This Week In Techdirt History: July 1st - 7th

from the how-it-went-down dept

Sat, Jul 7th 2018 12:00pm — Leigh Beadon

Five Years Ago

This week in 2013, we kicked things off with the latest Snowden leaks revealing that the US had used bugs for surveillance on its allies, and that the PRISM program was huge and complex. George W. Bush stepped up to defend the NSA while President Obama tried to smooth things over with Europe, FISA court judges were upset about the scrutiny, and the Washington Post published a sad editorial calling for the leaks to stop. Then James Clapper shockingly admitted to lying to congress, but was apparently off the hook with nothing more than a staged apology.

Ten Years Ago

This week in 2008, while Sony was further fragmenting the movie download market and NBC was once again failing to offer compelling Olympic coverage online, EMI was showing off its promised "new approach" to the internet by suing more platforms over piracy. Bono joined his manager in blaming ISPs for the destruction of music, while we wondered if the recording industry would play by its own proposed three-strikes rule but for faulty DMCA notices. Meanwhile, the RIAA argued in the Jammie Thomas case that evidence of actual distribution shouldn't be necessary to sue for infringement, while Viacom convinced the court that YouTube should hand over logs of the IP addresses and usernames of people who watched videos.

Fifteen Years Ago

This week in 2003, the FCC launched its national do-not-call list, which was so popular that the website to sign up quickly went down. Some people quickly started calling for a similar plan for spam, while others questioned how well it would really even work for calls. Speaking of spam, one spammer won in court this week since spamming is not "trespassing", but another submitted a guilty plea in his case because it certainly can be fraud. Spam was, overall, getting worse and costing money, while the world braced for the expected onslaught of text messaging spam.

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Anonymous Coward, 8 Jul 2018 @ 2:22am

Openly Supporting Socialism
I saw on Tucker Carlson this week some honest liberals (that sounded exactly like Techdirt contributors) flatly state that supported socialism for the USA. Is that what Techdirt supports? That is, no copyright law (or associated profit), no patent law (or associated profit), no borders etc.? Would you (Techdirt and Techdirt contributors) consider yourself socialists or at least openly in support of socialism? From reading a lot of your history, it sure sounds like socialism.
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Jul 2018 @ 8:11am

Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
such gaslight
much loaded
wow
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Leigh Beadon (profile), 8 Jul 2018 @ 8:40am

Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
Life advice: Grow up, and stop watching Tucker Carlson. Not necessarily in that order.
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Jul 2018 @ 9:00am

Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
lol.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFQFB5YpDZE
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Jul 2018 @ 10:02am

Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
"This comment brought to you by Senator McCarthy and the House Un-American Activities Committee"
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Jul 2018 @ 11:22am

Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
An obvious troll post, but I'll bite. Can anyone define exactly what "socialism" is anyway, and at what point on the scale is a country socialist or not socialist? Otherwise labels are meaningless.

Advocating for non-infinite copyright terms, the abolishment of statutory damages, and stricter patentability standards should not be considered socialism. Taking power away from corporations and corrupt judicial districts that should never have been granted that power is also not socialism. As intellectual property is something contrived and not real, so for the government is cut back its recognition of IP is not the same as private property confiscation, a hallmark of Marxist-style communism.
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Lawrence D’Oliveiro, 8 Jul 2018 @ 1:50pm

Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
Tucker Carlson, did you say?
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Jul 2018 @ 3:40pm

Socialism Boogeyman
It’s funny how the only people who say socialism five times in one paragraph suck so hard off of the public test.
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Jul 2018 @ 9:51pm

Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
Would you consider yourself a liberal or a progressive or something else? I am assuming you would disavow yourself as a conservative or a capitalist. This is an honest question please don’t misdirect. I am just trying to understand the political orientation of this site. Be honest.
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Jul 2018 @ 10:25pm

Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
Ymust be one of them socialists I keep hearing about, because you want someone else to do your homework for you.
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Mike Masnick (profile), 8 Jul 2018 @ 11:12pm

Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
I am just trying to understand the political orientation of this site. Be honest.

As we've stated many, many times in the past, this site has no "political orientation." Indeed, we think the very idea of "political orientation" is tribal nonsense.

This site is about supporting innovation and civil liberties. That's basically it. We've found that us not having political leanings tends to freak people out. People like you call us "liberals." Liberals tend to call us "right wingers." Neither is accurate. We don't look at things through a silly red team/blue team lens and root for one side or the other.

We look at things using basic concepts of innovation, economics and civil liberties and give our opinion on what seems likely to lead to the best overall outcome. That often means we disagree with "the party line" from any particular party -- but using that to lump us in with any other party is equally stupid.
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Jul 2018 @ 11:14pm

Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
Well, I would say that one could define socialism as follows: The one thing all people have in common is that they eat, they sleep, and they go to the toilet. These people can be subdivided into two categories, those that produce goods and services that other people value, and those that do not. Socialism bends over backwards to reward people who do little except eat sleep and (literally) produce crap. Capitalism (in the US) tries to reward people who produce goods and services (advances to the human condition) that other people value, otherwise known as a free market. Copyright rewards those who, from their own efforts, create valuable books, music and movies (and other things) and are rewarded by their service to others. This site seems to speak on behalf of those who create nothing (but crap) but demand the valuable goods and services produced by others for free. Free manuals, free software, free music, free games and movies. Socialism is the glorification of the government that produces nothing but controls everything.
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Jul 2018 @ 11:31pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
I think the repeated use of the word stupid speaks for itself. The lack of an honest response combined with berating the questioner makes you a flaming liberal.
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Mike Masnick (profile), 8 Jul 2018 @ 11:49pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
If that's what you get from my response... Best of luck to you in life. You are going to need it.
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Anonymous Coward, 8 Jul 2018 @ 11:55pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
Thank you for making my point for me, coward.
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Anonymous Coward, 9 Jul 2018 @ 2:22am

Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
>Capitalism (in the US) tries to reward people who produce goods and services

Capitalism, especially as practiced by the US, including the legacy publishers,labels, and studios, rewards having lots of money, and uses that as a signals that the endevours of people with lots of money are worth investing in. It enables those with lots of money to buy the products and labor of ordinary people quite cheaply; they have to be able to buy food, clothes and shelter, even if they struggle to earn enough to do so.

It occasionally picks someone with a creative gift to make rich, but is so structured that they end up investing that money in corporations that make the extremely rich even richer.
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Anonymous Coward, 9 Jul 2018 @ 6:18am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
You used the word "repeated" about the usage of the word "stupid".

The response you replied to contained the word "stupid" all of once.

It would seem basic numerical understanding is beyond your grasp. In which case, you would need a considerable amount of luck.
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Anonymous Coward, 9 Jul 2018 @ 7:11am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
Oh, Masnick! You're too modest. And lying by omission.

This site is for supporting corporatism and globalism, about unlimited immigration into the United States, anti-copyright and anti-patent.

You are a corporatist, first and last. For instance, you assert that corporations have "First Amendment Right" to control The Public's speech on the very "platforms" that are created to be Public Forums, completely contradictory to intent of both First Amendment and the statute.
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Anonymous Coward, 9 Jul 2018 @ 9:24am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
And there you are cheering AT&T's merger.

Nice job, corporatist.
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Leigh Beadon (profile), 9 Jul 2018 @ 9:32am

Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
Personally yes, I'd generally describe myself as a liberal and a progressive, though there are plenty of things people assume about both those labels that don't describe my beliefs too. But of course, I live up here in the socialist hellscape of Canada, so if I said anything else they'd probably ship me off to the gulag right? You can give your speech about us awful "flaming liberals" now, if you like.
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Leigh Beadon (profile), 9 Jul 2018 @ 9:36am

Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
See, to have a real discussion, you should define something honestly and then proceed to make your case for why you disagree with it. Baking your condemnation into the "definition" is just dumb, childish rhetoric.
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Mike Masnick (profile), 9 Jul 2018 @ 9:53am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
So, in this very thread, we have one clueless person accusing me of being a socialist who hates profits, and another accusing me of being a "corporatist" who only favors corporations.

I believe that makes my point for me that because people can't classify us under the traditional groupings, they have to just make up that we're the opposite of whatever they are.
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Anonymous Coward, 9 Jul 2018 @ 8:04pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
But you are (not surprisingly) consistent in attacking the speakers and not addressing the question - like most cowardly socialists (look it up). The Facebook CEO is promoting minimum incomes (free money) for everyone - does that sound like Socialism? Is he a Corporatist? Duh. The stupid act will only get you so far. You fail to persuade all but the poorly educated social outcasts that permeate this site. For the (huge) majority, we see right through your dishonesty and double speak.
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Anonymous Coward, 9 Jul 2018 @ 8:09pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
Well, good for you, to own your own opinions. Sometimes I sympathize a little with liberals and progressives (my sister is one, and she’s smarter than me), but I still think they miss the big points. For example - as a larger society, how do we encourage the most people to contribute to their fellow humans in a positive way? From my reading, the liberal agenda would give everybody free everything, and no one would work. The conservative agenda would give no one free anything, and everyone would work. And by work, I mean the capitalist idea of work, where you try very hard to figure out what other people need that they don’t already have, and you can uniquely produce. Music, writing, art, food, whatever it is, do something great and then get paid for it. IMHO, the conservative agenda does more to advance humanity, and the liberal agenda does more to enhance the government, which produces nothing of value to the rest of us.
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Anonymous Coward, 9 Jul 2018 @ 8:13pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
Gosh, Leigh, how does it benefit you to call my response “dumb childish rhetoric”? The previous post specifically asked me to define socialism, so I gave a short summary of my opinion. Why not attack my opinion and not me personally when all I was doing was responding to a questions. I sincerely think what you are missing by focusing on “free” this and that is the overall societal implications. The more that is free, the less people will be motivated to advance the human condition. The reason the US leads the world in innovation is simple - copyright, patent and other similar tools encourage people to innovate - history is quite clear on this point. Socialism leads to tyranny and laziness, free is just not as good as “for pay”. It’s the difference between giving someone a fish (free stuff) and teaching them how to fish.
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Leigh Beadon (profile), 9 Jul 2018 @ 9:12pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
From my reading, the liberal agenda would give everybody free everything, and no one would work

Then it's a very unsophisticated reading.
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Leigh Beadon (profile), 9 Jul 2018 @ 9:13pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
Okay.
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Mike Masnick (profile), 9 Jul 2018 @ 9:57pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
But you are (not surprisingly) consistent in attacking the speakers and not addressing the question

I did not attack and I did answer the question. That you missed both of those things raises some significant questions about your reading comprehension.

The Facebook CEO is promoting minimum incomes (free money) for everyone - does that sound like Socialism?

If you're talking about the concept of universal basic income, I don't believe Zuckerberg has come out in support of it though I could be wrong. But, you know who has supported it? Such noted "socialists" as... Milton Friedman and Friedrich Hayek.

One thinks that your understanding of both capitalism and socialism is a little amiss.

Meanwhile, you claim to support copyright and patents. Both of those are government granted monopolies, in which the government chooses winners and losers. Frankly, to me, that sounds a hell of a lot more "socialist" than a free market system in which creators and inventors have to rely on the free market to make money.

You fail to persuade all but the poorly educated social outcasts that permeate this site. For the (huge) majority, we see right through your dishonesty and double speak.

That must be why we've stayed in business so long, are frequently invited to address politicians and policy makers, invited to contribute to leading journals, and have won numerous awards. I'm sure it's because no one is convinced by us.
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Jul 2018 @ 2:05am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
You are hilarious, I will grant you that. The government “chooses” winners and losers with copyrights and patents? Back to school for you my friend. A copyright or a patent does not mean anyone wants to pay for your work. It only protects in the event that you produce something valued by OTHERS, then your creative talent is rewarded by ownership of YOUR OWN work. As for your awards, you mean when you shared the stage with a TRAITOR? That’s an award? Wow. Perhaps in your small circle of socialist fanatics, you are a star - but nowhere else. There is a reason that the US leads in the world in innovation - and it’s not because we promote “free” anything. Own your ideas, Masnick. Maybe I don’t agree with them, but everyone respects you less when you pretend to be anything but a flaming liberal socialist. Stand up, man, you’re pathetic. Even with Chelsea Manning beside you, you still don’t appear to be a man.
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Wendy Cockcroft, 10 Jul 2018 @ 2:33am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
So much wrong...

You are hilarious, I will grant you that. The government “chooses” winners and losers with copyrights and patents? Back to school for you my friend. A copyright or a patent does not mean anyone wants to pay for your work. It only protects in the event that you produce something valued by OTHERS, then your creative talent is rewarded by ownership of YOUR OWN work.

Erm... no. IPR protects nothing, it just gives you the right to sue infringers. That is all. The "choosing" is done by the USTPO, which can accept or reject patents, which is why he's right and you're wrong.

As for your awards, you mean when you shared the stage with a TRAITOR? That’s an award? Wow. Perhaps in your small circle of socialist fanatics, you are a star - but nowhere else.

Traitor? Learn what words mean, particularly where the law is concerned. You've spelt "Whistleblower" wrong. It was the government that was breaking the law.

There is a reason that the US leads in the world in innovation - and it’s not because we promote “free” anything.

The US promotes free trade and a free market. This actually does lead to more innovation.

Own your ideas, Masnick. Maybe I don’t agree with them, but everyone respects you less when you pretend to be anything but a flaming liberal socialist.

https://medium.com/@wendycockcroft/what-is-a-liberal-socialist-c6de6584f304

Stand up, man, you’re pathetic. Even with Chelsea Manning beside you, you still don’t appear to be a man.

Now you're getting nasty. Mike is a principled libertarian. All you do is lie and hate as an anonymous coward. That's it.
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Jul 2018 @ 4:10am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
Ok maybe that was a little nasty. Sorry about that. I thought nastiness was normal for this site.
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Jul 2018 @ 4:18am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism

For example - as a larger society, how do we encourage the most people to contribute to their fellow humans in a positive way?

Well one thing that is enabling people to contribute to society, and co-operate to improve their lives and skills is the Internet. Don't try to organize people, or tell them what to do, but rather give them the tools that enable them to learn, co-operate and enrich their own lives. Work to make sure that the Internet stays open, as it is a counterbalance to the 1% who control more the worlds the countries wealth and resources.
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Wendy Cockcroft, 10 Jul 2018 @ 5:36am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
Well it's not. I hope you read my article and discovered that "Liberal Socialist" does not mean "People who disagree with me."

I often argue with libertarians and I've argued with Mike, but where he differs from most of the others is that he's a small "L" publicly-minded one, which is where I agree with him. Caring about the public interest shouldn't be conflated with mad full-on property-grabbing communism or anything like it.
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Wendy Cockcroft, 10 Jul 2018 @ 5:49am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
What Leigh says. Politics, and indeed life, is more complex than that. Stop reducing everything to binary reductionism. Get out more and look around you.

If the government really does produce nothing of value to the rest of us what about schools? Infrastructure? Just two examples of the value that government provides. Does the private sector also provide? Yes, but to specific customers, not to the rest of us.

We are not stuck with a choice between government running All The Things! or the private sector running All The Things! That is not the way anything works.

As for work, somebody's got to do it. While I'm not a "flaming" liberal I do have a lot of sympathy with some progressive and liberal positions because I personally benefit from them in practice. But then, I've not reduced the entire universe to a choice between "X" or "Y."
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Wendy Cockcroft, 10 Jul 2018 @ 5:52am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
Agreed. Many people owe their livelihoods to the internet, which has opened a lot of doors for us. Also, people might be lazy and mooch-y for a while but sooner or later we want to do something just to make our mark on the world, if nothing else. I like the idea of being able to choose which job I can do instead of being herded into a job I don't want because that's the only option open to me.

People want to contribute to something they believe in. What can we do to encourage such belief?
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Wendy Cockcroft, 10 Jul 2018 @ 5:54am

Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
Socialism bends over backwards to reward people who do little except eat sleep and (literally) produce crap.

Read Das Kapital before you say that again. Seriously, you know nothing about Socialism. Conservative here, I just hate being lied to.
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Leigh Beadon (profile), 10 Jul 2018 @ 9:44am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
"You're right Karl Marx - linen IS expensive, and we SHOULD kill all the white people! Which is what this book says. Mmhmmm."
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Jul 2018 @ 7:04pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
Single paragraphs, capitalizing random words, right-wing speak... all coinciding with Shiva Ayyadurai's appeal being filed?

Fuck me sideways, Hamilton's back.
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That One Guy (profile), 11 Jul 2018 @ 12:45am

Eh, one more hack/troll just means slightly more stress-testing of the report function is that's the case.
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Wendy Cockcroft, 11 Jul 2018 @ 2:27am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Openly Supporting Socialism
I can see him saying that...!
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