It's about the reach, ease of access, and prestige. If people have to come to them rather than having their channel part of a package and something you can stumble upon then the number of people who will bother is going to be a lot smaller, and by going it on their own they lose the reputation of being on a major network and become just another group of people with an online show that they threw together.
It wouldn't surprise me if soliciting that sort of information for the express purpose of trying to destroy someone's reputation runs afoul of some law, and as for blackmail after their little outburst if they are stupid enough to go down that road(and I wouldn't put it past them) having made a public declaration like they did the case would likely write itself.
Whatever the case though it is very much not a good look, no, though I imagine it's not likely to change any minds as those that follow the channel will just cheer on their attempts to stick it to the libs and those that don't care for it aren't likely to have their opinion of the channel lowered from this stunt, with funnily enough the only group likely to actually be impacted by this are the very companies they're trying to pressure to keep the channel, as backing down after this would look real bad for AT&T/DirecTV.
Re: Re: 'What do you mean speech has consequences?! Not for me!'
If you're working the grift, Lindell's constant claims that he has evidence or Trump's regular promises of something happening in 2 weeks might be effective in the medium term. But, at some point someone's going to ask you where the evidence is, or why nothing happened after 2 weeks...
I feel like you are vastly overestimating Trump cultists and how easy it is to kick that particular can down the road. As their Dear Leader showed all you need to do is confidently keep asserting that you do have the evidence and you'll release it any day now when the time is right and you can keep those suckers hooked and handing over money for months if not longer.
It's certainly reprehensible and serves as another great reason to ditch them as soon as legally possible but I don't think it raises to the level of blackmail as the stated goal isn't to threaten to release the information unless AT&T/DirectTV changes their minds but to release it regardless as petty revenge.
Doing the equivalent of backhanding your boss in an attempt to keep your job, let's see how well that works out for them shall we?
Nothing says 'Dropping this channel was a long-overdue good idea and keeping it would be a horrible one no matter how many nujobs call in' quite like those running it making an open offer that if anyone wants to share 'dirt' on a black democrat member of the parent company that funded and created the channel they'll give it as much air time as they can manage as petty revenge.
'What do you mean speech has consequences?! Not for me!'
While I admittedly might be way off due to some legal shenanigans it seems to me that when you cross the line from 'This is my opinion of what happened' to 'This is absolutely what happened and I have proof' you've opened yourself wide open for defamation charges, and when your claims involve massive wide-scale vote fraud related to a presidential election the companies and individuals involved are probably not going to just shrug that off.
Now there does seem to be a simple way to get this and any similar lawsuit tossed immediately as it's not defamation if it's true, but given the Trump cult's... shall we say 'difficulty' in finding evidence to support their case that can stand up in court and under scrutiny that might be a tall ask for Lindell.
Having listened to the GAM teardowns of his two 'movies' about the election if he tried to argue that he was so batshit insane that he can't be changed with defamation because he believed all of it and/or he was just being hyperbolic I would be tempted to believe the first half at least, however given the 'I'm crazy/a liar so you can't charge me with defamation' would likely rather undermine the grift he's aiming at Trump cultists that would probably be a last-ditch effort for him, and it's quite possible he's nuts/arrogant enough to think that he can get away with his actions via the simple 'Nuh uh' defense.
Sidney Powell tried it but she laid flat on her face because she's not an entertainer but a lawyer which meant that judges believed her and she got sanctioned for that.
Yeah, the 'I was just making things up, that doesn't count' defense doesn't work out so well when the things you're trying to dismiss with the argument are statements you've argued in court and under oath as being true. Delightful self-own that.
It's interesting to see how Mike Lindell is going to have to defend himself from his inexcusable behavior.
Double-down on the conspiracy theories, break out the persecution-complex that's the go-to for people like him, and con the gullible fools who still believe him into giving him money so he can defend himself against the vile libs trying to silence him would be my guess.
I imagine you thought that was a witty 'gotcha', but I'm pleased to inform you that it very much was not. 'You can speak but you can't use our property to do so' is not even remotely equivalent to 'Now that we bought this company we're going to waffle about whether the games it offers will be available on other platforms before deciding that they aren't' except perhaps to the extent that both involve a company deciding what they allow on their own private property and how it will be used.
Step 2) People in both companies make vague statements about how they maybe/probably don't intend to make Bethesda games exclusives and the goal is simply to have the 'best' versions on Xbox/PC.
Step 3) More details come out and it turns out that yes, the games very much will be Xbox/PC exclusive.
Fast forward several months
Step 1) Microsoft buys Activision/Blizzard.
Step 2) Vague statements are made about how they don't intend to make the company's titles exclusive and they will be honoring the current multi-platform contracts.
Build atrocious system with utterly insane requirements like 'wait several hours on hold'.
Have people either decide to try again later under the mistaken impression that it's just busy at the time rather than your service being garbage or have a technical issue end the call for them.
Claim that any call that doesn't go through is evidence of fraud and shows that you deserve all the money you've been granted and them some.
Balderdash, I'm sure there's a perfectly innocent reason they want to have on-demand access to the most personal information on every child in the country, from their private messages and pictures to the real-time location....
The best part of companies freaking out over adblockers like this is it's an entirely self-inflicted wound, if those pushing and hosting ads had kept them reasonable, unintrusive and not a vector for malware people wouldn't have been so keen to block them all, but since they did none of that others had to step in and respond in kind.
'These are not the terrible companies you are looking for.'
When the facts are on your side, pound on the facts.
When the law is on your side, pound on the law.
When the laws(and resulting market dominance) that you bribed more than a few politicians for are under threat because your reputation has become so toxic that towns are building their own bloody broadband networks rather than deal with yours... pay someone to lie like a rug and gaslight like mad for you I guess.
(As an aside I find it absolutely hilarious that they'd try to tag Karl for that 'study', talk about the last person likely to fall for their lies though silver lining I would take it as evidence that he's perhaps been a bit more effective in calling them out on their actions then they'd like.)
Followed by assurances that of course no-one else will ever find and use that key other than them, why the very thought is downright silly and anyone bringing it up is obviously a criminal sympathizer who wants to use fear and play on the emotions of the good, law-abiding citizens who the police just super-duper want to protect with the key.
'Not being constantly watched and tracked is a terrible threat!'
UK government: The children will be in great danger if it's not possible for anyone with the proper keys to access every single scrap of information about them, up to and including their location in real time.
Skeptical individual: And what happens when that deeply personal and potentially dangerous information gets into the hands of those with less-than-good intentions, because it will if you mandate that vulnerability.
UK government: That is a price we are willing to (have the children) pay.
Few things wave the 'We have no valid arguments or defense for our position' flag quite so enthusiastically like 'Think of the children!'
If I run a store and offer people a corkboard that they can leave messages/advertisements on am I 'censoring' someone if for whatever reason I decide not to allow one or more people to continue to use it?
There's an important difference between 'you're not allowed to speak' and 'you're not allowed to speak on/using my property', and one of the problems with mixing the two is that it waters down the definition of 'censorship' to the point where it loses all impact and people simply don't care any time it's brought up because they've been conditioned to associate it with 'someone suffered consequences for their actions and they're throwing a fit over it' rather than 'the government and/or a similarly powerful group is trying to silence someone and prevent them from speaking not just via a particular outlet but at all'.
Okay now you're just flailing around for a way to salvage your position and it's getting sad. Trespassing laws have nothing to do with revoking someone's digital account and banning them from a platform(for that you need look to those pesky first amendment and property rights), and last I checked that wasn't the explanation given for why he was booted out the door, so even it those laws were applicable for digital platforms they weren't used here.
Accept that you botched your original argument and let it die already because you're not saving it on the merits when it doesn't have any and trying is just making your look worse and worse.
Maybe Twitter used some other section of federal law to shut down the then-sitting president's account?
They didn't use and didn't need to use any law(federal or otherwise) to boot his ass out the door, it's their platform and he was there at their discretion, all they needed to do was decide that he wasn't welcome anymore and out he went.
We can debate whether piracy is wrong, but blindly sending out takedown notices to review sites will not turn anyone into customers.
Given my first response to the article was 'Well, there's two publishers to avoid' and as the comment below notes I'm not the only one it certainly does the reverse of that quite nicely.
On the post: OAN Throws A Hissy Fit After Being Axed By AT&T, DirecTV
Re: Why does OAN care?
It's about the reach, ease of access, and prestige. If people have to come to them rather than having their channel part of a package and something you can stumble upon then the number of people who will bother is going to be a lot smaller, and by going it on their own they lose the reputation of being on a major network and become just another group of people with an online show that they threw together.
On the post: OAN Throws A Hissy Fit After Being Axed By AT&T, DirecTV
Re: Re: Re:
It wouldn't surprise me if soliciting that sort of information for the express purpose of trying to destroy someone's reputation runs afoul of some law, and as for blackmail after their little outburst if they are stupid enough to go down that road(and I wouldn't put it past them) having made a public declaration like they did the case would likely write itself.
Whatever the case though it is very much not a good look, no, though I imagine it's not likely to change any minds as those that follow the channel will just cheer on their attempts to stick it to the libs and those that don't care for it aren't likely to have their opinion of the channel lowered from this stunt, with funnily enough the only group likely to actually be impacted by this are the very companies they're trying to pressure to keep the channel, as backing down after this would look real bad for AT&T/DirecTV.
On the post: Smartmatic Sues MyPillow CEO For Defamation Over His Months Of Nonstop Election Conspiracy Theories
Re: Re: 'What do you mean speech has consequences?! Not for me!'
If you're working the grift, Lindell's constant claims that he has evidence or Trump's regular promises of something happening in 2 weeks might be effective in the medium term. But, at some point someone's going to ask you where the evidence is, or why nothing happened after 2 weeks...
I feel like you are vastly overestimating Trump cultists and how easy it is to kick that particular can down the road. As their Dear Leader showed all you need to do is confidently keep asserting that you do have the evidence and you'll release it any day now when the time is right and you can keep those suckers hooked and handing over money for months if not longer.
On the post: OAN Throws A Hissy Fit After Being Axed By AT&T, DirecTV
Re:
It's certainly reprehensible and serves as another great reason to ditch them as soon as legally possible but I don't think it raises to the level of blackmail as the stated goal isn't to threaten to release the information unless AT&T/DirectTV changes their minds but to release it regardless as petty revenge.
On the post: OAN Throws A Hissy Fit After Being Axed By AT&T, DirecTV
Thanks for validating the decision there OAN
Doing the equivalent of backhanding your boss in an attempt to keep your job, let's see how well that works out for them shall we?
Nothing says 'Dropping this channel was a long-overdue good idea and keeping it would be a horrible one no matter how many nujobs call in' quite like those running it making an open offer that if anyone wants to share 'dirt' on a black democrat member of the parent company that funded and created the channel they'll give it as much air time as they can manage as petty revenge.
On the post: Smartmatic Sues MyPillow CEO For Defamation Over His Months Of Nonstop Election Conspiracy Theories
'What do you mean speech has consequences?! Not for me!'
While I admittedly might be way off due to some legal shenanigans it seems to me that when you cross the line from 'This is my opinion of what happened' to 'This is absolutely what happened and I have proof' you've opened yourself wide open for defamation charges, and when your claims involve massive wide-scale vote fraud related to a presidential election the companies and individuals involved are probably not going to just shrug that off.
Now there does seem to be a simple way to get this and any similar lawsuit tossed immediately as it's not defamation if it's true, but given the Trump cult's... shall we say 'difficulty' in finding evidence to support their case that can stand up in court and under scrutiny that might be a tall ask for Lindell.
On the post: Smartmatic Sues MyPillow CEO For Defamation Over His Months Of Nonstop Election Conspiracy Theories
Re: My question is this…
Having listened to the GAM teardowns of his two 'movies' about the election if he tried to argue that he was so batshit insane that he can't be changed with defamation because he believed all of it and/or he was just being hyperbolic I would be tempted to believe the first half at least, however given the 'I'm crazy/a liar so you can't charge me with defamation' would likely rather undermine the grift he's aiming at Trump cultists that would probably be a last-ditch effort for him, and it's quite possible he's nuts/arrogant enough to think that he can get away with his actions via the simple 'Nuh uh' defense.
Sidney Powell tried it but she laid flat on her face because she's not an entertainer but a lawyer which meant that judges believed her and she got sanctioned for that.
Yeah, the 'I was just making things up, that doesn't count' defense doesn't work out so well when the things you're trying to dismiss with the argument are statements you've argued in court and under oath as being true. Delightful self-own that.
It's interesting to see how Mike Lindell is going to have to defend himself from his inexcusable behavior.
Double-down on the conspiracy theories, break out the persecution-complex that's the go-to for people like him, and con the gullible fools who still believe him into giving him money so he can defend himself against the vile libs trying to silence him would be my guess.
On the post: Deja Vu All Over Again: Microsoft, Sony Making Vague Statements About Exclusivity In Activision Titles
Swing and a miss
I imagine you thought that was a witty 'gotcha', but I'm pleased to inform you that it very much was not. 'You can speak but you can't use our property to do so' is not even remotely equivalent to 'Now that we bought this company we're going to waffle about whether the games it offers will be available on other platforms before deciding that they aren't' except perhaps to the extent that both involve a company deciding what they allow on their own private property and how it will be used.
On the post: Deja Vu All Over Again: Microsoft, Sony Making Vague Statements About Exclusivity In Activision Titles
Fool me once...
Step 1) Microsoft buys Bethesda.
Step 2) People in both companies make vague statements about how they maybe/probably don't intend to make Bethesda games exclusives and the goal is simply to have the 'best' versions on Xbox/PC.
Step 3) More details come out and it turns out that yes, the games very much will be Xbox/PC exclusive.
Fast forward several months
Step 1) Microsoft buys Activision/Blizzard.
Step 2) Vague statements are made about how they don't intend to make the company's titles exclusive and they will be honoring the current multi-platform contracts.
Step 3) ...
On the post: Biometric Tech Company ID.Me Continues To Swallow Gov't Agencies, Cause Problems For People Trying To Access Their Gov't Benefits
Good con if you can run it
Build atrocious system with utterly insane requirements like 'wait several hours on hold'.
Have people either decide to try again later under the mistaken impression that it's just busy at the time rather than your service being garbage or have a technical issue end the call for them.
Claim that any call that doesn't go through is evidence of fraud and shows that you deserve all the money you've been granted and them some.
Profit.
On the post: UK Gov't: Encryption Endangers Kids. Also UK Gov't: No, Encryption *Protects* Kids
Re:
Balderdash, I'm sure there's a perfectly innocent reason they want to have on-demand access to the most personal information on every child in the country, from their private messages and pictures to the real-time location....
On the post: The Internet Wins: Adblocking (And Other Extensions) Don't Violate Copyright Law In Germany
Consequences for my own actions, we meet again...
The best part of companies freaking out over adblockers like this is it's an entirely self-inflicted wound, if those pushing and hosting ads had kept them reasonable, unintrusive and not a vector for malware people wouldn't have been so keen to block them all, but since they did none of that others had to step in and respond in kind.
On the post: Yet Another Telecom-Backed Think Tank Insists U.S. Broadband Is Great, Actually
'These are not the terrible companies you are looking for.'
When the facts are on your side, pound on the facts.
When the law is on your side, pound on the law.
When the laws(and resulting market dominance) that you bribed more than a few politicians for are under threat because your reputation has become so toxic that towns are building their own bloody broadband networks rather than deal with yours... pay someone to lie like a rug and gaslight like mad for you I guess.
(As an aside I find it absolutely hilarious that they'd try to tag Karl for that 'study', talk about the last person likely to fall for their lies though silver lining I would take it as evidence that he's perhaps been a bit more effective in calling them out on their actions then they'd like.)
On the post: UK Gov't: Encryption Endangers Kids. Also UK Gov't: No, Encryption *Protects* Kids
Re:
Followed by assurances that of course no-one else will ever find and use that key other than them, why the very thought is downright silly and anyone bringing it up is obviously a criminal sympathizer who wants to use fear and play on the emotions of the good, law-abiding citizens who the police just super-duper want to protect with the key.
On the post: UK Gov't: Encryption Endangers Kids. Also UK Gov't: No, Encryption *Protects* Kids
'Not being constantly watched and tracked is a terrible threat!'
UK government: The children will be in great danger if it's not possible for anyone with the proper keys to access every single scrap of information about them, up to and including their location in real time.
Skeptical individual: And what happens when that deeply personal and potentially dangerous information gets into the hands of those with less-than-good intentions, because it will if you mandate that vulnerability.
UK government: That is a price we are willing to (have the children) pay.
Few things wave the 'We have no valid arguments or defense for our position' flag quite so enthusiastically like 'Think of the children!'
On the post: Funniest/Most Insightful Comments Of The Week At Techdirt
Context matters, as what rights you actually have
If I run a store and offer people a corkboard that they can leave messages/advertisements on am I 'censoring' someone if for whatever reason I decide not to allow one or more people to continue to use it?
There's an important difference between 'you're not allowed to speak' and 'you're not allowed to speak on/using my property', and one of the problems with mixing the two is that it waters down the definition of 'censorship' to the point where it loses all impact and people simply don't care any time it's brought up because they've been conditioned to associate it with 'someone suffered consequences for their actions and they're throwing a fit over it' rather than 'the government and/or a similarly powerful group is trying to silence someone and prevent them from speaking not just via a particular outlet but at all'.
On the post: Totally Bogus DMCA Takedowns From Giant Publishers Completely Nuke Book Review Blog Off The Internet
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Second option and a dash of dishonesty it is I see.
On the post: Totally Bogus DMCA Takedowns From Giant Publishers Completely Nuke Book Review Blog Off The Internet
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Okay now you're just flailing around for a way to salvage your position and it's getting sad. Trespassing laws have nothing to do with revoking someone's digital account and banning them from a platform(for that you need look to those pesky first amendment and property rights), and last I checked that wasn't the explanation given for why he was booted out the door, so even it those laws were applicable for digital platforms they weren't used here.
Accept that you botched your original argument and let it die already because you're not saving it on the merits when it doesn't have any and trying is just making your look worse and worse.
On the post: Totally Bogus DMCA Takedowns From Giant Publishers Completely Nuke Book Review Blog Off The Internet
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Maybe Twitter used some other section of federal law to shut down the then-sitting president's account?
They didn't use and didn't need to use any law(federal or otherwise) to boot his ass out the door, it's their platform and he was there at their discretion, all they needed to do was decide that he wasn't welcome anymore and out he went.
On the post: Totally Bogus DMCA Takedowns From Giant Publishers Completely Nuke Book Review Blog Off The Internet
Re: Turn piracy into profit
We can debate whether piracy is wrong, but blindly sending out takedown notices to review sites will not turn anyone into customers.
Given my first response to the article was 'Well, there's two publishers to avoid' and as the comment below notes I'm not the only one it certainly does the reverse of that quite nicely.
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