Re: Next time put a percentage of stock on the line
The government body overseeing this merger was the FCC. Why would we want the FCC to be in control of some percentage of any company? Amongst the many problems with that is that the next administration will 'reinvent' the FCC again and screw over any decisions made by the previous commission make up. What a way to run a business?
NO, government should not own parts of business's, for confirmation just look to the post office.
Oranges competing with squash for the best protein prize
The perspective missing from Charter's erroneous statement of competition in video is that there are numerous silos out there, all of whom have select content. So it isn't the silos that are competing against each other, it is the content they contain, which means there isn't any actual competition between providers, but their products. Now if that content was distributed between each of the silos, equally, then we would have a market for competition between silos.
§ 230 is a more likely target because it has a higher potential to control speech they like/dislike. Attacking (to the rest of us fixing) § 512 would do little in terms of speech they like/dislike but might harm those who so zealously wish to protect their IP (and make campaign contributions), which is now seen as our greatest resource (and under current law our most endurable resource though that durability could do harm to generating new IP) whether the claimant owns (or has been granted authority to act for the owner) that IP or not.
If the IP is not producing income for the IP maximalist (or someone posing as an IP owner) then it is blatantly an illegal use (to them), and false claims are seen as a boon to the system rather than a detriment. Culture be damned as it is a better resource if owned, at least in the minds of the IP maximalists and their supporting politicians.
Only someone as irrational as the police who exercise this blatantly illegal action. I haven't heard of any of these cases actually being prosecuted, but you still can't beat the ride to the police station, nor the lost time as being released immediately wouldn't fit their demented intent.
In addition it is more difficult for politicians to control what private companies will consider to be appropriate moderation (thus directly impacting their advertising buys) than (in their imaginations) changing the laws (despite campaign contribution anxiety). The § 230 amending crowd want to control speech and are looking for ways to 'fix' the 1st Amendment by making someone (but not them) liable for third party speech they don't like. The stumbling block is how they can keep speech they like without any repercussions at the same time (or having those amendments to the law reversed by 1st Amendment realities).
I don't think they will largely agree with the results of this corporate 'interference' as they don't see themselves in control of the outcomes, something they desperately desire. That it disintegrates their 'no incentive' arguments is not of as much consequence as being able to control the political arena. Any step toward an authoritarian state (with their party in charge) is a good step. Stumbling blocks are considered the equivalent of 'felony interference with a business model' for which there is no actual law, but plenty of actionable behaviors, that they will relish taking.
Think about all the times an officer testify's in court about his 'training and experience' to justify some behavior and then being able to show the actual training belies that statement. No wonder they don't want that material to be public.
Anonymous Anonymous Coward (profile), 30 Jun 2020 @ 3:42pm
Re: Privacy is paramount, not pointless.
Absolutely! And what about our 1st Amendment rights. It's our data! Why is is that not only corporations, but our government (the courts especially, third party doctrine and all) think that the 1st Amendment doesn't control our ability to control our own information.
U.S. Constitution - Amendment 1 - Freedom of Religion, Press, Expression
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
That part about freedom of expression should clearly allow for us NOT to speak, as in controlling information collected about us that we do now wish to express. It should be our decisions, not theirs.
I also don't think that the establishment of 'corporate personhood', a fiction created in the interest of being able to deal with corporations properly, conferred all of the rights of the Constitution upon them. A search of the Constitution for the words corporation, company, and entity did not get any hits. Isn't that telling.
Anonymous Anonymous Coward (profile), 29 Jun 2020 @ 5:28pm
Re: Re: If you're going to be a racist loser at least be an hone
There is a difference. I can be discriminating (I like chocolate ice cream more than I like vanilla, but butter pecan is my favorite) but not be racist (I don't dislike anyone because of any of of the usual metrics i.e. race, religion, national origin, skin color etc.) but can dislike people because of their behavior (I am talking about individuals here not groups). I can be angry about groups (the police across the nation have raised my ire on numerous occasions, but I don't think all police are bad (though it is hard from here to tell one from the other).
While there is a 'natural' my clan vs your clan, it doesn't necessarily relate to race. So I disagree, it is possible to be not racist, but I might still dislike someone of some race or another due to their individual behavior, just so long as one doesn't use those racial characteristics and apply them to all others of that race, unless they individually exhibit bad behavior as well.
One of the big problems is that what racism exists is reversible. There are some who would claim that it is not possible to be white and not be racist. There are others who would claim that if your not Islamic your an abomination and should die. There are others who would claim that if your Mexican your a rapist. There are a lot more examples. They are all wrong.
Anonymous Anonymous Coward (profile), 29 Jun 2020 @ 4:42pm
Re:
The problem with DNS deciding what domain names they carry is that not that many people know either what DNS really means or how or why they should change the setting on their own computers.
If, say a Comcast customer, is directed to their DNS servers and Comcast decides not to include say Techdirt, then they will get a 'host not found' result instead of the web page. Depending upon how picayune a particular DNS host is, they could keep people from a lot of legitimate content, or they could decide to hate say YouTube, or Amazon and not let people through to them, or decide that the current power base in Washington isn't to their liking and block all .gov sites.
DNS servers, all of them, should carry everything, not just what they want. Or we educate the general public on why they should use (or for that matter not use) certain servers, and then how to change their settings. Good luck with that.
Anonymous Anonymous Coward (profile), 29 Jun 2020 @ 3:14pm
Re: This is why you need a licensing system that works
It would probably be easier to require some form of police malpractice insurance (as has been mentioned before) and creating a personal liability. Then when an officer is put in the position of not being able to get insurance because they create too high a liability for the insurance companies they lose their jobs, and the unions will have little to say about it, unless they are providing the insurance, then they have the liability for their members actions.
Anonymous Anonymous Coward (profile), 26 Jun 2020 @ 10:59am
Re: Re:
Isn't it more likely they didn't find enough people listening on the new site? Or could it be they didn't find enough people agreeing with them? Or could it be that that they missed the cacophony of voices in agreement or not?
Anonymous Anonymous Coward (profile), 26 Jun 2020 @ 7:45am
Re: Re:
Doesn't that depend upon whether one selects their own set of DNS servers or not? If a Comcast customer allows Comcast to select the DNS servers, then your right, but if there was say a tool that reset DNS servers to ones that weren't Comcast but were enabled to handle the encrypted requests then something different would be needed for Comcast to monetize those requests.
Anonymous Anonymous Coward (profile), 25 Jun 2020 @ 12:04pm
Trust whom?
Why does the term anti-trust make me think of not trusting the government that is supposed to wield those laws to protect us? I think of it as against trusting the feds.
The concept that one or two phone companies (give them time, it will come) is OK but the emerging market of cannabis where non competing entities merge leaving lots of competition requires investigation tells us a lot about where election funding is coming from (give the cannabis industry a bit of time to catch up). That election funding controls where law enforcement efforts are expended is more than a little disconcerting.
What will be interesting is if they actually bring their 'investigations' to a court of law for adjudication whether the judges will stop laughing long enough to administer a laugh test.
Anonymous Anonymous Coward (profile), 25 Jun 2020 @ 8:36am
Addressing the wrong code
§ 230 seems to be overly popular with our legislative drones. Why aren't they as concerned with the DMCA, which is much more problematic? That is causing more speech restrictions than § 230 (in its present form) ever could (and as pointed out elsewhere might even be censorship as it is government mandated) as well as economic harm to many individuals rather than corporations. Is it that § 230 goes after evil corporations? I thought corporations with their large sources for regulatory capture donations (a.k.a. bribes) were the friends of compliant congresscritters.
Anonymous Anonymous Coward (profile), 25 Jun 2020 @ 7:23am
We wanna see more pictures that have nothing to do with our case
"...open to police scrutiny without proper safeguards…"
Once the police have access to the phone (both physically and unlocked), how is a law going to stop them from looking at everything on it? Unless the phone is kept by a responsible, non police, third party who will observe and contain the search and collection of evidence within the time and subject matter constraints imposed by law there will be fishing expeditions for either other crimes or mere prurient interest.
And, as pointed out above, those results, in their entirety, should be immediately released to both sides of the conflict. One side or another might have some objections to what was actually looked at and/or collected.
On the post: Court Shoots Down AT&T, Comcast Attempt To Crush Maine Privacy Law
Re: War
It's more like Corporations for themselves and the people be damned, even if they are customers.
On the post: Charter Spectrum Lobbies FCC To Kill Time Warner Cable Merger Conditions
Re: Next time put a percentage of stock on the line
The government body overseeing this merger was the FCC. Why would we want the FCC to be in control of some percentage of any company? Amongst the many problems with that is that the next administration will 'reinvent' the FCC again and screw over any decisions made by the previous commission make up. What a way to run a business?
NO, government should not own parts of business's, for confirmation just look to the post office.
On the post: Charter Spectrum Lobbies FCC To Kill Time Warner Cable Merger Conditions
Oranges competing with squash for the best protein prize
The perspective missing from Charter's erroneous statement of competition in video is that there are numerous silos out there, all of whom have select content. So it isn't the silos that are competing against each other, it is the content they contain, which means there isn't any actual competition between providers, but their products. Now if that content was distributed between each of the silos, equally, then we would have a market for competition between silos.
On the post: Facebook Follows Twitter In Recognizing A 'More Speech' Approach Is Best For Newsworthy Liars
Re: Very Workable
Why do all of your comments seem more like The Corbomite Maneuver than reality? Captain Kirk's enemy's are impressed. No one else is though.
On the post: Rather Than Attacking Section 230, Why Aren't Trump Supporters Angry About The DMCA That's Actually Causing Issues?
Because it doesn't fit their agenda
§ 230 is a more likely target because it has a higher potential to control speech they like/dislike. Attacking (to the rest of us fixing) § 512 would do little in terms of speech they like/dislike but might harm those who so zealously wish to protect their IP (and make campaign contributions), which is now seen as our greatest resource (and under current law our most endurable resource though that durability could do harm to generating new IP) whether the claimant owns (or has been granted authority to act for the owner) that IP or not.
If the IP is not producing income for the IP maximalist (or someone posing as an IP owner) then it is blatantly an illegal use (to them), and false claims are seen as a boon to the system rather than a detriment. Culture be damned as it is a better resource if owned, at least in the minds of the IP maximalists and their supporting politicians.
On the post: How An NYPD Officer Can Hit A Teen With His Car In Front Of Several Witnesses And Get Away With It
Re: Resisting arrest
Only someone as irrational as the police who exercise this blatantly illegal action. I haven't heard of any of these cases actually being prosecuted, but you still can't beat the ride to the police station, nor the lost time as being released immediately wouldn't fit their demented intent.
On the post: 'But Without 230 Reform, Websites Have No Incentive To Change!' They Scream Into The Void As Every Large Company Pulls Ads From Facebook
Re:
In addition it is more difficult for politicians to control what private companies will consider to be appropriate moderation (thus directly impacting their advertising buys) than (in their imaginations) changing the laws (despite campaign contribution anxiety). The § 230 amending crowd want to control speech and are looking for ways to 'fix' the 1st Amendment by making someone (but not them) liable for third party speech they don't like. The stumbling block is how they can keep speech they like without any repercussions at the same time (or having those amendments to the law reversed by 1st Amendment realities).
I don't think they will largely agree with the results of this corporate 'interference' as they don't see themselves in control of the outcomes, something they desperately desire. That it disintegrates their 'no incentive' arguments is not of as much consequence as being able to control the political arena. Any step toward an authoritarian state (with their party in charge) is a good step. Stumbling blocks are considered the equivalent of 'felony interference with a business model' for which there is no actual law, but plenty of actionable behaviors, that they will relish taking.
On the post: Companies Issuing Bogus Copyright Claims To Hide Police Training Materials From The Public
They told me to...no they didn't.
Think about all the times an officer testify's in court about his 'training and experience' to justify some behavior and then being able to show the actual training belies that statement. No wonder they don't want that material to be public.
On the post: The Most Important Privacy Case You've Never Heard Of
Re: Privacy is paramount, not pointless.
Absolutely! And what about our 1st Amendment rights. It's our data! Why is is that not only corporations, but our government (the courts especially, third party doctrine and all) think that the 1st Amendment doesn't control our ability to control our own information.
That part about freedom of expression should clearly allow for us NOT to speak, as in controlling information collected about us that we do now wish to express. It should be our decisions, not theirs.
I also don't think that the establishment of 'corporate personhood', a fiction created in the interest of being able to deal with corporations properly, conferred all of the rights of the Constitution upon them. A search of the Constitution for the words corporation, company, and entity did not get any hits. Isn't that telling.
On the post: New Bill Would Kill State Laws Blocking Broadband Competition
Re: Who are the bill's sponsors?
Could it be that those sponsors might have another label in common, such as fiscally independent of the Telecom/Broadband provider industry?
On the post: I'd Bet Ted Cruz Will Start Supporting Section 230 Once He Realizes He's On The Hook For Parler's Legal Expenses
Thank Parler for the road map.
Let's see, five steps to an attitude reversal on § 230.
Ted Cruz and/or any other congresscritter posts something actionable.
Someone sues Parler (under the deep pocket theory) for that post.
Parler racks up big legal fees and sends Ted Cruz and/or other congresscritter a huge bill.
Ted Cruz and/or other congresscritter throws hissy fit.
Dear Ted,
Please start posting your diatribes. Given your history it won't be long until this road map is put to work.
Sincerely
More Reasonable People
On the post: North Carolina Cops Fired After Their In-Car Camera Catches Them Talking About Wiping Black People 'Off The (Expletive) Map'
Re: Re: If you're going to be a racist loser at least be an hone
There is a difference. I can be discriminating (I like chocolate ice cream more than I like vanilla, but butter pecan is my favorite) but not be racist (I don't dislike anyone because of any of of the usual metrics i.e. race, religion, national origin, skin color etc.) but can dislike people because of their behavior (I am talking about individuals here not groups). I can be angry about groups (the police across the nation have raised my ire on numerous occasions, but I don't think all police are bad (though it is hard from here to tell one from the other).
While there is a 'natural' my clan vs your clan, it doesn't necessarily relate to race. So I disagree, it is possible to be not racist, but I might still dislike someone of some race or another due to their individual behavior, just so long as one doesn't use those racial characteristics and apply them to all others of that race, unless they individually exhibit bad behavior as well.
One of the big problems is that what racism exists is reversible. There are some who would claim that it is not possible to be white and not be racist. There are others who would claim that if your not Islamic your an abomination and should die. There are others who would claim that if your Mexican your a rapist. There are a lot more examples. They are all wrong.
On the post: Knight Foundation Grant To Copia To Research Content Moderation, Governance, Rules & Norms For Internet Infrastructure
Re:
The problem with DNS deciding what domain names they carry is that not that many people know either what DNS really means or how or why they should change the setting on their own computers.
If, say a Comcast customer, is directed to their DNS servers and Comcast decides not to include say Techdirt, then they will get a 'host not found' result instead of the web page. Depending upon how picayune a particular DNS host is, they could keep people from a lot of legitimate content, or they could decide to hate say YouTube, or Amazon and not let people through to them, or decide that the current power base in Washington isn't to their liking and block all .gov sites.
DNS servers, all of them, should carry everything, not just what they want. Or we educate the general public on why they should use (or for that matter not use) certain servers, and then how to change their settings. Good luck with that.
On the post: North Carolina Cops Fired After Their In-Car Camera Catches Them Talking About Wiping Black People 'Off The (Expletive) Map'
Re: This is why you need a licensing system that works
It would probably be easier to require some form of police malpractice insurance (as has been mentioned before) and creating a personal liability. Then when an officer is put in the position of not being able to get insurance because they create too high a liability for the insurance companies they lose their jobs, and the unions will have little to say about it, unless they are providing the insurance, then they have the liability for their members actions.
On the post: Senator Loeffler's New Section 230 Reform Bill Would Threaten Encryption And Pressure Websites To Keep Spam & Porn
Re: Re: MAGA?
Agenda, you left out agenda.
In these cases with § 230 we can guess guess at the agendas but for sure they don't have the voters in mind.
On the post: Just Like Every Other Platform, Parler Will Take Down Content And Face Impossible Content Moderation Choices
Re: Re:
Isn't it more likely they didn't find enough people listening on the new site? Or could it be they didn't find enough people agreeing with them? Or could it be that that they missed the cacophony of voices in agreement or not?
On the post: Comcast And Mozilla Partner Up To Help Encrypt DNS
Re: Re:
Doesn't that depend upon whether one selects their own set of DNS servers or not? If a Comcast customer allows Comcast to select the DNS servers, then your right, but if there was say a tool that reset DNS servers to ones that weren't Comcast but were enabled to handle the encrypted requests then something different would be needed for Comcast to monetize those requests.
On the post: Barr DOJ Weaponized Antitrust To Launch Flimsy Inquiries Into Legal Weed Companies
Trust whom?
Why does the term anti-trust make me think of not trusting the government that is supposed to wield those laws to protect us? I think of it as against trusting the feds.
The concept that one or two phone companies (give them time, it will come) is OK but the emerging market of cannabis where non competing entities merge leaving lots of competition requires investigation tells us a lot about where election funding is coming from (give the cannabis industry a bit of time to catch up). That election funding controls where law enforcement efforts are expended is more than a little disconcerting.
What will be interesting is if they actually bring their 'investigations' to a court of law for adjudication whether the judges will stop laughing long enough to administer a laugh test.
On the post: Another Day, Another Bad Bill To Reform Section 230 That Will Do More Harm Than Good
Addressing the wrong code
§ 230 seems to be overly popular with our legislative drones. Why aren't they as concerned with the DMCA, which is much more problematic? That is causing more speech restrictions than § 230 (in its present form) ever could (and as pointed out elsewhere might even be censorship as it is government mandated) as well as economic harm to many individuals rather than corporations. Is it that § 230 goes after evil corporations? I thought corporations with their large sources for regulatory capture donations (a.k.a. bribes) were the friends of compliant congresscritters.
On the post: UK Information Commissioner Says Police Are Grabbing Too Much Data From Phones Owned By Crime Victims
We wanna see more pictures that have nothing to do with our case
Once the police have access to the phone (both physically and unlocked), how is a law going to stop them from looking at everything on it? Unless the phone is kept by a responsible, non police, third party who will observe and contain the search and collection of evidence within the time and subject matter constraints imposed by law there will be fishing expeditions for either other crimes or mere prurient interest.
And, as pointed out above, those results, in their entirety, should be immediately released to both sides of the conflict. One side or another might have some objections to what was actually looked at and/or collected.
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