at 100 years. I offer a compromise to 5 years. If your next offer would be 120 years, plus shutting down competing distribution methods and throwing people behind them in jail - then you're not compromising.

    Start rolling the completely unsupportable position back, and we can find options.

  • On the post: Extra Kudos To Senators Willing To Stand On Principle Against PROTECT IP

    Josh in CharlotteNC ( profile ), 21 Nov, 2011 @ 07:53pm

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

    Then please define what you think P2P is, because you seem to be living in a completely different world than the rest of us.

  • On the post: Extra Kudos To Senators Willing To Stand On Principle Against PROTECT IP

    Josh in CharlotteNC ( profile ), 21 Nov, 2011 @ 07:36pm

    Re: Re: Re: Re:

    Now tell us how you will enforce that on a website hosted in Belieze.

    First, if you're talking about the small country in Central America, its Belize. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belize

    Second, that's obvious. You check to see if the person is breaking any laws in Belize. If they have broken a law there, take it up with the authorities there. If they are not breaking a law there, then again, it is obvious that you need to adjust your distribution model to account for the competition from another country.

  • On the post: Extra Kudos To Senators Willing To Stand On Principle Against PROTECT IP

    Josh in CharlotteNC ( profile ), 21 Nov, 2011 @ 07:28pm

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

    The only thing from that post that is close:

    "I want to argue that unauthorized publication amounts to forcing another to speak. Unauthorized publication is wrongful because it is compelled speech."

    When it comes to a p2p site, this doesn't apply. You've already put your speech out in (at least) one form. You wrote a book, recorded a video or music. Someone else is repeating something you have already said. And that is not "compelled speech."

  • On the post: SOPA Is Not About Copyright, It's About Regulating The Internet

    Josh in CharlotteNC ( profile ), 21 Nov, 2011 @ 06:37pm

    Re: Re: Re: SOPA

    Loopholes in the DMCA are being used to protect tens of thousands of acts of copyright infringement every day.

    It's not a loophole to properly apply liability to the correct party.

    On the other hand, it has been used to censor legal and legitimate speech. There are hundreds and thousands of documented examples. It has been used to jail legitimate software developers (remember Dmitry Sklyarov?).

    If you want to ignore the mountains of evidence, that's your choice, just don't expect anyone else to accept your bullshit.

  • On the post: Extra Kudos To Senators Willing To Stand On Principle Against PROTECT IP

    Josh in CharlotteNC ( profile ), 21 Nov, 2011 @ 06:24pm

    Re: Re:

    +1

  • On the post: Extra Kudos To Senators Willing To Stand On Principle Against PROTECT IP

    Josh in CharlotteNC ( profile ), 21 Nov, 2011 @ 06:22pm

    Re: Re:

    the problem with PIPA is that it punishes those engaged in trafficking illegal goods.

    Too bad for your argument that trafficking in illegal goods is already against the law and there are quite hefty punishments for it.

    http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/18/2320.html
    US Code, Title 18, Section 2320:
    (1) In general.? Whoever; [1] intentionally traffics or attempts to traffic in goods or services and knowingly uses a counterfeit mark on or in connection with such goods or services, or intentionally traffics or attempts to traffic in labels, patches, stickers, wrappers, badges, emblems, medallions, charms, boxes, containers, cans, cases, hangtags, documentation, or packaging of any type or nature, knowing that a counterfeit mark has been applied thereto, the use of which is likely to cause confusion, to cause mistake, or to deceive, shall, if an individual, be fined not more than $2,000,000 or imprisoned not more than 10 years, or both, and, if a person other than an individual, be fined not more than $5,000,000.

  • On the post: Extra Kudos To Senators Willing To Stand On Principle Against PROTECT IP

    Josh in CharlotteNC ( profile ), 21 Nov, 2011 @ 06:18pm

    Re: Re: Re:

    Copyright is probably the single most important tool available to the individual for defending the meaning of what one says.

    That is bullshit.

    Social mores and direct evidence of what someone says protect against that. In other words, the way to combat false speech is with more speech (and evidence).

    I will concede your point IF you can give some kind of rational explanation in why shutting down a peer2peer site has even the slightest link to protecting the "integrity" of something you said/wrote.

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