Mason Wheeler 's Techdirt Comments

Latest Comments (4010)

• On the post: Investigators, Reporters Close In On The Origins Of Those Fake Net Neutrality Comments

  

  Mason Wheeler ( profile ), 22 Feb, 2019 @ 08:43am

  Re: Re: "Closing in" just like "Trump Russia collusion":

  Here's an interesting idea: does what they've done count as defamation? Think about it. The necessary elements are there.

  • Publishing of false facts (that Karl Bode supports this position)? Check.
  • Publishing of false facts that, if believed, will cause reputational harm to the subject? Well, there are plenty of people who will think less of someone who supports net neutrality repeal, and for good reason. I would certainly think Karl was an idiot if he actually supported it. Check.

  This is starting to sound like a legitimate, if unorthodox, libel case.

• On the post: Investigators, Reporters Close In On The Origins Of Those Fake Net Neutrality Comments

  

  Mason Wheeler ( profile ), 22 Feb, 2019 @ 07:38am

  Re:

  Karl has "breathless," Mike has "laughable," lots of people have favorite words they overuse. At least they're not sprinkling the word "maladroitly" everywhere...

• On the post: Catholic School Teen's Lawyers File $250M Defamation Suit Against The Washington Post; Fail To List Any Actual Defamation

  

  Mason Wheeler ( profile ), 22 Feb, 2019 @ 07:21am

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

  Excuse me? First off, someone hiding behind an AC tag has no right to call somebody going by their real name while expressing controversial opinions cowardly. Zero. Second, define "own up." Yes, I understand that these principles may, at times, produce unfavorable outcomes. If I didn't, I wouldn't have mentioned that fact right there in the thing you quoted. But I also understand something that the people on here who appear to be arguing in favor of situational ethics don't seem to get: a principle-guided life, (if guided by good principles, of course) produces more good outcomes than bad ones. If nothing else, there's one point that ought to be utterly obvious to anyone with the mental maturity of an adult: if you abandon your honor and do underhanded, dirty things to your opponent, even to gain what appears to be a desired outcome, you are legitimizing those tactics to be used against you in the future. That's what's at the root of most of my arguments on here: de-escalation. Don't let this garbage become mainstream. When people are despicable enough to employ them, make an example out of those people to show that we do not consider cheating and dirty tricks acceptable, that we're still better than that.

• On the post: Catholic School Teen's Lawyers File $250M Defamation Suit Against The Washington Post; Fail To List Any Actual Defamation

  

  Mason Wheeler ( profile ), 22 Feb, 2019 @ 07:12am

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

  When was the last time you saw a story on Techdirt that would allow you to test that theory? Maybe it's just too early right now, but I can't recall anything recently about left-wing people being the victims of this sort of lynch mob. Can you?

• On the post: Catholic School Teen's Lawyers File $250M Defamation Suit Against The Washington Post; Fail To List Any Actual Defamation

  

  Mason Wheeler ( profile ), 22 Feb, 2019 @ 07:10am

  Re: Re: Re: tl;dr

  Yes, there's a real pattern there, but it's not the one you're insinuating. Namely, there's a pattern of Techdirt stories covering cases where people "on the right" are treated unfairly. When we have stories on here about modern-day lynch mobs going after people "on the left," you'll see me here in the comments defending them just as strongly. But I haven't seen a story like that in a while. Have you?

• On the post: AI Writes Article About AI: Does The Newspaper Hold The Copyright?

  

  Mason Wheeler ( profile ), 22 Feb, 2019 @ 11:36am

  What I expect will happen is that, in a hypothetical case exactly like this that ended up in court, the Guardian would end up as the copyright owner under work-made-for-hire doctrine, which obviously did not apply to the infamous monkey photographer.

  It's not right. It's not good. But I bet it will be what we end up with.

• On the post: Investigators, Reporters Close In On The Origins Of Those Fake Net Neutrality Comments

  

  Mason Wheeler ( profile ), 22 Feb, 2019 @ 07:40am

  Center for Individual Freedom (CFIF), a "dark money" influence group with historical ties to defending tobacco companies

  Typical Libertarian doublespeak. They call themselves supporters of "individual freedom," then defend the rights of rich and powerful conglomerates to cause harm to and reduce the freedom of actual individuals.

• On the post: European Journalists Point Out That Article 11 Will Enrich Publishers At The Expense Of Journalists

  

  Mason Wheeler ( profile ), 22 Feb, 2019 @ 07:33am

  Internet platforms face incentives to pay for artists and journalists’ work used

  Except, actual journalists in the EU are realizing exactly what many of us have been talking about for months: nothing in the Directive will lead to more money for journalists. Instead, at best, it might lead to more money for publishers

  So basically, the journalists are about to experience what "artists" (particularly musicians and actors) have been experiencing for decades now under the modern copyright regime: having all of the money that's supposed to be going to them diverted into publishers' coffers instead?

• On the post: Catholic School Teen's Lawyers File $250M Defamation Suit Against The Washington Post; Fail To List Any Actual Defamation

  

  Mason Wheeler ( profile ), 21 Feb, 2019 @ 02:16pm

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

  My "usual trick" is to make principled arguments. You appear to be back to yours, which is demonstrating a complete lack of understanding of the concept of a general principle in the abstract, and how adherence to them can be valuable even in specific situations where they might produce an outcome you find unfavorable.

• On the post: Catholic School Teen's Lawyers File $250M Defamation Suit Against The Washington Post; Fail To List Any Actual Defamation

  

  Mason Wheeler ( profile ), 21 Feb, 2019 @ 01:32pm

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

  And I'm refusing to play that game. The way this works is that you get someone to commit to something specific, and then pull out a carefully-chosen example to make that look ridiculous, thereby discrediting them. Even if it's not what you, specifically, are trying to do, do you really think none of the other people on here would do exactly that? My argument is that you do not need to know precisely where the line is in order to recognize that certain extreme examples (such as this one) are waaaaaaay off on the wrong side of it!

• On the post: Catholic School Teen's Lawyers File $250M Defamation Suit Against The Washington Post; Fail To List Any Actual Defamation

  

  Mason Wheeler ( profile ), 21 Feb, 2019 @ 01:24pm

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

  More than zero!

• On the post: Catholic School Teen's Lawyers File $250M Defamation Suit Against The Washington Post; Fail To List Any Actual Defamation

  

  Mason Wheeler ( profile ), 21 Feb, 2019 @ 01:22pm

  Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

  I was about to point out how both of you appear to not know what that actually means, despite linking to the definition. Then I looked at the article and was very sad to find out that someone screwed it up several years ago and it's been sitting like that ever since. That's really annoying! What reductio ad absurdum actually means is demonstrating that a logical absurdity (aka a contradiction) follows from a premise, and therefore that premise cannot possibly be true. For example, "there's no such thing as the biggest natural number, because if there were such a number, I could add 1 to it and have an even bigger number." It doesn't mean "reducing" an argument to an "absurd" (aka silly) looking strawman. That's not a valid form of argument and never has been.

• On the post: Teen Musician Turns Down $3 Million Record Deal: No Need For A Label Thanks To The Internet

  

  Mason Wheeler ( profile ), 21 Feb, 2019 @ 12:53pm

  Re: Re: Re: WHAT would be great...

  Huh? Even my first job out of high school, working fast food, I had contracts and papers to sign to make my employment legal.

• On the post: Catholic School Teen's Lawyers File $250M Defamation Suit Against The Washington Post; Fail To List Any Actual Defamation

  

  Mason Wheeler ( profile ), 21 Feb, 2019 @ 12:35pm

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

  You said it was 'reckless' of them to report on the matter before knowing all the details

  No, I did not. I said it was reckless of them to report on the matter before knowing any of the details beyond the original video. They had one side of the story and nothing else, and instead of investigating and digging into it and finding out anything else at all, they rushed to publish. That's not journalism; it's gossip, and malicious gossip at that.

• On the post: Catholic School Teen's Lawyers File $250M Defamation Suit Against The Washington Post; Fail To List Any Actual Defamation

  

  Mason Wheeler ( profile ), 21 Feb, 2019 @ 12:21pm

  Re: Re: Re:

  To get it right, don't put a space between the [text] and the (url). It should just go ]( with nothing in between.

• On the post: Catholic School Teen's Lawyers File $250M Defamation Suit Against The Washington Post; Fail To List Any Actual Defamation

  

  Mason Wheeler ( profile ), 21 Feb, 2019 @ 12:19pm

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

  You don't comprehend what I'm typing. Because all you're doing here is restating the original trollish point that I literally just took apart. An argument is a connected series of statements intended to establish a proposition! Argument is an intellectual process. Contradiction is just the automatic gainsaying of anything the other person says.

• On the post: One Person's Unsettling Experience With A $20k Higbee Copyright Troll Demand Letter

  

  Mason Wheeler ( profile ), 21 Feb, 2019 @ 12:10pm

  Re: Re: Re: Re:

  That's not proof that it was never licensed under Creative Commons. (Especially coming from a notorious troll and extortionist!)

• On the post: Catholic School Teen's Lawyers File $250M Defamation Suit Against The Washington Post; Fail To List Any Actual Defamation

  

  Mason Wheeler ( profile ), 21 Feb, 2019 @ 12:05pm

  Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

  Oh, I have. All too many times. As I said above, that doesn't mean I have to accept that it's right just because I know it's a real thing that exists.

• On the post: Catholic School Teen's Lawyers File $250M Defamation Suit Against The Washington Post; Fail To List Any Actual Defamation

  

  Mason Wheeler ( profile ), 21 Feb, 2019 @ 12:04pm

  Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

  At no point did I say "100% of the details" or anything even close to that. If someone is going to disagree with what I said, I can respect that, but if they're going to come up with a ridiculous strawman that was not at all what I said and try to mock it, I'm going to call them on it. It's dishonest and it's lazy. What I said was that there was obviously going to be more to the story, because there always is, and for them to fail to take that into account--particularly on a story that ends up damaging someone's reputation!--is the very definition of reckless journalism.

• On the post: Catholic School Teen's Lawyers File $250M Defamation Suit Against The Washington Post; Fail To List Any Actual Defamation

  

  Mason Wheeler ( profile ), 21 Feb, 2019 @ 11:40am

  Re: Re: Re:

  You can always tell the person in the argument who knows they've got nothing: they're the first one to abandon logic and reason and turn to mockery as a desperate attempt to distract the audience from the paucity of his position.

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