Funniest/Most Insightful Comments Of The Week At Techdirt

from the conversing dept

This week, our first place comment on the insightful side comes from aerinai in response to our post about John Oliver's show about defunding the police:

I was a skeptic...

I won't lie, the first time I heard the phrase I thought "defunding police" was a 'bridge too far' until I actually educated myself on it and learned what the proposals were. I personally don't like the name, I think it is needlessly divisive title, but honestly, the policies behind the name do make sense:

Quit sending a police officer to a person who is suicidal... send a counselor.

Don't send a police officer to take care of a stray dog... send Animal Control.

Dedicate a division to traffic enforcement that is not apart of the police department (remember, not just pulling people over, but wrecks, traffic light outages, blocked intersections, etc)

The list can go on and on and on and on. This would be better for literally everyone... except the police unions which will spin this any which way they can as an 'attack on the police', even if the police would benefit from being pulled in 30 different directions, being overworked, and understaffed.

The police have become polite society's handy man... they do everything and don't do all of it well. Defund the police for their sake as well as ours.

In second place, it's Stephen T. Stone responding to the conversation around police donning Punisher symbols:

Does anyone else see the dark humor in people sincerely asking Disney, of all companies, to file lawsuits and manipulate IP law in its own favor?

For editor's choice on the insightful side, we start out with a comment from Philosopherott about protests that turn destructive:

shooting into crowds

While the first choice of oppressors, violence is a last resort of the desperate and oppressed.

I believe we all learned what happened when shots were fired into a crowd of protestors in Boston. I believe we called it a massacre and it started this country. Riots; Boston tea party. Change occurs when the oppressed stomach no more and organize.

I applaud those who call for peace, but I commend those willing to fight for it.

Next, it's Samuel Abram with a response to Don Henley's whining about copyright law:

Henley doesn't speak for me

Some background:

I make Chiptunes, or Chipmusic. Before the internet, I took piano lessons and guitar lessons. When I started to make music with LSDJ on the Nintendo Game Boy, I used the lessons I learned in reading music and playing with scales from the aforementioned piano and guitar lessons to create my own music, which you can buy on bandcamp here. I also have my music's performance rights managed by Songtrust, and my collections agency is BMI (I decided not to use ASCAP because they went after Creative Commons which is pro-artist, if anything, so I didn't see ASCAP as representing the actual interests of songwriters). I licensed all my original music with an Attribution-Noncommercial Creative Commons License. I even have a 20% songwriting credit in the Mega Ran song "O.P." (because I created the game-boy-produced outro to that song). My royalty statements from BMI and Songtrust are usually over $2. While I'm not making a profit off of my music, I am making revenue, and I am having fun. I am also dedicating all my original music to the public domain when I die. I have played the Music And Gaming Festival, or MAGFest in 2017. I have also played Pulsewave, which was a monthly chiptune show in NYC. I am friends with all four members of Anamanaguchi, who are currently signed to artist-friendly label Polyvinyl. I am also friends with Jonathan Coulton, who actually lives near where I live, and I answer questions in my career, er, hobby with "WWJD?", or "What Would Joco Do?"

So basically, the internet made me earning money from my own music possible.

Now that that's out of the way, in no way does Don Henley represent me. It reminds me of those times when Krist Novoselic or Bono were claiming to speak for people like me when in fact they are–or were–the top 1% of musicians. I work for a living and make music for fun. While I would like to earn more money on my music, I do not–I repeat, I do NOT want to do so at the expense of ordinary kids and people expressing themselves. That's the part Don Henley misses: he thinks he's going after Google and TikTok and Facebook, but he's really saying "Fuck You!" to the users of the web sites more so than the employees or even the bosses thereof.

Over on the funny side, our first place winner is Toom1275 quoting one of the all-time greatest famous responses to a legal threat, as a response to Trump's attempt to claim a CNN poll is defamatory:

Dear Ms. Ellis,

Attached is a letter that we received on June 9, 2020. I feel that you should be aware that some asshole is signing your name to stupid letters.

Very Truly Yours,

D.C. Vigilante"

In second place, it's dfed responding to a different Trump claim — that protests are being hijacked by extremists:

HOLY SHIT! LOOK AT ALL THE HORRIFYING ACTS PERPETUATED BY ANTIFA IN MINNEAPOLIS!!!

For editor's choice on the funny side, we've got a pair of additional responses to Don Henley's comments in the Senate. First, it's an anonymous proposal:

How about we perform a test and make it a federal offence to play ANYTHING AT ALL by Don henley on anything but a 1960s gramophone?

50 years in prison per song.

Also we ban his DVDs, CDs, cassette tapes (they're KILLING music!), posters, adverts etc.

we try this from now upto 70years after Don kicks the bucket and see if it has an effect.

Theoretically his sales should ROCKET!

And finally, it's Code Monkey employing the power of remix:

I think Don's just trying to get down to the heart of the matter. Even if, even if, we don't love him anymore....

(I may owe him like, 3 cents, for that. Who knows....)

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
    Samuel Abram (profile), 14 Jun 2020 @ 1:20pm

    Wow.

    So I've won funny twice, first as editor's choice and second on my own merits, but this is the first time I won insightful!

    Mr. Beadon, have I been nicer than usual to you? It's interesting that I'm racking up all the wins here…

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      Leigh Beadon (profile), 14 Jun 2020 @ 1:23pm

      Re: Wow.

      I don't play favourites (mostly)! And I think the readers notice a lot more patterns than I do - I'm generally not thinking so much about who has won in the past or how often.

      Indie artists talking about their own experience with copyright and the recording industry and how it doesn't serve them is something I always like to highlight though, for sure.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • This comment has been flagged by the community. Click here to show it
        identicon
        Anonymous Coward, 15 Jun 2020 @ 12:14am

        Re: Re: Wow.

        Well, I never won, that seems unfair. Frankly, a lot of people don't even respond to me. That could be because my comments are hidden. I'm very sad about that. You don't care, you have Techdirt Privilege. It's hard for me to make friends, and Techdirt was my last resort. You've really hurt me, deeply, and permanently. Frankly, I think you're all racist. And hemophobic. AND, if you don't stop, I'm going to get REALLY HURT and REALLY SAD and you're going to have to pay me REPARATIONS! For Generations!

        link to this | view in chronology ]

        • icon
          ECA (profile), 15 Jun 2020 @ 12:56am

          Re: Re: Re: Wow.

          secret..
          about 1/2 the people make a comment and never come back to read the rest..
          Iv had a few good ones.. but no votes...

          Whats the avg number of votes given??

          link to this | view in chronology ]

        • identicon
          Anonymous Coward, 15 Jun 2020 @ 3:01am

          Re: Re: Re: Wow.

          Frankly, a lot of people don't even respond to me

          And now you've hurt my feelings, Hamilton. What, my insults directed at Shiva Ayyadurai and how you simped for him harder than a white knight incel on 4chan not good enough for you?

          It's hard for me to make friends, and Techdirt was my last resort

          Turns out nobody likes wanna Ku Klux Klan members, who would have fucking thought?

          AND, if you don't stop, I'm going to get REALLY HURT and REALLY SAD and you're going to have to pay me REPARATIONS! For Generations!

          Yeah, about that, how'd that scheme work out for Shiva? Fran Drescher fucking him yet?

          link to this | view in chronology ]

          • identicon
            Anonymous Coward, 15 Jun 2020 @ 6:38am

            Re: Re: Re: Re: Wow.

            on the tune of ‘Congratulations and Celebrations’ - ‘Reparations, for Generations’?

            link to this | view in chronology ]

        • icon
          Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 15 Jun 2020 @ 6:31am

          Re: Re: Re: Wow.

          "Frankly, I think you're all racist. And hemophobic."

          I think one of those statements have to go. Historically racists aren't afraid of seeing blood.

          With that out of the way, Baghdad Bob...as per usual we'll just tell you there's a world of difference between being an entitled snowflake demanding everyone listens to how you hate <fill in minority here> on a private platform and actual minorities not being able to speak of <insert real and personal grievance here> in the public space.

          Briefly summarized having your comments hidden by the community on a private platform where you regularly do a blackface improv act and pretend to be a kruska-eating serial killer and black activist...isn't censorship. Nor is it "Techdirt privilege" when people ostracize you for acting like an asshole.

          Come back to that assertion once we do the same not because of your actions but because of what color of skin you have.
          Or when we tacitly accept that the people we employ regularly work you over for no reason.

          I'm not sure if you'll ever know what an argument is - but I have to inform you, once again, that putting on a pair of clown shoes and smashing yourself in the dick isn't it.

          link to this | view in chronology ]

        • identicon
          Anonymous Coward, 15 Jun 2020 @ 12:44pm

          Re: Re: Re: Wow.

          Refusing to understand what privilege actually is doesn't score any points.

          Plenty of people respond to your wack-ass verbal vomit, you just don't like what they say.

          I'm sorry they don't have a category for "most abusive / trolling" comment of the week, but we all recognize you anyway so, uh... good job? (And how could we pick just one? All your comments are basically the same, and there are a hell of a lot of them.)

          link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 14 Jun 2020 @ 3:53pm

      Re: Wow.

      You are definetely one of the purveyors of quality comments.

      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.