Funniest/Most Insightful Comments Of The Week At Techdirt

from the not-forgotten dept

We've got another double-winner this week, with the first place for insightful and the second place for funny both going to the same anonymous comment. It came in response to the recent loss by the guy who won the original right to be forgotten case, and highlighted the fundamental irony of the law:

It would seem that the right to be forgotten has become the right to be Streisand-ed.

The second place comment on the insightful side comes from another anonymous commenter on the same post, this time in response to someone who complained that RTBF only removes search engine links. To some, and given Europe's history with a certain search giant, this alone is suspicious:

I'm of the belief that the true purpose of RTBF is to make life difficult for Google.

For editor's choice on the insightful side, we start out on our post about the parking ticket app that stirred the ire of California cities. TKnarr suggested a design workaround to nullify the complaints:

Keep the app up, just have it email the dispute letter to the user and let them mail/FAX it in. Let the city try to argue that people are entitled to dispute the tickets but they aren't entitled to use the city's process for disputing a ticket. Even local judges aren't going to fall for that one.

Next, we've got an anonymous commenter on our discussion about orphaned works and the massive cultural black hole they represent. The comment underlines the fact that opt-in copyright would solve so, so many problems:

The sad thing is it shouldn't be that difficult to solve the problem of orphan works.

Something as simple as updating copyright law so that "registered works" receive the current copyright protections, and "unregistered works" (i.e. the stuff most likely to become orphaned works) receives shorter protection (such as 5-10 years), then enter the public domain unless registered during that period would take care of much of it. The big media companies' stuff stays locked up, and things no one is even trying to monetize enters the public domain for them to raid. It should be win/win for them, and a win for the public as well. The amount of work to register is trivial, and something that would likely be done anyways by someone looking to use their copyrights for profit.

Much of the rest of the problems of orphaned works could be solved by adding a requirement that the owner of a registered work keep periodically updated contact information on file for their copyright. If they fail to do so, the work enters the public domain after a certain amount of time has elapsed. For example, they must update their contact information every five years, and if they fail to do so, the work enters the public domain after another five years passes. The net result being that all registered works for which the owner isn't willing to take the time once every ten years to formally say "I own this. You must pay me to make use of it. Those who wish to make me monetary offers can find me here." fall into the public domain. Again, a trivial amount of upkeep, one aimed at ensuring that people can offer the rights holder money at that.

Combine the two, and a large amount of material enters the public domain after a decade, as it's owners demonstrates they aren't interested in taking advantage of copyright's protections. People doing things as a hobby have ample time and protections to decide they want to try and make money off their hobby.

Is this an ideal situation? No. It's a quick and dirty solution that tries to protect the interests of legacy big media corporations while getting orphaned works into the public domain. There's almost certainly things involved I haven't thought of. It's just an example to show that it isn't that difficult to come up with ways to deal with orphaned works while providing essentially the same protections to works that aren't orphaned. The only people who would lose out are the people that can't be arsed to take the time once a decade to say "Here I am, this is mine, pay me." In other words, the people who orphaned the works in the first place. And really, if you aren't interested or willing in doing that much, then there's no real reason for you to have the copyright in the first place.

Over on the funny side, first place goes to a response to the terrible idea that is JPEG DRM. Mr Big Content dropped by to put the debate to rest:

JPEG Will Never Suceed Without DRM

If they want there format to become popular, they will HAVE to support DRM. Do you think poeple will use a Format that lets there preciuos pictures, teh product of so much hard work, be freely copied? NO WAY! No camera vendor would touch such a format with a TEN FOOT POLE! You think Microsoft would willingly allow a piracy-friendly format into there PC OS? Adobe willingly risk the security of Photosohp by opening such a export loophole? Photo websites allow uploading any format that can be so easily downloaded by any old Tom, Dick and Harry Softwear? NOT A CHANCE!!!

So let these smart-aleck photographic "experts" (makes air quotes) WAKE UP AND SMELL TEH COFFEE!! Otherwise THERE CLEVER FORMAT PORPOSAL WILL BE LEFT IN TEH DUST BY TEH MARKET!

We've already had the second place funny winner above, so we move straight on to the editor's choice, where we start out on a post about the world's new famous orphaned work, Happy Birthday. In response to Warner's bizarre argument that a missing or incorrect name on a copyright registration shouldn't effect anything, Calvin Smith decided to get in on the action:

I've just noticed that my name is missing from the copyright notice as well. According to Warner-Chappell that means I have a valid copyright claim. I can expect a cheque in the post shortly, can't I?

And finally, after Twitter suspended some feeds for posting animated GIFs of sports highlights, That One Guy went into full-on sarcasm mode:

I used to read books, but now I just glance at the short blurb on the back, or on the inside of the dust cover, and that's more than enough for me.

I used to watch movies, but these days I find that trailers show everything I might be interested in anyway, so there's no longer any need to actually watch the full movie.

I used to listen to music, but these days it just takes too long, so now I just listen to a randomly chosen 5-second clip before moving on to the next song, and the next randomly chosen clip.

Given the above, of course short, soundless gifs are going to compete with the shows as a whole, because why would anyone bother watching an entire game if they can watch short clips from it, devoid of any sound?

That's all for this week, folks!

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