1) Years ago (maybe 10 years) Penn & Teller's "Bullsh*t" show had an episode on gun violence. As a probably inhumane and unethical experiment, they found an 11 year-old who was an expert in the latest first-person-shooter and gave him a real machine. After the kid fired a few rounds, he was a crying mess because he couldn't stand to shoot a real weapon. Granted, this was one kid and it was hardly a scientific experiment, but the fact was that this kid was an expert in video games and it didn't translate into shooting a real gun.
2) I know the facts don't matter to people like the governor, but it would interesting if the video game industry itself put out some statistics to finally debunk the "let's blame video games" idiocy. For example, how many millions of people have played Doom? Yet some people think it was the cause of the Columbine shooting because the shooters made a map of their high school within the game.
How many people have played Quake or Call of Duty or even Warcraft or Starcraft?
Yet some mass shooters maybe played a video game at some point, so the entire industry should be blamed? Really?
With all this talk about zero tolerance for different things, is it time to have zero tolerance for "bugs" on sites such as Facebook? After all, Facebook literally has billions of users. Isn't it safe to assume they have all manner of testing, QA, beta testing, and alpha testing before any feature goes live? Then who approved the idea to spam people using their two-factor authentication number? And then who approved posting their reply to their wall? I can easily see a programmer coming up with the idea, but team leads and managers are supposed to not allow these things. And where are the testers saying this isn't a good idea?
Or is this "bug" actually a feature passed down from higher management as yet another way to spy and track people?
Changing the subject slightly, I'd like to see a court weigh in on when a "free" item isn't actually free. We've always considered "free" to mean "not paying money", but what about spending people's time, such as: - Forced to watch a 30 second commercial on YouTube before the video starts. - Forced to watch an ad to continue playing a free game on your phone. - Going to a Windows download site to get a driver, but having to guess which of the 5 download buttons will download the driver and which will download a toolbar or malware. - Having to keep a sharp eye on software installers (such as Flash updates) that want to install toolbars or change your home page. - Not to mention the usually irrelevant ads on places like Facebook and Pinterest.
All of these are considered annoyances and distractions, but we put up with them to get the free item or service.
How about rewording the statement slightly: _According to onlookers, E.W. is a 10 year-old child with a child's level of fight-training, while Dolgos is a licensed law-enforcement officer who presumably has had training in martial arts and controlling suspects._ Yet this 10 year-old child was so dangerous that Dolgos had to put handcuffs on her? I think Dolgos should be fired if she's that afraid of children. After all, what happens when she faces a real criminal with a weapon?
I can maybe, sort-of see putting the child in handcuffs to teach her a lesson, but then Dolgos shouldn't claim that she did it out of "safety for herself and school administrators".
Like other people are saying, did this "public service" organization mention the fact that many ad networks have been, and will continue to, serve malware? How many times have we seen legitimate sites become the unwitting delivery system for malware simply because they use a "trusted" service like doubleclick?
Yet there's no mention that people can get infected this way?
And did the video talk about Flash ads that contain malware and that Flash should be disabled for safety?
I might be in the minority, but here's something to consider: I actually use my computer's processor to render images of digital models. This means the rendering software will take 80-85% of my CPU usage, usually for about an hour or two.
I use this time to browse the web and read interesting stories. I sometimes load up 5 or 6 tabs with stories to read just so Firefox doesn't have to load any pages, then I started rendering an image.
So what happens to people like me who are already using their processor? Will Salon work if its crypto-miner can't run any calculations because there's no free CPU cycles? Will I get a pop-up saying to free up more CPU or the site won't load the rest of the page?
I agree with Bruce Schneier that this is a problem that won't have a solution any time soon.
For the most part, vendors don't care about privacy because customers don't care about privacy or security. And many customers don't care about privacy because they don't know any better.
How many people realize that the "Which Harry Potter character are you" quizzes at Facebook allow the quiz-company full access to their public profile, including posts and photos? And how many people realize a "bad guy" can easily create one of these quizzes and then data-mine everyone who answers... right down to the person's street address, elementary school, and the name of their dog. In other words, the answers to many sites' "recover your password" security questions.
If people don't care about privacy and security on Facebook, then convincing them to care about their TV's is a much harder process.
Here's a tip for Confluence Brewery: The last time I went to Germany, I visited a city called Koblenz. Since the name means "confluence" in German and since it's located on the confluence of 2 rivers, I naturally assumed the city was either named after Confluence Brewery or had some kind of endorsement deal. Would you please go ahead and file a trademark dispute against the city for daring to use the word "confluence"? Using a different language doesn't mean they can get around trademark infringement.
It sounds like the AI is learning all right, but it's learning that more people click on fake news and entertainment than on real news. After all, which is more popular- the crazy story that everyone knows is false or the true, correct version of the story?
Like PaulT said above, how many people won't bother verifying the information? They'll scroll through the stories or click to read it, then move on to the next thing in their feed.
You say nothing is accomplished by using clip art? I think it's the opposite: everyone knows it's an advertisement for the Super Bowl, but NONE of the NFL logos or trademarks are used. Why can't the NFL figure out that any mention of the Super Bowl or the teams or even the logos is more advertising? Yes, I know they have licenses to protect, but still.
"That would be a hilarious system to see in place in an alternate fictional reality. If the residents are lucky it would result in people doing really weird stuff to get attention."
Actually, this is happening now. Why else are teenagers eating Tide Pods laundry detergent or doing any number of "challenges"? To post their video on YouTube and get attention.
Or was your comment sarcasm and I wasn't supposed to answer it? :)
A better comparison would be Puerto Rico. How should it be listed on a website drop-down list? Is it a separate country from the United States? Is it in the US, but a territory? Or should it be listed as a US state?
However, I don't see the US getting upset at a Chinese hotel chain for mis-labeling Puerto Rico. Then again, the US doesn't have the political history as China and Tibet or China and Taiwan.
I think YouTube should absolutely be a gate-keeper, and to play the devil's advocate, they should also remove any videos that are dangerous, stupid, or both.
Here's an example: the latest "stupid things teenagers do" is that teens are filming themselves eating Tide Pods (yes, laundry detergent) and then uploading the videos to YouTube so they can get their 10 seconds of fame. If YouTube had rules against stupid and dangerous videos, then teens wouldn't be able to upload these kinds of videos, and chances are good that most of them wouldn't eat Tide Pods to begin with. After all, many teens wouldn't do something stupid *unless* their friends were filming it.
This kind of rule would also de-monetize all the immature and stupid crap that passes for entertainment, including all the foreign animation that pops up in the "you might also like". Yes, there's the argument that what one person thinks is crap could make someone laugh for days, but this could probably be overcome.
I didn't watch the video because I want to keep my sanity, but does it cover the topic of: "I'm free to use any image I find on a Google Image search because there's no way those images are copyrighted"?
As I've said many, many times, there needs to be harsher penalties for lawyers that take cases like this, because: 1) They don't know copyright law well enough to know they don't have a case. 2) They DO know copyright law, but ignore it in favor of taking money from a client.
Either way, the penalty for filing a case like this needs to a bar-review of some kind, and if he gets enough reviews, then he need to be disbarred.
If encryption is really so bad, then why doesn't the FBI test this idea and lead by example: from now on, they should 100% unencrypted cellphones, e-mails, and other communications. If no data is stolen and no one loses anything, then we'll slowly roll it out to the rest of the country.
In some cases, the middlemen have deeper pockets. This is why people choose to sue Google or Facebook for user-generated content instead of actually going after the user or website that created the content.
And, yes, this is the idea behind Europe's "right to be forgotten": it's easier to ask Google to delist an offending website than it is to actually contact the website ask them to correct or update the content.
I know this is probably a fool's errand, but I would almost go on the legal offensive and claim "San Diego Comic Con" is more about pop culture than comic books, and therefore, can't own "comic con" since it's clearly not a "comic book convention".
Just look at the trailers, cast and crew panels, and sneak peeks for "Twilight", "Star Trek", "Star Wars", and "Avatar", none of which are comic books. And how about the announcement of exclusive toys for "Star Wars" at SDCC... when neither toys nor movies are comic books.
It would be like me owning a show called "San Diego Auto Show" and then suing "Salt Lake City Auto Show" because I think I own the trademark on "auto show"... even though most of the vehicles at my show are motorcycles, not automobiles.
What other tools do the police not know how to use?
Can we take this discussion up a level, so to speak?
If the police testified that they don't know how to use the drug testing equipment, is it safe to assume they don't know how to use other equipment? Then can we assume these police officer may not know how to use their gun to shoot accurately? Can we assume they may not know how to operate a patrol car properly? Okay, maybe driving a car is a bad example, but you know what I mean.
I'm surprised no one has brought up the word "truthiness" yet, Stephen Colbert's word for something that you think is probably true, even though there's no basis in fact.
Does Trump watch Gorilla TV? It sounds like it could be true. Do vaccines cause autism? Sure, why not- it's easier to believe than looking at the medical data. Was Obama born in Kenya? Well, he's black, so why not?
On the post: Right On Time: Kentucky Governor Lays The Blame For Florida School Shooting At The Feet Of Video Games
I know the facts don't matter, but...
1) Years ago (maybe 10 years) Penn & Teller's "Bullsh*t" show had an episode on gun violence. As a probably inhumane and unethical experiment, they found an 11 year-old who was an expert in the latest first-person-shooter and gave him a real machine.
After the kid fired a few rounds, he was a crying mess because he couldn't stand to shoot a real weapon.
Granted, this was one kid and it was hardly a scientific experiment, but the fact was that this kid was an expert in video games and it didn't translate into shooting a real gun.
2) I know the facts don't matter to people like the governor, but it would interesting if the video game industry itself put out some statistics to finally debunk the "let's blame video games" idiocy.
For example, how many millions of people have played Doom? Yet some people think it was the cause of the Columbine shooting because the shooters made a map of their high school within the game.
How many people have played Quake or Call of Duty or even Warcraft or Starcraft?
Yet some mass shooters maybe played a video game at some point, so the entire industry should be blamed? Really?
On the post: Facebook 'Security': A New VPN That's Spyware And Two-Factor Authentication That Spams You
Zero tolerance for "bug"
After all, Facebook literally has billions of users. Isn't it safe to assume they have all manner of testing, QA, beta testing, and alpha testing before any feature goes live?
Then who approved the idea to spam people using their two-factor authentication number? And then who approved posting their reply to their wall? I can easily see a programmer coming up with the idea, but team leads and managers are supposed to not allow these things. And where are the testers saying this isn't a good idea?
Or is this "bug" actually a feature passed down from higher management as yet another way to spy and track people?
On the post: German Court Says Facebook's Real Names Policy Violates Users' Privacy
Free users pay with data
- Forced to watch a 30 second commercial on YouTube before the video starts.
- Forced to watch an ad to continue playing a free game on your phone.
- Going to a Windows download site to get a driver, but having to guess which of the 5 download buttons will download the driver and which will download a toolbar or malware.
- Having to keep a sharp eye on software installers (such as Flash updates) that want to install toolbars or change your home page.
- Not to mention the usually irrelevant ads on places like Facebook and Pinterest.
All of these are considered annoyances and distractions, but we put up with them to get the free item or service.
On the post: Appeals Court: Handcuffing A Compliant Ten-Year-Old Is Unreasonable But Deputy Had No Way Of Knowing That
Where's the safety in handcuffing a child?
_According to onlookers, E.W. is a 10 year-old child with a child's level of fight-training, while Dolgos is a licensed law-enforcement officer who presumably has had training in martial arts and controlling suspects._
Yet this 10 year-old child was so dangerous that Dolgos had to put handcuffs on her?
I think Dolgos should be fired if she's that afraid of children. After all, what happens when she faces a real criminal with a weapon?
I can maybe, sort-of see putting the child in handcuffs to teach her a lesson, but then Dolgos shouldn't claim that she did it out of "safety for herself and school administrators".
On the post: Anti-Piracy Video Masquerades As Anti-Malware Education And Is Filled With Lies
Adblockers
How many times have we seen legitimate sites become the unwitting delivery system for malware simply because they use a "trusted" service like doubleclick?
Yet there's no mention that people can get infected this way?
And did the video talk about Flash ads that contain malware and that Flash should be disabled for safety?
On the post: Salon Offers To Remove Ads If Visitors Help Mine Cryptocurrency
Browsing the internet while rendering an image
I actually use my computer's processor to render images of digital models. This means the rendering software will take 80-85% of my CPU usage, usually for about an hour or two.
I use this time to browse the web and read interesting stories. I sometimes load up 5 or 6 tabs with stories to read just so Firefox doesn't have to load any pages, then I started rendering an image.
So what happens to people like me who are already using their processor? Will Salon work if its crypto-miner can't run any calculations because there's no free CPU cycles? Will I get a pop-up saying to free up more CPU or the site won't load the rest of the page?
On the post: Consumer Reports: Your 'Smart' TV Remains A Privacy & Security Dumpster Fire
Vendors don't care because customers don't care
For the most part, vendors don't care about privacy because customers don't care about privacy or security. And many customers don't care about privacy because they don't know any better.
How many people realize that the "Which Harry Potter character are you" quizzes at Facebook allow the quiz-company full access to their public profile, including posts and photos?
And how many people realize a "bad guy" can easily create one of these quizzes and then data-mine everyone who answers... right down to the person's street address, elementary school, and the name of their dog. In other words, the answers to many sites' "recover your password" security questions.
If people don't care about privacy and security on Facebook, then convincing them to care about their TV's is a much harder process.
On the post: Confluence Brewing Sues Confluence On 3rd, An Apartment Complex, For Trademark Infringement
Koblenz, Germany
The last time I went to Germany, I visited a city called Koblenz. Since the name means "confluence" in German and since it's located on the confluence of 2 rivers, I naturally assumed the city was either named after Confluence Brewery or had some kind of endorsement deal.
Would you please go ahead and file a trademark dispute against the city for daring to use the word "confluence"? Using a different language doesn't mean they can get around trademark infringement.
On the post: An English-Language, Algorithmically-Personalized News Aggregator, Based In China -- What Could Possibly Go Wrong?
Feature or bug?
Like PaulT said above, how many people won't bother verifying the information? They'll scroll through the stories or click to read it, then move on to the next thing in their feed.
On the post: The NFL Pretending Trademark Law Says Something It Doesn't Leads To Hilariously Amateurish Ads For 'The Big Game'
Nothing is accomplished?
Why can't the NFL figure out that any mention of the Super Bowl or the teams or even the logos is more advertising? Yes, I know they have licenses to protect, but still.
On the post: Rupert Murdoch Admits, Once Again, He Can't Make Money Online -- Begs Facebook To Just Give Him Money
Re: Re: What about the creators?
Actually, this is happening now. Why else are teenagers eating Tide Pods laundry detergent or doing any number of "challenges"? To post their video on YouTube and get attention.
Or was your comment sarcasm and I wasn't supposed to answer it? :)
On the post: Marriott Freezes Its Social Media Globally, And Makes Grovelling Apology To China, All For A Drop-Down Menu And Liking A Tweet
Re: Imagine in the U.S...
However, I don't see the US getting upset at a Chinese hotel chain for mis-labeling Puerto Rico. Then again, the US doesn't have the political history as China and Tibet or China and Taiwan.
On the post: The Constant Pressure For YouTube To Police 'Bad' Content Means That It's Becoming A Gatekeeper
Remove all dangerous and stupid videos
Here's an example: the latest "stupid things teenagers do" is that teens are filming themselves eating Tide Pods (yes, laundry detergent) and then uploading the videos to YouTube so they can get their 10 seconds of fame.
If YouTube had rules against stupid and dangerous videos, then teens wouldn't be able to upload these kinds of videos, and chances are good that most of them wouldn't eat Tide Pods to begin with. After all, many teens wouldn't do something stupid *unless* their friends were filming it.
This kind of rule would also de-monetize all the immature and stupid crap that passes for entertainment, including all the foreign animation that pops up in the "you might also like".
Yes, there's the argument that what one person thinks is crap could make someone laugh for days, but this could probably be overcome.
On the post: UK Begins Absolutely Bonkers 'Education' Of Grade Schoolers About Intellectual Property And Piracy
Does it talk about Google Image
On the post: EFF Tells Court That Boing Boing Linking To Playboy Images Is Not Infringement
Disbar lawyers who keep filing cases like this
1) They don't know copyright law well enough to know they don't have a case.
2) They DO know copyright law, but ignore it in favor of taking money from a client.
Either way, the penalty for filing a case like this needs to a bar-review of some kind, and if he gets enough reviews, then he need to be disbarred.
On the post: FBI Says Device Encryption Is 'Evil' And A Threat To Public Safety
Let the FBI test this idea
On the post: Appeals Court Drives Another Stake Into The Heart Of Idaho's 'Ag-Gag' Law
Re:
And, yes, this is the idea behind Europe's "right to be forgotten": it's easier to ask Google to delist an offending website than it is to actually contact the website ask them to correct or update the content.
On the post: The Other Side: Phoenix Comicon Proactively Changes Names To Avoid San Diego Comic-Con Bully
Is SDCC even a comic book convention any more?
Just look at the trailers, cast and crew panels, and sneak peeks for "Twilight", "Star Trek", "Star Wars", and "Avatar", none of which are comic books.
And how about the announcement of exclusive toys for "Star Wars" at SDCC... when neither toys nor movies are comic books.
It would be like me owning a show called "San Diego Auto Show" and then suing "Salt Lake City Auto Show" because I think I own the trademark on "auto show"... even though most of the vehicles at my show are motorcycles, not automobiles.
On the post: Jury Awards Couple No Damages For Bungled Marijuana Raid Predicated On Wet Tea Leaves
What other tools do the police not know how to use?
If the police testified that they don't know how to use the drug testing equipment, is it safe to assume they don't know how to use other equipment? Then can we assume these police officer may not know how to use their gun to shoot accurately? Can we assume they may not know how to operate a patrol car properly?
Okay, maybe driving a car is a bad example, but you know what I mean.
On the post: The Gorilla Channel Satire Demonstrates The Ridiculousness Of Banning Fake News
Truthiness
Does Trump watch Gorilla TV? It sounds like it could be true.
Do vaccines cause autism? Sure, why not- it's easier to believe than looking at the medical data.
Was Obama born in Kenya? Well, he's black, so why not?
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