Funniest/Most Insightful Comments Of The Week At Techdirt

from the eye-of-newt dept

This week, after Verizon tried to "debunk" the simple reality that its wireless plans are terrible, one commenter broke down the numbers to show how expensive they are compared to Comcast. Michael won first place for insightful by underlining the horror of what just happened:

When someone holds up Comcast as a better deal, you know you have a problem...

Meanwhile, we asked why the UK's Intellectual Property Office was praising the National Portrait Gallery's brazen copyright heist of public domain images, and That One Guy won second place for insightful with a classic quotation:

How's that saying go again?

“It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” -Upton Sinclair

For editor's choice on the insightful side, we've got a pair of anonymous responses to the post that will also bring us our funniest comment in a few moments — Newt Gingrich's silly and dangerous claim that anyone visiting extremist websites should go to jail. First, one commenter demonstrated the uselessness of any policy that fails to consider context and consequences:

Well, I guess if you want to increase the prison population exponentially, it sounds like a good idea.

Perhaps being part of the "party of fiscal responsibility" he should outline the estimated costs of implementing such a ridiculous policy up front, including:

- how much it'll cost to feed & water all these felons
- estimated welfare costs, since their job prospects after getting out of jail would be close to or equal to zero

Seems like someone didn't learn from "3 strikes" "mandatory minimum sentences" or the "Rockefeller drug laws"

Then, another commenter surmised a truly unintended consequence of such a rule:

Surprise web redirect will be the new swatting

If something this dumb comes to pass, instead of calling SWAT teams to your house, teen brats will just redirect your web browser to a "known terrorist web page".

But that would never be abused.

Over on the funny side, first place comes as promised in response to Gingrich as well — Gwiz topped the charts with a simple and slightly surrealist joke:

Maybe he's right. I looked at an ISIS website once and it turned me into a Newt.

In second place, we've got another response to Verizon's facile defense of its wireless offerings. Vidiot tried to envision the fiction necessary to support Verizon's claims of serving its customers:

Service with a smile

"We bring together options customers tell us they want..."

Me: "I want a bigger bill every month. Can you do that for me?"

VZ: "Sure!"

Me: "I'd like my rollovers to be totally useless, too."

VZ: "Can do! After all, the customer is always right..."

For editor's choice on the funny side, our first comment comes from a different telco tantrum in Europe, where a coalition of telcos and hardware vendors are protesting net neutrality by threatening to withhold next-gen wireless. One anonymous commenter put it in simple terms:

In other news, 5 year old threatens to hold breath until he gets a cookie.

Finally, after a Sony VP abused the DMCA to try to hide his Wikileaks-listed salary, Pixelation began devising countermeasures:

I'm going to take a trademark out on $320,000 and sue Yankelevits for infingement. Based on music industry numbers I should be able to recover millions.

That's all for this week, folks!

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