Funniest/Most Insightful Comments Of The Week At Techdirt

from the you-said-it dept

This week, we're going to go out of order again, since we've got a good discussion with our first place winner in the middle — sandwiched by two good editor's choices. On our post about friend-of-patent-trolls Judge Rodney Gilstrap crafting an incredibly broad set of conditions for having patent cases heard in East Texas, aerinai offered up our first editor's choice for insightful with some thoughts on the impact this will have:

Goodbye East Texas Jobs

So let's assume for a second this is allowed to stand.... All I'm hearing is it is dangerous as a company to have business dealings or employees in East Texas...

Assume for a moment that you are a tech company that has to litigate this nonsense. Wouldn't it make more sense for me to lay off my East Texas workforce (especially in remote instances like this) to lower my risk? Be cheaper to fly in a sales person every week than 'establish residence'.

If you live in East Texas, say goodbye good paying jobs, courtesy of your one and only Judge Gilstrap!

In response to that, we've got our first place winner for insightfulAnonymous Anonymous Coward going ahead and taking the idea one step further:

Not only that, but websites will probably block IP addresses assigned to East Texas because Judge Gilstrap will interpret that that constitutes having a business in East Texas. He appears to be quite imaginative in not only his patent case rulings, but in his interpretation of SCOTUS rulings.

Funny what power does to logic. Or, maybe not so funny.

And then, in response to that, we've got our second editor's choice for insightful from Paul Brinker, offering a capper to the discussion:

I have to agree with this. As a business owner I would restrict all travel, business, and customers from East Texas.

I would go so far as make this a public corporate policy.

This way they would have to make some new test like "My Website can be seen from Texas" which will quickly fail in higher courts.

And now all that remains on the insightful side is our second place winner, a very simple anonymous comment in response to this week's good news about the dismissal of Shiva Ayyadurai's lawsuit against us:

Congratulations!

Over on the funny side, our first place winner comes yet again in response to that very first comment about Judge Gilstrap's patent test, anonymously chiming in:

What is this east texas you speak of? It seems I can't find it on google maps any longer.

In second place, we've got a response from TechDescartes to the convoluted nightmare of Spotify streaming licensing:

Troll-kien

One license to rule them all,
one license to find them,
One license to bring them all
and in the darkness bind them.

For editor's choice on the funny side, we've got a pair of anonymous comments. The first came in response to the Screen Actors Guild's strained attempts to stop IMDB from publishing facts about actors, offering a possible explanation:

Explanation for illogical arguments

"I'm not a competent legal scholar, but I play one on TV."

And the second was a very British response to UK terrorism law reviewer Max Hill's anti-encryption comments:

Had to check twice, but

Mr. Hill's first name is indeed Max, not Benny.

That's all for this week, folks!

Hide this

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team


Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread


  • icon
    Unanimous Cow Herd (profile), 10 Sep 2017 @ 12:29pm

    Had to check twice, but Mr. Hill's first name is indeed Max, not Benny.

    Now I have the image of Benny chasing around scantily clad terrorists with an internet ban hammer stuck in my head. Thanks.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 10 Sep 2017 @ 12:45pm

      Re: Had to check twice, but Mr. Hill's first name is indeed Max, not Benny.

      Scantily clad or criminally underdressed? (Or maybe both, considering the legally enforced prudishness in some areas...)

      link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      That One Guy (profile), 10 Sep 2017 @ 2:14pm

      Re: Had to check twice, but Mr. Hill's first name is indeed Max, not Benny.

      With the ultimate punchline being that doing so would almost certainly be more effective than the various plans and programs currently in place.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • icon
        orbitalinsertion (profile), 10 Sep 2017 @ 4:52pm

        Re: Re: Had to check twice, but Mr. Hill's first name is indeed Max, not Benny.

        Should the incidental and/or theme music remain Yakkety Sax or go with something more like Entry of the Gladiators played on a calliope?

        link to this | view in chronology ]

        • icon
          That One Guy (profile), 10 Sep 2017 @ 9:46pm

          Re: Re: Re: Had to check twice, but Mr. Hill's first name is indeed Max, not Benny.

          Yakkety Sax goes with everything, so I'd say stick with that.

          link to this | view in chronology ]

          • icon
            Stephen T. Stone (profile), 10 Sep 2017 @ 10:46pm

            Re: Re: Re: Re: Had to check twice, but Mr. Hill's first name is indeed Max, not Benny.

            Yakety Sax goes with everything

            Sorry, you must be thinking of “Guile’s Theme”.

            link to this | view in chronology ]

            • icon
              That One Guy (profile), 11 Sep 2017 @ 6:41am

              Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Had to check twice, but Mr. Hill's first name is indeed Max, not Benny.

              Not this time. Guile's Theme might be applicable in many situations, much like Yakkety Sax, but the general tone for the former is for something serious, whereas Yakkety Sax is for more comedic effect, so would likely fit better.

              link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Dingledore the Mildly Uncomfortable When Seated, 11 Sep 2017 @ 2:39am

    Had to check twice, but Mr. Hill's first name is indeed Max, not Benny.

    Can I just dispute that this was a "very British response". Any reference to Benny Hill is almost certainly to come from the USA because he's not at all popular over here and his sows aren't on TV.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 11 Sep 2017 @ 11:16am

      Re: Had to check twice, but Mr. Hill's first name is indeed Max, not Benny.

      Umm, neither British nor American, but Dutch.

      OP here. (I know, anonymous and all; you'll have to take my word for it.)

      Back when I was young (70's, 80's), the Benny Hill Show was shown weekly on Dutch TV. As were other, more tasteful British series. British TV is still popular in the Netherlands, though not as popular as the Yankee stuff.

      link to this | view in chronology ]


Follow Techdirt
Essential Reading
Techdirt Deals
Report this ad  |  Hide Techdirt ads
Techdirt Insider Discord

The latest chatter on the Techdirt Insider Discord channel...

Loading...
Recent Stories

This site, like most other sites on the web, uses cookies. For more information, see our privacy policy. Got it
Close

Email This

This feature is only available to registered users. Register or sign in to use it.