Internet Zen Master 's Techdirt Comments

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  • On the post: 'Anti-Propaganda' Ban Repealed, Freeing State Dept. To Direct Its Broadcasting Arm At American Citizens

    Internet Zen Master ( profile ), 15 Jul, 2013 @ 04:32pm

    Oh great.

    Soon the US will have its own version of China Daily.

    Now will have FOUR news organizations to classify:

    MSNBC: Left-Leaning (or as they like to call it, "Forward").
    FOX: Right-Leaning (Or "Fair and Balanced")
    CNN: Incompetent
    BBG: Bullshit

  • On the post: 71% Of Americans Believe The Founding Fathers Would Be Disappointed At The Way The Nation Has Turned Out

    Internet Zen Master ( profile ), 15 Jul, 2013 @ 08:52am

    Re: Re:

    "were the dominate power in the world?"

    Last I checked America can still nuke the whole goddamn planet three times over and still have a few warheads left to play with. That sounds like the dominate power in the world to me (at least in the military sense).

    And sadly, I have to agree with you on the second part. They wouldn't be surprised to learn that Europe nearly destroyed itself in what was pretty much a pair of back-to-back wars. The Founding Fathers did have to deal with Napoleon after all...

  • On the post: Google, Microsoft And Other Ad Networks Agree To 'Best Practices' To Stop Ads From Appearing On 'Pirate' Sites

    Internet Zen Master ( profile ), 15 Jul, 2013 @ 12:43pm

    In the long term, this is probably good

    Having the major tech giants come up with collaborative "best practices" agreement on their own (okay, the White House was pressuring them, but that's not the point here!) is great in the long run because it was formed by people who actually understand what they're regulating/doing. Compare that to Congress/politicians, who (aside from Ron Wyden and a few others) can't tell their head from their ass when it comes to things related to the Internet (see: SOPA, PIPA, CISPA, etc, etc.).

    I'd take a bunch of tech guys over a bunch of bumbling politicians when it comes to designing with a mutual agreement on how to deal with ad networks and copyright infringement any day of the week (and twice on Sundays).

    Will this please the MPAA/RIAA? It did for about 0.00000001 seconds, and then Chris Dodd started whining about the tech giants are still refusing to be Hollywood's personal copyright police force.

    Will it be effective?

    As the Zen Master says, "We'll see."

  • On the post: 71% Of Americans Believe The Founding Fathers Would Be Disappointed At The Way The Nation Has Turned Out

    Internet Zen Master ( profile ), 15 Jul, 2013 @ 08:27am

    So does the disappointment come before

    or after they get over the shocking fact that a) Slavery is now illegal, and b) there is a black man (Obama) in the White House and running the country?

    Aside from that, yeah, I figure that the founding fathers would be rather displeased with how our government's currently acting.

    That said, do we really need to keep going back to the "Founding Fathers" all the time and treat them like some sort of modern demi-gods every time we've got some major government scandal that should be (but currently is not) rocking this nation to its very core?

  • On the post: The Latest Leaks Contradict Claims Made In Microsoft's Own 'Law Enforcement Requests Report'

    Internet Zen Master ( profile ), 12 Jul, 2013 @ 11:50am

    Re: Re: In Microsoft's defense

    And why wouldn't Microsoft buy Skype? It's one of the most (if not most) recognized brands in the VoIP market. I mean, why bother creating your own product when you can just BUY the best product in the market and add it to your collection of products? Business-wise it made perfect sense, participation in a privacy-violating program like PRISM be damned.

  • On the post: John Steele Shows Up In Judge Wright's Court; Bet He Wishes He Hadn't

    Internet Zen Master ( profile ), 12 Jul, 2013 @ 05:48pm

    Professionalism

    Steele clearly has none.

  • On the post: DOJ: Now That We've Been Embarrassed For Spying On Journalists, We'll Be A Little More Careful

    Internet Zen Master ( profile ), 12 Jul, 2013 @ 04:48pm

    Hmmm...

    "That's simply not true. The DOJ's guidelines are just that: guidelines. They can set pretty clear guidelines for themselves that make it clear that the DOJ will not spy on reporters' communications with sources."

    "They're more like guidelines anyway."
    - Mr. Gibbs, Pirates of the Caribbean


    That line immediately popped into my head while reading this.

  • On the post: NSA Talking Points On Utah Data Center: We're Teaming Up With Tech Companies To 'Protect' The Internet

    Internet Zen Master ( profile ), 12 Jul, 2013 @ 09:25am

    Re: Re:

    Exhibit A: The kid down in Texas who got thrown in jail and held on $500k bond for several months because he made some snarky comments on League of Legends about "yeah, I'm crazy, I'm gonna shoot up a kindergarten" (or something to that effect) after someone in the chat called him crazy.

  • On the post: DRM-Plus, Or How Eidos Is Treating Anyone With A Jail-Broken iPad Like A Criminal

    Internet Zen Master ( profile ), 12 Jul, 2013 @ 09:17am

    Re:

    EA would like a word with you...

  • On the post: Lawyer: Apple Should Protect Me From My Porn Addiction

    Internet Zen Master ( profile ), 12 Jul, 2013 @ 04:00pm

    I miss Jack Thompson

    His bizzaro complaints about video games causing real-world violence are [i]disturbingly reasonable[/i] in compared to what Chris Sevier is whining about.

    You didn't know that there is such a think as porn on the internet? That's like saying you didn't know that water is wet until somebody shoved you into a pool.

  • On the post: The Latest Leaks Contradict Claims Made In Microsoft's Own 'Law Enforcement Requests Report'

    Internet Zen Master ( profile ), 12 Jul, 2013 @ 09:54am

    In Microsoft's defense

    This is the kind of thing that happens when companies aren't allowed to disclose their dealings with the federal government. They're forced to lie to their customers about things like consumer privacy as a result or face the government's wrath.

    And sadly, even if Skype had never been bought by Microsoft in the first place, it was already participating in the PRISM program (having joined the program 8 months prior to its acquisition by Microsoft).

  • On the post: Court Finds Apple Guilty Of Conspiring To Raise Ebook Prices

    Internet Zen Master ( profile ), 10 Jul, 2013 @ 11:07am

    About the Amazon complaint

    As I recall, didn't this whole thing start when Apple asked the DOJ to look into Amazon for supposedly anticompetitive practices. The DOJ found nothing wrong with Amazon, but when they looked back at Apple and the publishers, they saw that something wasn't adding up.

    In the end, Apple got exposed for being greedy scumbags trying to drive out competition by price fixing and then having the gall to turn around and accuse their main competitor of anti-competitive practices.

    Looks like the DOJ actually did its job right this time. Well, you know what they say about broken clocks...

  • On the post: A Secret Court Making Secret Laws? That's No Democracy

    Internet Zen Master ( profile ), 08 Jul, 2013 @ 11:48am

    Now the big question is

    Will the big US news organizations cover stuff like this (along with the latest NSA leak about deals with foreign telecoms)?

    *checks CNN*

    Nope. They're too busy covering the airplane crash down in San Francisco to bother with such a good story. Unconstitutional secret courts which are effectively eviscerating one of the most important amendments in the US Constitution are apparently a non-story for such a world-class "news organization".

  • On the post: Obama To Angry Europeans: Hey, Come On, You Guys Spy On Us Too, Right? Right?

    Internet Zen Master ( profile ), 02 Jul, 2013 @ 01:17pm

    Re: How we have fallen

    Name one politician currently in office that even comes close to the Henry Stimson definition of a "gentleman". I can't really think of any ('course, I'm multi-tasking so that's part of the problem).

  • On the post: Germans Want To Give Snowden A Medal, French Want To Give Him Asylum — And To Call Off TAFTA/TTIP

    Internet Zen Master ( profile ), 02 Jul, 2013 @ 01:13pm

    Message to France: Pot, meet Kettle.

    And no, I'm not translating into French for you.

    Kinda surprised the French are even considering giving Snowden asylum, considering that it will probably remind the US that France is the world leader in industrial espionage (they've probably been spying on US negotiators in preparation for TAFTA/TTIP in order to have an edge at the bargaining table).

    But if it kills TAFTA/TTIP then by all means, go right ahead.

  • On the post: Obama To Angry Europeans: Hey, Come On, You Guys Spy On Us Too, Right? Right?

    Internet Zen Master ( profile ), 02 Jul, 2013 @ 12:34pm

    France Doesn't Get to Complain

    The NSA's spying apparatus is focused on national security, the French have been actively engaged in state-sponsored industrial espionage since the 1980s, if not before.

    http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/archive/?date=19930418&slug=1696416

    Not only have they spied on the US, they've done it to the UK as well.

    http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Industrial+espionage+incident+revealed+involving+BAe+and+Airbus...-a062833503

    And according to cables released by Wikileaks back in 2011, they're the #1 country when it comes to industrial espionage.

    http://www.france24.com/en/20110104-france-industrial-espionage-economy-germany-russia-china-business

    In other words, the rest of the EU can feel free to tear Obama a new one over the spying scandal, but the French aren't invited to the "shock and outrage" party.

  • On the post: Church Of Scientology Uses Copyright, Trademark, And Cyberbullying Laws To Silence Critical Parody

    Internet Zen Master ( profile ), 28 Jun, 2013 @ 03:52pm

    Not even "kinda-old"

    Judiasm is old.
    It's younger brother, Christianity (as in the Catholic Church and everyone who broke off from them) is old. Their half-brother Islam is also old.

    Their redheaded stepbrother Mormonism/LDS is what qualifies as "kinda-old".

    Scientology is the bratty toddler who comes from Mister Fraud's house down the street. It does not qualify as "kinda-old".

    Sigh. I still think the only reason they ever got tax exemption was because their was a scientologist plant at the IRS who granted it to them.

    Kind of surprised that it took scientology so long to get into the EFF's Hall of Shame (part of me sort of expected them to be in there already. Learn something new every day I guess.)

  • On the post: President Obama Calls Ed Snowden A 'Hacker' When He Didn't Hack Anything

    Internet Zen Master ( profile ), 27 Jun, 2013 @ 01:54pm

    Re: Another way of looking at this

    Depending on how many drives are in the laptops he took, you may be right on the quantity of hard drives he has with him. The quality of the data inside of those drives, on the other hand, is something different altogether when you look at how freaked out the NSA has been.

  • On the post: Kim Dotcom's Lawyer Says DOJ 'Blessed' Destruction Of Evidence In Megaupload Case

    Internet Zen Master ( profile ), 27 Jun, 2013 @ 10:38am

    Re: Re: Going back to this, eh? On unsupported word of a lawyer.

    "His assets are frozen. He hasn't been able to pay because he can't access his money.


    Bolded for relevance.

    While it's true that Dotcom did have access to some funds, the NZ court only gave him enough for living expenses while he's being dragged through what's amounted to a modern-day witch hunt. The rest of it is STILL frozen, so he couldn't use it to pay the rent on those servers to begin with.

    Sure, he could've used some of the money provided to him by the court for the payments, but I figure Dotcom was assuming that Leaseweb would hold onto that 40% of MU's data while this whole thing got sorted out.
    The evidence is part of a criminal investigation, which means the hosting company is required to keep that data (or submit it to the court/parties of said case)."


    Oddly enough, this is exactly what MegaUpload did when asked (indirectly mind you) by the DOJ not to touch 38-39 copyrighted movies which had been uploaded to MegaUpload's Megavideo by the tv show/movies/documentaries streaming website NinjaVideo, and were used as part of the evidence against them by the prosecution.

    That trial happened in late September of 2011 with most of NinjaVideo's staff pleading guilty to criminal copyright infringement (though apparently an active uploader for the group remains at large). Megaupload didn't touch those files due to the possibility of getting charged with tampering of evidence (one of the co-founders of NinjaVideo was sentenced sometime in February 2012, AFTER the MU takedown).

    I can understand why Dotcom is so irritated. Why the hell does his business get shut down for following protocol (the sentencing for one of the co-founders of NinjaVideo occurred in February 2012, AFTER the MegaUpload takedown), and LeaseWeb gets a free pass to delete 40 PB of data that is possible "exculpatory evidence"? I'd be pissed too if something like that happened to me.

  • On the post: Dear Everyone: Please Don't Turn Edward Snowden Into Julian Assange

    Internet Zen Master ( profile ), 24 Jun, 2013 @ 11:51am

    Re: Re: Re: We might not have to worry about that problem

    Wikileaks = Dumping a full 36"x12"x12" tub full of random Legos on the floor and then saying "Have fun finding brick X".

    Snowden & Greenwald with Leakfest = Handing you a Lego kit with all the pieces already sorted for you and going "Have fun!"

    Of course, apparently Julian is now Snowden's unofficial spokesperson/advocate [what with Ed being assisted by Wikileaks and all], but since Assange is a natural for attracting media attention, he is the perfect diversion. Go figure.

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