MadAsASnake 's Techdirt Comments

Latest Comments (314)

• On the post: FBI's Hacking Tool Found To Have Compromised Dozens Of Computers In Austria

  

  MadAsASnake ( profile ), 01 Aug, 2016 @ 06:16am

  Re:

  What - like Andrus Nom did?

• On the post: How A Supreme Court Case On Cheerleader Costumes & Copyright Could Impact Prosthetic Hands And Much, Much More

  

  MadAsASnake ( profile ), 26 Jul, 2016 @ 03:04am

  Re: Re:

  The thing is - that is usually a good thing - that is how society progresses.

• On the post: How A Supreme Court Case On Cheerleader Costumes & Copyright Could Impact Prosthetic Hands And Much, Much More

  

  MadAsASnake ( profile ), 26 Jul, 2016 @ 01:58am

  "Clothing and fashion have never been considered covered by copyright for many good reasons"
  
  As far as I can see, this can be generalised over pretty much everything copyright is used for. Copyright has one mechanism: to stop people doing things.

• On the post: Drug Dealer's Lawyers Want To Know How Yahoo Is Recovering Communications It Previously Said Were Unrecoverable

  

  MadAsASnake ( profile ), 25 Jul, 2016 @ 06:20am

  Difficult to know. What Yahoo advertise and what their labyrinthine scripts do may well be very different things. This is not unusual in large organisations.
  This could be the result of anything from Yahoos lawyers not knowing how these systems work, to the NSA giving it back and asking them to "find" it.
  Granting discovery is exactly the right thing to do.

• On the post: Just As We Warned: A Chinese Tech Giant Goes On The Patent Attack — In East Texas

  

  MadAsASnake ( profile ), 21 Jul, 2016 @ 04:14am

  What is the betting that the US gov suddenly takes an interest in cleaning up patent trolling in East Texas as a matter of priority? Either that or foreign companies find that East Texas isn't friendly except for local?

• On the post: Former STL Cardinals Scouting Director Gets Jail Time For Illegally Accessing Astros Scouting Database

  

  MadAsASnake ( profile ), 20 Jul, 2016 @ 07:00am

  Re: Re:

  Ah - got it.

• On the post: Former STL Cardinals Scouting Director Gets Jail Time For Illegally Accessing Astros Scouting Database

  

  MadAsASnake ( profile ), 20 Jul, 2016 @ 06:39am

  "used the old passwords of a former employee"
  
  Now the question I have is: Why would these passwords still work? This is security 101, and not excusing Correa's actions, it would not have been possible had the Astro's had even the most basic opsec in place.
  
  This isn't hacking. It's hardly even social engineering.

• On the post: Half Of TSA's 30,000 Employees Accused Of Misconduct; Nearly A Third Multiple Times

  

  MadAsASnake ( profile ), 19 Jul, 2016 @ 03:21am

  Re: WTF?

  You could say the same about the war on drugs

• On the post: Defeat Of Philip Morris In Its Corporate Sovereignty Case Against Uruguay Likely To Open Floodgates For Tobacco Packaging Legislation

  

  MadAsASnake ( profile ), 19 Jul, 2016 @ 03:12am

  That it is possible to bring a case claiming the corporate profit overrides national laws regarding false advertising should be a worry. That there was an expectation that Philip Morris would win should be truly frightening. Imagine the precedent set had Philip Morris won - that it is a corporate right to mislead consumers? ISDS needs to be removed from all treaties as the abomination it is.

• On the post: USOC Demands That Company Take Down Twitter Posts Of Olympic Athlete It Sponsors

  

  MadAsASnake ( profile ), 13 Jul, 2016 @ 01:13am

  The IOC is making the whole Olympics so poisonous to host that they already have trouble getting hosts for the Winter one. Recall that the last one in London resulted in Londoners not being able to use their own roads - all for corporate profit - won't be long and they'll be having trouble finding hosts for the summer ones too.

• On the post: Checking In: Blizzard Still Suing Hack/Cheat Makers For Copyright Infringement? Yup!

  

  MadAsASnake ( profile ), 12 Jul, 2016 @ 05:20am

  Re:

  They cannot legally serve papers if the organisation has no presence in the US. Any claims to have done so should be questioned by the courts and the case dropped for inability to serve. There should be no default judgement. Of course, when copyright is included in a case, all sense goes out the windo and anything can happen.

• On the post: Homeland Security Committee Thinks Backdoors Are Bad, But Encryption Still A Problem The Government Needs To Fix

  

  MadAsASnake ( profile ), 08 Jul, 2016 @ 05:43am

  Re:

  I think the message to US police is:
  
  "Stop shooting black guys that are no threat"
  
  Encryption is irrelevant. It will be trotted out of course...

• On the post: Comcast Continues To Claim It's 'Not Feasible' To Offer Its Programming To Third-Party Cable Boxes

  

  MadAsASnake ( profile ), 08 Jul, 2016 @ 07:49am

  Even if this does go through, they'll simply add the "rental" on as some other rate hike... unlikely to actually save consumers any money... one other thing - haven't these guys figured out that almost no-one wants ads?

• On the post: NRA Trademark Complaint Over Yes Men Parody Takes Down 38,000 Websites

  

  MadAsASnake ( profile ), 30 Jun, 2016 @ 11:42am

  Re: People of Limited Cognitive Faculties Traveling at Excess Velocity

  If you find this website too plausible then I think you are worrying about the wrong organisation.

• On the post: NRA Trademark Complaint Over Yes Men Parody Takes Down 38,000 Websites

  

  MadAsASnake ( profile ), 30 Jun, 2016 @ 10:22am

  Re: Re: Parody or Slander?

  NRA probably thinks its a good idea...

• On the post: NRA Trademark Complaint Over Yes Men Parody Takes Down 38,000 Websites

  

  MadAsASnake ( profile ), 30 Jun, 2016 @ 10:21am

  Re: Parody or Slander?

  So, looking at a scheme supposedly from the NRA, to give guns free to poor inner city folks, you think this is something the NRA might actually do?
  
  The same NRA that suggested that the way to deal with guns in schools was to put a lot more guns in schools?
  
  Either way, I think the parody works pretty well, at least on anyone not from the NRA.

• On the post: TAFTA/TTIP Just Got Harder: Brexit Is 'A Midsummer Night's Nightmare' Says EU Trade Commissioner

  

  MadAsASnake ( profile ), 30 Jun, 2016 @ 03:19am

  Re:

  Gotta say "Boris Johnson, thinks" is:
  - a far more reasonable proposition than for some recent US presidents
  - not an endorsement.
  
  I don't think Boris expected to "win" and was simply trying to take Cameron out. Of the 4 promises the leave campaign came up with:
  - control over immigration (they already admit no advantage)
  - more money for the NHS (... oh, not)
  - better trade deals (as this article points out - unlikely)
  - sovereignty - uhhh - well, that would be pretty Pyrrhic given that we won't be able to exercise it and get any trade deals at the same time - oh, and our bargaining position? Not good...
  
  If Johnson does get the leadership, he's handed himself a poison chalice as he can't possibly deliver on his promises and those Leave voters that were persuaded by the campaign will be pretty angry when they find out. I for one don't think he should lead on the back of such a dishonest campaign.

• On the post: Another Dumb Idea Out Of The EU: Giving Robots & Computers Copyright

  

  MadAsASnake ( profile ), 28 Jun, 2016 @ 06:31am

  Re: Re: Re: What could possibly go wrong?

  Yeah - but no bot today could possibly be classed as alive. Not being alive, it doesn't die, even when destroyed. My vote is to get a bunch of competent people to rewrite copyright law from scratch.

• On the post: Another Dumb Idea Out Of The EU: Giving Robots & Computers Copyright

  

  MadAsASnake ( profile ), 28 Jun, 2016 @ 06:28am

  Re: What could possibly go wrong?

  So, what happens when a bot happens to spit out something that a genuine creator has actually come up with? Do you sue the bot for copyright infringement?

• On the post: Another Dumb Idea Out Of The EU: Giving Robots & Computers Copyright

  

  MadAsASnake ( profile ), 28 Jun, 2016 @ 06:23am

  Re: No wonder Brexit happened

  You mean apart from people that actually live here?

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