vivaelamor 's Techdirt Comments

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  • On the post: Senator Wyden Says He'll Block COICA Censorship Bill

    vivaelamor ( profile ), 20 Nov, 2010 @ 10:49am

    Re:

    "I mean I just can't buy your arguments if you never created anything and then had it stolen."

    I can see many flaws with his arguments, but I don't believe lack of experience is one of them. If I was in the music business then I don't think it would help my arguments one tiny bit, because they're not based on my experience of the music business.

    Of course, if he is making arguments supposedly backed by his own 'insight', then have at it.

  • On the post: Senator Wyden Says He'll Block COICA Censorship Bill

    vivaelamor ( profile ), 20 Nov, 2010 @ 10:42am

    Re: Re: Re:

    "Like it or not, copyright is also a right. It's a right that coexists with First Amendment rights."

    Copyright is a law by Congress and is therefore subject to the First Amendment. The Constitution only grants Congress the authority to make copyright law, not the authority to make law that violates the First Amendment. I'm no expert on The Constitution, but I don't see how any interpretation of it can put the Copyright Clause on par with the First Amendment.

    "Funny how you defend the pirates' rights, but not the rights of those whom they infringe upon."

    A funny thing about those rights is that they're not mutually exclusive. If Mike defends the right to free speech then that defends the rights of 'pirates' and those infringed upon (who may be even be the same people). To even suggest that pirates and copyright holders are somehow mutually exclusive groups is just plain wrong. Thank your First Amendment rights for your ability to lie through your teeth.

  • On the post: Jay-Z Explains He Is 'Honored' To Have His Work Remixed By Others

    vivaelamor ( profile ), 20 Nov, 2010 @ 10:21am

    Re: I got no talent...

    "...but if I did have talent, and I worked really hard at producing an album, and some dumb@ss came by and took that work to make his own work to make money. Well? I would be miffed."

    Except they couldn't take your work to make their money. If they took your work then you wouldn't be able to sell it, however if they've copied your work then you can still sell it and they'd have to compete with you. Nothing is created in a vacuum; either people are free to copy other people for their own work or everyone starts from scratch and we forget about having any modern music. Drawing a line in the sand serves no purpose other than to claim entitlement for the sake of greed.

  • On the post: The Problems With Letting Child Porn Victims Demand Cash From Those Caught With Their Images

    vivaelamor ( profile ), 05 Nov, 2010 @ 05:26pm

    Re: To you all.

    "There isn't a court judgment in the world that can give that to us.

    I wish that people stopped pretending there is."

    Thank you for your sincere and insightful post.

    I believe that the best way to minimise abuse is to ensure the full focus of the law is on finding children actually at risk or being abused. Anything beyond that should be shown to be consistently more effective, otherwise the risk is taken that less children are going to be identified and properly dealt with. I'll preempt any responses about resources with the fact that there is already an obscene backlog for dealing with child pornography cases.

    As you say, there is no legislative cure all, further I believe that there is no policy of zero tolerance that will eventually make the problem go away. It needs to be dealt with on a case by case basis with the potential harm to a vulnerable person at the center of the case. At the moment the act of harm seems to be the premise for the laws but the prevention of harm doesn't seem to be the purpose. While being a victim will in most cases be a tragically life damaging experience, laws against possessing images of that experience seem likely to have a greater effect diverting resources away from preventing further abuse than the positive effect the may have for a victim.

    Besides which, it is my belief that no one should ever have their life destroyed based on such a tenuous link to a act of harm. People who commit direct harm with intent are in most situations unlikely to be treated remotely as harshly as someone possessing child pornography, merely considering the social effect let alone the law.

  • On the post: The Problems With Letting Child Porn Victims Demand Cash From Those Caught With Their Images

    vivaelamor ( profile ), 05 Nov, 2010 @ 04:07pm

    Re:

    "I could state some of my views on this and the child pornography laws in general, but I would probably get banned for doing so."

    I trust Mike not to stifle discussion on issues just because they are sensitive, but if you're concerned then I would suggest posting anonymously and using the tor project to minimise risk. It helps to stay on topic though (something which I'm guilty of breaching on occasion).

    "There is no reason to wait even two WEEKS after the so-called 'abuse', and at that point I think it's more a case of 'fucker's remorse' where the child was willingly involved in a sexual interaction with someone or allowed nude pictures to be taken of them, and wants 'revenge' on the person in question."

    The premise is that there can never be informed consent, as such 'fucker's remorse' (classy name :P) is irrelevant. That's why they call it statutory rape, because it is rape as defined by law rather than as implied by events. There are many issues associated with age of consent laws but unless you're trying to argue that all children are capable of consent then a better alternative is needed before anything will change.

    Personally I don't get why so little attention is paid to vulnerable adults considering they are more likely to be isolated.

  • On the post: The Problems With Letting Child Porn Victims Demand Cash From Those Caught With Their Images

    vivaelamor ( profile ), 05 Nov, 2010 @ 03:38pm

    Re: Re: Seriously?

    "He knew that there was a crime, and he didn't report it."

    One of the common arguments against this sort of thing is that making possession illegal may decrease the likelihood that people will report a crime. It is hard to believe that the positive effect of reporting something already in the public domain will outweigh the risk associated with supplying self incriminating evidence to the police. In fact, I'm no expert (because I'm not American), but it occurs to me that the fifth amendment may protect against the situation you describe.

  • On the post: The Problems With Letting Child Porn Victims Demand Cash From Those Caught With Their Images

    vivaelamor ( profile ), 05 Nov, 2010 @ 03:24pm

    Re: Re: Re:

    "the sex drive of a healthy/normal individual is not based on acts wherein the partner is incapable of giving consent."

    You view BDSM as unhealthy and abnormal? I can understand why you might, but I don't see how that makes those people more likely to commit rape. Even if it does, we don't lock those people up as potential rapists.

    "A straight, "normal" dude who goes to a bar is not automatically putting all the women in that bar at risk -- men are not by default rapists, sex is not by default dangerous. "

    You have not presented any evidence to suggest that pedophiles are by default rapists. I'm not even sure where whether it is dangerous or not comes into the issue of consent; as far as I'm concerned people are entitled to refuse consent whether there may be danger or not.

    "A pedophile in the company of children is automatically putting those children at risk because a) humans tend to suck at completely quashing absolutely all of their sexual impulses and b) the sexual impulses of pedophiles are specifically tied to the fact that the objects of their desire can't consent."

    Again, if that's the premise then your argument should apply to everyone who has deviant fantasies. By your logic, anyone who gets off on erotic stories involving death should be considered a danger to society, because people are legally incapable of consenting to being killed as part of a sexual fantasy.

    Further, you wouldn't limit enforcement to footage of real events, but also to any non fiction works on such subjects. Not only would 'pseudo images' be illegal but also pure text stories.

    "I don't really agree with the capital punishment scenario, but drawing sharp comparisons between healthy sexuality and pedophilia is silly."

    Well I was going to compare it to beekeeping but I didn't think you'd understand the point then.

  • On the post: Virginia High School Says Barring Students From Doing Outside Research Helps Them 'Think For Themselves'

    vivaelamor ( profile ), 05 Nov, 2010 @ 08:07am

    Re: Re: Re: Re:

    "No, my argument is that, if a student is given an input, and asked to react to that input, then a reaction based on that input and no other sources will truly be the student's reaction. One response to one stimulus, enabling a teacher to see how well a student structures an argument when the ground rules are firmly established and followed, and also how well the student understands the subject matter, in and of itself."

    Firstly, while that is a sound argument it doesn't remotely resemble the one that I responded to.

    Secondly, if it were applicable in this case then why wouldn't they just say that instead of coming out with crazy talk (like you did) which implied that they had no understanding of the potential benefits of their own methods. Having a valid reason for doing something isn't very compelling if you claim to have done it for a completely different reason.

  • On the post: The Problems With Letting Child Porn Victims Demand Cash From Those Caught With Their Images

    vivaelamor ( profile ), 05 Nov, 2010 @ 07:51am

    Re: It's called a nuclear deterrent

    "Penalties should be based on punishment, justice being seen to be done and deterrence. "

    Why not put them all to death then? Why 'merely' bankruptcy?

  • On the post: The Problems With Letting Child Porn Victims Demand Cash From Those Caught With Their Images

    vivaelamor ( profile ), 05 Nov, 2010 @ 07:37am

    Re:

    "If an adult has sexual desires pertaining to children, they are a danger to any child they are near."

    Wouldn't it then follow that all other adults with a healthy sexual drive are a danger to those they are attracted to?

    "Death would not be going too far."

    Ah, capital punishment for looking at pictures. I can see reason and logic will get me far here.

  • On the post: Virginia High School Says Barring Students From Doing Outside Research Helps Them 'Think For Themselves'

    vivaelamor ( profile ), 02 Nov, 2010 @ 11:58am

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

    "The entire history of Human civilization to draw from, and you went the Nazi route. I'm just saying that Godwin's law struck again, and this time, you were its agent."

    You know what is more disrupting to a discussion than mentioning Hitler? Godwin's law.

  • On the post: Virginia High School Says Barring Students From Doing Outside Research Helps Them 'Think For Themselves'

    vivaelamor ( profile ), 02 Nov, 2010 @ 11:54am

    Re: Re:

    "Have to disagree with you there, AC. You're not talking about thinking for oneself, you're talking about deciding which option among other people's thoughts you feel is best."

    This goes to the whole 'nothing occurs in a vacuum' thing that Nina Paley wrote an article about some time ago. No matter what your thinking is, you will have at least one input that will influence you. This may mean that you end up parroting the input but the more inputs you have the less likely this is to happen. Sure, you may just end up parroting a different input back, but more likely you will take the inputs and form your own opinion, distinct from any one of the inputs.

    "If these students aren't given the option of choosing from among myriad sources, then they will have to suck it up and voice their own opinion, backed up by solid arguments."

    Your argument here ignores the fact that they already have one input. If you believe that a useful opinion can better form in a vacuum then you should be arguing for them not to be taught at all.

  • On the post: Apple Prefers To Keep GPL'd Software Out Of App Store So It Can Keep DRM On All Apps

    vivaelamor ( profile ), 02 Nov, 2010 @ 05:02am

    Re: Who's denying whom here?

    "Wait wait wait... Apple approved the app. "Free" software people noted that restrictions on their license would not allow it on a platform tainted by DRM. The developer asks Apple to remove it to remain in compliance, and Apple will comply. "

    More specifically, one developer out of many who worked on the VLC project submitted a complaint.

    "And Apple is the bad guy here? "

    For complying with the complaint? No. They're the "bad guy" for not changing their app store terms to be compatible with the GPLv2. The Android market has a specific clause to avoid such issues: "4.2 Some components of Products (whether developed by Google or third parties) may also be governed by applicable open source software licenses. In the event of a conflict between the Terms and any such licenses, the open source software licenses shall prevail with respect to those components. "

    "but they make a case (you may feel it's reasonable or not) that apps must be signed in order to protect their users."

    That isn't the issue here; the issue is purely over conflicting licencing terms, not DRM. I'm unsure why Mike dragged DRM into this article without explaining that.

    "The control in this case is coming from the Free Software folks, not DRM-loving Apple."

    And the outrage is coming from ignorant people on both sides, the ones who 'favour' the GPL without apparently understanding it and those who are getting outraged at their ignorant outrage (which would appear to be you). I think anyone who understands what the GPL is about will concur that this is merely it functioning as intended.

    As you say, we can be mad at Apple for being Apple, but not specifically in this case (they're Apple all the time). The same goes for the GPL and those using it, you can't be mad at them in this specific case, the GPL is just doing its job.

  • On the post: Google Sues The US Government For Only Considering Microsoft Solutions

    vivaelamor ( profile ), 01 Nov, 2010 @ 05:58pm

    Re: Re: Re: Google's Conquest of the World Starts

    "The only person I could accept, or at least listen to such an argument from ("blah blah Google bad blah blah dominate world"), would be a person using some Gentoo Linux, compiling his own packages, not letting any closed-source package in, and not using any Web-based service (except his own, on his own server), plus a condition on the mobile phone he has (free software only, some OpenMoko or Cyanogen Android I guess)."

    I worry how close I come to that description! Currently using Arch Linux as my primary OS, but cut my teeth on Linux From Scratch and Gentoo. Currently using third party servers, but for the reason of I don't own my internet connection rather than don't want to run my own server. My mobile phone runs Maemo and I plan to upgrade to Meego next year if 1.2 is stable for handsets. By the way, using open source every day shouldn't be a pretence for 'I audit the code running on my PC', because even when I did compile every single package on my system I rarely looked at a line of code myself.

    All that and despite aspiring to run my own email I'm using Gmail in the meantime because while I have reservations about Google, I trust them more than my ISP or as much as some other random service provider.

  • On the post: Thank Copyright Infringers For Still Being Able To Hear Great Moments In World Series History

    vivaelamor ( profile ), 01 Nov, 2010 @ 02:01am

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

    "Did you click the link I provided above?"

    I read the linked article last week, thanks.

    "It makes sense for Mike to consider the consequences of his actions but why should he care about your actions?"

    Why shouldn't he care?

    "Its bogus to say look at all of the good things that come from recording/copying/sharing but then to say that you should not do it."

    I think Karl has sufficiently explained why it is not bogus.

  • On the post: Thank Copyright Infringers For Still Being Able To Hear Great Moments In World Series History

    vivaelamor ( profile ), 31 Oct, 2010 @ 09:06am

    Re: Re: Re:

    "It is intellectually dishonest to say that recording is good, copying is good, sharing is good but if any of those things happen to be illegal then downloading them is not good."

    Why is it intellectually dishonest? I don't share Mike's apparent respect for the law, but I can still understand and accept it. You seem to suggest that it is impossible to make decisions based solely on whether something is legal or not. Respect for the law aside, is it intellectually dishonest to consider the negative consequences of your actions, or is that just rational thought?

  • On the post: Judge Orders Limewire To Shut Down; Limewire Pretends It Can Still Exist

    vivaelamor ( profile ), 28 Oct, 2010 @ 10:55am

    Re: Re:

    "there will always be sociopaths and nerds that would rather rip off a musician than support them."

    I wonder what you would say to musicians who are also nerds. Why do you hate Marian Call so much?

  • On the post: Judge Orders Limewire To Shut Down; Limewire Pretends It Can Still Exist

    vivaelamor ( profile ), 27 Oct, 2010 @ 10:31am

    Re: Re: Advocating Piracy

    "nerds will always bend over backwards to pirate"

    Do you have some reasoning behind that statement, or do you just not like nerds?

  • On the post: Universal Claiming Dancing Baby Video Not An Obvious Case Of Fair Use

    vivaelamor ( profile ), 26 Oct, 2010 @ 05:20am

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Nature of the Copyrighted Work

    "You can start with Henley v. DeVore"

    It would seem the decision in that case was based on the notion that there did not have to be direct monetary gain, but all the examples in the case were about linking the infringement to monetary gain. You had stated that the requirement was for any gain, monetary or otherwise, which is not backed up by that case. Going by your statement, had someone directly gained votes for no purpose other than to have more votes then that would be considered commercial.

    In this case the defendant quite clearly made no money but did possibly gain something on personal level, such as pride, which by your words would be commercial use. You can call me out for nitpicking but you do keep telling us how things supposedly are, so I expect you to at least make it plain what you mean.

  • On the post: Jailbreaking Your iPhone? Legal! Jailbreaking Your Xbox? 3 Years In Jail!

    vivaelamor ( profile ), 26 Oct, 2010 @ 05:04am

    Re: Strawman argument

    "I feel this all a big strawman argument."

    That's an ironic start to your post.

    "Who exactly ruled it's legal to "hack stuff you own"?"

    The US Copyright Office, apparently.

    "it's legal to bypass measures that prevent you from using third party software on a device you own. It's illegal to bypass measures that only serve to bypass copy protection on software for your device."

    But if that wasn't the case with the iPhone, then why would it be with the XBox?

    "Of course it's complicated, since hacking your XBox can result in more than just making it possible to run pirated software. And on the other end, you can argue that hacking your iPhone would allow you to install pirated versions of iPhone software. But a court could definitely rule that in the case of the iPhone the good (installing legal apps outside the App Store) outweighs the bad and that this is not the case with the XBox."

    Where did the USCO say that the 'good outweighs the bad' in the iPhone case? I read: "the modifications that are made purely for the purpose of such interoperability are fair uses.", which seems pretty unambiguous in stating that if your modifications are required to run third party software then they are fair use.

    "At any rate, the logic "if you're allowed to hack one device you own, you should be allowed to hack all of them" is flawed. That's like saying "if I'm allowed to use a knife to cut pork, I should be allowed to use a knife to cut my kittens". PETA disagrees, so do millions of YouTube users..."

    It is only flawed if the two situations are not sufficiently analogous. By your logic, not all humans should be afforded the same rights because everyone is different in some way.

    The reason people don't like the idea of harming kittens but do eat pork are varied but at least exist: kittens are considered cute, pigs are slaughtered by other people, cats aren't generally considered food in most countries, etc. While you can disagree with the reasons (btw, I'm vegetarian but I probably disagree with PETA on a lot of issues), at least they relate to actual distinctions.

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