Funniest/Most Insightful Comments Of The Week At Techdirt

from the some-insight-mixed-with-some-funny dept

Another week done, and there were a ton of great comments, so let's just get right to it. Coming in right at the top was a comment by SpacePirate in response to the news that the TSA was taking its security theater production on the road. He seemed to think it was time to remind us of a little bit of history:
I'm writing a letter, anyone want to sign?

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation...
I'm a bit surprised that won for most insightful, but I think it demonstrates just how fed up some people are with the state of things today. Coming in second was E. Zachary Knight's response to the story about police freaking out about a woman filming them from her own front yard. EZK noted that the idea that this might change their behavior said something important:
If the police must adjust their behavior upon being filmed, perhaps they need to seriously reconsider their behavior to begin with.
Okay. For editor's choice it was really difficult to narrow things down. I originally had a list of eight (eight!) comments I was trying to decide between, and eventually narrowed it down to three. Good work keeping me on my toes. First up, we have an Anonymous Coward explaining how his real problem with all this copyright enforcement is how it is ratcheting up the cost on legitimate customers:
I get the fact that businesses want to be paid. They want to be paid even if the thing I am "buying" isn't actually something that costs them any money (like fees on transfers from my savings account to cover a payment from my checking account... What did that fee buy? A Transfer that would have been free for me had I done this in person with a teller? Or how about a 10 cent text message).

But where I draw the line is when their mechanism to be paid costs *ME* money. Like when I have to set up a "license server" for a software product where the "server's" purpose in a system is just to make sure IBM or Oracle is getting paid for every instance of their product. The time and effort to setup and maintain and trouble shoot these "license servers" drives me right to open source.

The same problem occurs here. Policing copyright is COSTING me money, as a consumer. I don't CARE if company X wants to make money off their content. I don't CARE if company X wants to take action to make sure they make money off their content. But their desire to make money IS NOT MY PROBLEM. Right or wrong, I see no reason I should be forced to pay in real money the costs of policing their business and their customers.

There is piracy going on here, but the pirates are the businesses that are stealing MY resources and MY money and wasting MY time to serve THEIR interests. If they can't figure out a way to pay for their own enforcement, then they need to give it up. There are better purposes for my tax dollars and my communication dollars than to spend them policing the use of their products
Next up, is Rich Fiscus giving an excellent analysis of why Sony is in decline:
Nothing about Sony's recent decline is particularly surprising. Decades ago they were the lean competitor taking on giant corporations which ultimately fell under the weight of their own hubris. Just like Sony today, those companies failed to recognize the future until it took their legs out from under them.

Once upon a time Sony was a company that learned from their failures. Even something as big as losing the VCR standards war could be salvaged. When Betamax lost to VHS, they adapted the technology to create the 8mm camcorder format. They eventually figured out they had tried to pound a square peg into a round hole and found a square hole that needed filling. Now they just look for a bigger hammer.

It's no different than what the companies they dethroned all those years ago were doing, except for this. Thanks to the size of modern megacorporations, their hammers are made up of legislators, judges, and even heads of state. Ultimately it won't stop their demise, but it does mean their death throes will be far more damaging to society than their predecessors.

Sony's problem isn't their mistakes. It's that they forgot the importance of learning from those mistakes. That's the natural cycle of business.
That last bit is so good, it deserves a repeat:
Sony's problem isn't their mistakes. It's that they forgot the importance of learning from those mistakes.
It seems like you could write a whole book on that subject. Finally, in the insightful category, we've got another Anonymous Coward (who says they don't contribute?) pointing out why the FBI is spending so much time trying to hunt down LulzSec:
The problem is that Lulz has committed an unspeakable crime: they have embarrassed people in power. So even though in terms of the actual threat they pose, they're negligible (garden-variety spammers do far more damage every day than Lulz has combined, to date) they must be pursued with high priority in order to prevent the further discomfort of those holding the FBI's leash
Why so serious, let's move on to the funny. The winner, by far, this week was a comment by Prisoner 201, in response to the story of that woman filming cops, in which he got to repurpose a favorite line of law enforcement types:
If the police doesn't have anything to hide, what are they worried about?

Damn that felt good
Coming in second was an old (groan-inducing) joke from Dev Concepts. I'd like to think we'd go for something wittier than old jokes... but, it did make me chuckle too:
When Mozart passed away, he was buried in a churchyard. A couple days later, the town drunk was walking through the cemetery and heard some strange noise coming from the area where Mozart was buried.

Terrified, the drunk ran and got the priest to come and listen to it. The priest bent close to the grave and heard some faint, unrecognizable music coming from the grave. Frightened, the priest ran and got the town magistrate.

When the magistrate arrived, he bent his ear to the grave, listened for a moment, and said, "Ah, yes, that's Mozart's Ninth Symphony, being played backwards."

He listened a while longer, and said, "There's the Eighth Symphony, and it's backwards, too. Most puzzling."

So the magistrate kept listening; "There's the Seventh... the Sixth... the Fifth..."

Suddenly the realization of what was happening dawned on the magistrate; he stood up and announced to the crowd that had gathered in the cemetery, "My fellow citizens, there's nothing to worry about. It's just Mozart decomposing."
Ok... on to the editor's choice. First up, we've got Chronno S. Trigger, with a further analysis of the concept of doublethink:
"'Doublethink means the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one's mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them.' - George Orwell"

Maybe that's why these kinds of people seem so thick to me. It's not that they are, it's just they have 66% less free space in their brains. While I have one belief, they have to have one belief, a contradictory belief, and paradox absorbing crumple zones.
Paradox absorbing crumple zones is too good a turn of phrase to have disappear. Next up, we've got Ima Fish's note that I'm being too hard on copyright holders for declaring that they should be the ones who figure out what exceptions there are to copyright laws, because obviously they know best:
What you're forgetting Mike is that the copyright industry has to be able to recoup their massive investments.

If Rebecca Black has taught us anything, it's that to get a hit song you need to spend millions of dollars in production costs, in hiring the very best musicians, plus promotion and advertising, etc. It's not like just anyone can write and perform a song and have it become an overnight hit. It costs money and the labels are performing a valuable public service in fronting those costs
And, then we've got non-anonymous coward's take on the roving TSA teams, combining that story with the standard claim of people who support security theater at airports, that if we don't like it, don't fly. Now we've got to expand that a bit:
So let me see if I understand. The 4th amendment still applies while traveling, except when using one of the following means:

Aircraft
Bus
Train
Subway
Ship
Car

If you whiners don't want to be harassed, just avoid these.

Will you libertarians please stop complaining?
Oh, and just as a final note, fbzr bs lbh znl rawbl guvf guernq bs qvfphffvba. See you all next week...
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Reader Comments

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  1. icon
    Greg G (profile), 26 Jun 2011 @ 1:07pm

    re: fbzr bs lbh znl rawbl guvf guernq bs qvfphffvba.

    XRY LFQL YQZ FPDQNPRWZ. P'S ZLPDD DSQR QL LFQL LFNJQM.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. icon
    Greg G (profile), 26 Jun 2011 @ 1:13pm

    re: fbzr bs lbh znl rawbl guvf guernq bs qvfphffvba.

    Zqz, psyp zyt pqq oicce. Ycv m yxkrr zmps syrhsrtpit ycv psr vqkf gqbbrcp.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  3. icon
    cc (profile), 26 Jun 2011 @ 1:29pm

    "some of you may enjoy this thread of discussion"

    What do I win?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  4. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 26 Jun 2011 @ 3:28pm

    Re:

    An interesting discussion.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  5. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 26 Jun 2011 @ 3:51pm

    Re:

    link to this | view in thread ]

  6. icon
    Beta (profile), 26 Jun 2011 @ 3:52pm

    "'Paradox absorbing crumple zones' is too good a turn of phrase to have disappear."

    Agreed, but the credit belongs to Futurama.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  7. identicon
    Lawrence D'Oliveiro, 26 Jun 2011 @ 4:35pm

    Sue!

    I can hear Matt Groaning already...

    link to this | view in thread ]

  8. icon
    Chronno S. Trigger (profile), 26 Jun 2011 @ 4:43pm

    Re:

    "Agreed, but the credit belongs to Futurama."

    That's why it's a good turn of phrase. I would never be able to think up something that witty on my own.

    I love how no one pointed out that it was Futurama until now. I wonder if AC ever did figure that out.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  9. icon
    Capitalist Lion Tamer (profile), 26 Jun 2011 @ 5:54pm

    Re: Re:

    I wonder if AC ever did figure that out.

    I'm guessing not. Probably otherwise detained by the Hypnotoad.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  10. icon
    Jay (profile), 26 Jun 2011 @ 7:33pm

    Re: Re:

    The oddest thing I have noticed its that the best comments have almost always been a remix of an idea that someone else had. One ac remixed fresh prince. You did futurama. Its a sign that people communicate through these experiences of common culture.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  11. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 26 Jun 2011 @ 9:31pm

    Re: Re:

    Courtesy of Gwiz.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  12. icon
    The eejit (profile), 26 Jun 2011 @ 11:53pm

    Re: Re: Re:

    Ands thus, Psychomemetic Operands is born.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  13. icon
    charliebrown (profile), 27 Jun 2011 @ 12:37am

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

    Say the topic out loud, sounds like the car won't start!

    link to this | view in thread ]

  14. icon
    Planespotter (profile), 27 Jun 2011 @ 1:39am

    Re: Re: Re:

    Copyright Infringement!

    oh... sorry. You still have fair use laws... for now!

    link to this | view in thread ]

  15. identicon
    Nicedoggy, 27 Jun 2011 @ 1:41am

    Re: Sue!

    Growling and grinding :)

    link to this | view in thread ]

  16. identicon
    Nicedoggy, 27 Jun 2011 @ 1:48am

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

    http://www.ivona.com/ (commercial TTS)
    http://www.cstr.ed.ac.uk/projects/festival/onlinedemo.html (Open Source TTS, if you use NoScript you need to allow Google API)
    Put the text there and try it.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  17. icon
    Richard (profile), 27 Jun 2011 @ 1:50am

    Re: Re: Re:

    Somehow being a remix makes it funnier. When Banco Santander (a Spanish bank) bought Abbey National (a British bank) the Now show ( a British satirical radio show) did a complete re-run of the Monty Python "I never expected the Spanish Inquisition" sketch along the following lines

    I thought someone would buy Abbey but I never expected a Spanish acquisition! No one expects a Spanish acquisition. Our main weapon is surpirise.. and a desire for exposure to the UK retail baning sector...etc

    and the UK foriegn secretary joked that Pinochet "never expected a Spanish extradition".

    part of the MOnty Python sketch was itself based on an earlier exchange in the show "Dad's Army".

    Life is always a remix.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  18. icon
    The eejit (profile), 27 Jun 2011 @ 4:29am

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

    Ah, the joys of ciphers.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  19. icon
    Chronno S. Trigger (profile), 27 Jun 2011 @ 5:11am

    Re: Re: Re: Re:

    As I have said ever since I realized it in junior-high school; I only write what my experiences have given me and twist it up to make it look new. It took me years before I realized that everyone did that.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  20. icon
    David (profile), 27 Jun 2011 @ 8:57am

    I wonder....

    I wonder, did RIAA charge the cemetery a "Public Performance" rate for Mozart's decomposition?

    link to this | view in thread ]


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