nospacesorspecialcharacters (profile), 9 Jan 2013 @ 4:21am
This should be a Monty Python sketch!
"We advise anyone contacted in error to contact us so records can be updated. Where our records show that people are here illegally, it is vital we are able to contact them as we are determined that they should return home."
UKBA: Hello.
IMMIGRANT: Hello, I'd like to report an error in your records...
UKBA: Oh, I see, OK then what seems to be the problem?
IMMIGRANT: Well it's my immigration status - it's wrong...
UKBA: Wrong? Oh, so it's reporting that you're here illegally, is that the problem?
IMMIGRANT: No, it says I'm a legal immigrant, but it's wrong.
UKBA: How so?
IMMIGRANT: Well. I'm actually an illegal immigrant, but your system is wrong, it says I'm a legal immigrant, you see.
UKBA: Oh well, that's terrible. What an aweful inconvenience for you...
IMMIGRANT: Yes, there I was getting on with life in the UK and I realised I just wasn't receiving the level of suspicion and harassment that I was used to.
UKBA: Well let's see if we can fix that then shall we?
IMMIGRANT: Why thankyou very much!
UKBA: Of course, I fully understand [goes into back office for 2 minutes then returns with papers]. There we go, all fixed now, you are no longer a legal immigrant. Good luck!
IMMIGRANT: Thanks... err... aren't you going to deport me?
UKBA: What? Oh.. umm... well no, I can't. Not my department you see. We contract it out, so you'll have to wait till you receive a text message...
IMMIGRANT: A text message? A TEXT MESSAGE? This is blatently unfair treatment! I make the effort to come down here and get my illegal status fixed, and all you can do is send a text message.
UKBA: Now calm down...
IMMIGRANT: Calm down?! What about my human rights... I demand to be deported right now!
UKBA: Perhaps you'd like to take a seat and I'll talk to my manager and see what we can do.
IMMIGRANT: OK fine. [mutters] you just can't get the service these days...
UKBA [returns]: Hello, OK we can't deport you right now, but what we can do is have a policeman rough you up a bit. How does that sound?
IMMIGRANT: I suppose I'll have to settle for that for now. Bastards!
nospacesorspecialcharacters (profile), 9 Jan 2013 @ 1:51am
In a nutshell
This is what the debate over any free speech boils down to:
In other words, it's very possible that at some point in the future, majorities will come to hate rather than like the personal beliefs of minister Vallaud-Belkacem and Farago. And when that happens, when those majorities go to criminalize the views which minister Vallaud-Belkacem and Farago hold rather than condemn, they'll have no basis whatsoever for objecting, other than to say: "oh no, it's only fair to criminalize the ideas I hate, not the ones I like."
Like it or not, the people living in the current zeitgeist like to delude themselves that they've reached the pinnacle of enlightenment and thought. That the 'freedoms' they believe in are universally accepted and unchallenged - that their children and their children's children will continue to hold their views.
The reality is that the world is still very full of prejudice, hate and backwards thinking that the children of tomorrow will look back on, shaking their heads...
"How could the people of the early 21st Century have been so ignorant and stupid about [insert future socially-accepted-moral-value-that-is-probably-currently-outlawed]?"
I've got a feeling that there are a number of things we find perfectly acceptable today - are going to be considered morally repugnant by future generations. Likewise, many things we find morally repugnant now, will become the 'freedoms' that future generations will enjoy and defend as righteous causes.
nospacesorspecialcharacters (profile), 8 Jan 2013 @ 8:42am
Financial Incentive
Thank goodness that Bob Dylan wrote those songs almost 50 years ago knowing that the copyright term was going to be extended last year - otherwise he wouldn't have had the incentive to write and perform them.
Just think, we wouldn't have had those songs if copyright was not extended for another 20 years in 2011!
nospacesorspecialcharacters (profile), 7 Jan 2013 @ 8:16am
Re: Re: Poor quality writing on techdirt.
Going by the description and examples in the link you provided, I'd say it's "affect" - as it's describing an influence on our emotional state, rather than a result of the reaction.
nospacesorspecialcharacters (profile), 7 Jan 2013 @ 8:08am
Racist or just having fun with differences?
I haven't seen the apps in question so I may be coming from a position of ignorance here - but going by the descriptions given, how are these racist?
Comedians like Lenny Henry dress up as different races all the time, a number of Hollywood movies (of varying success) have done the same thing for laughs - Soul Man, White Chicks.
I just can't see an app that changes your facial features to see how you would look as another race being offensive.
To me it would be fun to see how I look - I've already had a go at making myself Old, Fat, Zombie, Ghost... unless they're using insensitive/offensive words to describe the race, I'm lost here.
nospacesorspecialcharacters (profile), 7 Jan 2013 @ 4:50am
Re: Re:
The same reason other companies have a trademark on such common words as Windows, Apple, Eat, Olympic, Amazon, Gap, Virgin etc...
Because the majority of the world believes abstract concepts and ideas can be owned and protected, that's why.
It's getting worse because courts are losing sight of the fact that trademarks exist (unlike copyright and patents) to protect consumers, not corporate brands.
nospacesorspecialcharacters (profile), 4 Jan 2013 @ 4:55am
Tim, Tim, Tim...
You've got it all wrong! Sony is the good guy here.
By attempting to file a patent on this technology, they're trying to prevent anyone from actually inventing and implementing it. That's the whole purpose of patents, is it not?
Here's to more patents on DRM technologies - please keep filing them!
nospacesorspecialcharacters (profile), 4 Jan 2013 @ 4:47am
Is there any point to ratings agencies?
Is it just me or are ratings systems just a get-out for lazy parenting?
Personally I'd prefer to see the reverse enforcement - everything is available and select products should have a label that simply states "Certified safe for Kids and/or Teens".
I mean, the standards of ratings agencies have fallen in line with changes in culture (some 12A rated movies would have been 15/18 20 to 30 years ago), which kind of makes them arbitrary to me, and hypocritical in trying to assert any moral meaning.
Ironically my parents ignored any ratings and let me watch whatever I wanted apart from The Exorcist because my mum believed it screwed people up. I loved watching horror movies as a kid, when I finally got to see The Exorcist, I was left disappointed that it wasn't really as scary or mind-altering as my mum hyped it to be.
Ratings are a waste of time. The parents who want them are too lazy to engage with or monitor their kids exposure to media, and then the parents who ignore them it has no effect on anyway.
Has Australia banned the Bible? There's far more sex, violence, gore, incest, murder, blasphemy, curses and rape in it than any videogame currently on the market.
nospacesorspecialcharacters (profile), 3 Jan 2013 @ 8:33am
Re:
It's somewhat ironic, but knowledge of the Streisand Effect has still not successfully managed to permeate mainstream consciousness and thus prevent unfortunate incidents like this.
Perhaps someone needs to attempt a DMCA takedown of the Wikipedia article in order to get it more attention?
nospacesorspecialcharacters (profile), 14 Dec 2012 @ 7:36am
It's about choice, not being the first result...
I think those trying to strike a parallel to the monopoly abuse by Microsoft over bundling its browser are missing a fairly crucial bit of evidence in the bundling. Microsoft bundled IE for free and did not include alternative browsers in its preinstalled OS. Google, by its very nature wouldn't exist if it didn't include search results for competing services... You could say its main function in search is to offer as many alternatives as possible.
The problem is when you list results, a list, by definition, will contain a first result. Otherwise it wouldn't be a very useful list... You would have to code the page to just throw words and links at the searcher... it wouldn't be a very popular search engine.
And this is where the fight is. To be top of the search results. Somehow, competing vertical search engines feel that it is their privileged entitlement to be top of the list of results. They also think that Google's own algorithm should be weighted towards their own site, despite the fact the algorithm is the core of Google's search and not a democratic voting process or a contract.
It's like saying Microsoft shouldn't just offer alternative browsers, it should cripple it's own browser and run Firefox when you click on the IE icon.
Finally it does come down to convenience and effect on the user. IE was not an easy thing to disable or uninstall, it was made a core part of the OS. Google search on the other hand can be "uninstalled" as fast as it can take you to type in another URL. You are free to click on an advertisement, the Google service, the top result or a result further down the page on Google's "platform".
I'd much more prefer to see the FTC take on Microsoft on the bundling of its OS with hardware, it's skulduggery over secure boot and it's patent trolling over Linux.
nospacesorspecialcharacters (profile), 14 Dec 2012 @ 6:49am
There seems to be a real cognitive dissonance in some strains of the security theatre community in that there's a literalist approach to security.
Nowhere is this more obvious than this idea that terrorists would simply announce themselves and their intentions on social media.*
@achmed_the_terrorist 12:04: Here is a picture of my kitten.
@achmed_the_terrorist 12:31: Sausages and mash for lunch, mmm...
@achmed_the_terrorist 13:23: Thinking about bombing Elbownian embassy
Did the terrorists need Twitter or Facebook to plan the 9/11 attacks? Did the CIA get their intel from MySpace when they warned the Bush administration of an imminent attack on 22 June 2001?
No the terrorists organised the same way armies, freedom fighters and insurgents have organised for thousands of years before them.
How WW2 would have been won if America led the war front I do not know. Rather than try and crack secret messages, they would have just accepted them as innocent love letters and gibberish, whilst looking for the real enemy messages broadcast in clear understandable English.
*Unless your redefining terrorism to include speech that is critical of your endless war.
nospacesorspecialcharacters (profile), 8 Dec 2012 @ 5:53am
Re: Re:
Wow! Yes, that I'd definitely a conversation worth having and I like the comparison to Photoshop. In fact I think I'll be using that in future conversations on the topic of copyright and also fair use!
On the post: There Is No End In Sight For The Self-Perpetuating 'War On Terror'
Re: The slippery slope of big power applies both ways.
"See, there's three kinds of people: dicks, pussies, and assholes."
Team America World Police - Fuck Yeah!
On the post: There Is No End In Sight For The Self-Perpetuating 'War On Terror'
Re: Re:
Have you even read 1984? "We are at war against Eurasia, we have always been at war with Eurasia."
So tell me, what is your definition of terror, and then explain to me how would you conceive an end of a war against terror?
On the post: There Is No End In Sight For The Self-Perpetuating 'War On Terror'
Re: The project for a new American Century
http://xkcd.com/1013/
On the post: UK Border Agency Spends Christmas Sending Texts Telling Legal Immigrants To Leave The Country
This should be a Monty Python sketch!
UKBA: Hello.
IMMIGRANT: Hello, I'd like to report an error in your records...
UKBA: Oh, I see, OK then what seems to be the problem?
IMMIGRANT: Well it's my immigration status - it's wrong...
UKBA: Wrong? Oh, so it's reporting that you're here illegally, is that the problem?
IMMIGRANT: No, it says I'm a legal immigrant, but it's wrong.
UKBA: How so?
IMMIGRANT: Well. I'm actually an illegal immigrant, but your system is wrong, it says I'm a legal immigrant, you see.
UKBA: Oh well, that's terrible. What an aweful inconvenience for you...
IMMIGRANT: Yes, there I was getting on with life in the UK and I realised I just wasn't receiving the level of suspicion and harassment that I was used to.
UKBA: Well let's see if we can fix that then shall we?
IMMIGRANT: Why thankyou very much!
UKBA: Of course, I fully understand [goes into back office for 2 minutes then returns with papers]. There we go, all fixed now, you are no longer a legal immigrant. Good luck!
IMMIGRANT: Thanks... err... aren't you going to deport me?
UKBA: What? Oh.. umm... well no, I can't. Not my department you see. We contract it out, so you'll have to wait till you receive a text message...
IMMIGRANT: A text message? A TEXT MESSAGE? This is blatently unfair treatment! I make the effort to come down here and get my illegal status fixed, and all you can do is send a text message.
UKBA: Now calm down...
IMMIGRANT: Calm down?! What about my human rights... I demand to be deported right now!
UKBA: Perhaps you'd like to take a seat and I'll talk to my manager and see what we can do.
IMMIGRANT: OK fine. [mutters] you just can't get the service these days...
UKBA [returns]: Hello, OK we can't deport you right now, but what we can do is have a policeman rough you up a bit. How does that sound?
IMMIGRANT: I suppose I'll have to settle for that for now. Bastards!
UKBA: Right... Officer...!
Immigrant: Ouch! You bastard!
On the post: Journalists Cheering On Censorship Is A Form Of Hate Speech
In a nutshell
Like it or not, the people living in the current zeitgeist like to delude themselves that they've reached the pinnacle of enlightenment and thought. That the 'freedoms' they believe in are universally accepted and unchallenged - that their children and their children's children will continue to hold their views.
The reality is that the world is still very full of prejudice, hate and backwards thinking that the children of tomorrow will look back on, shaking their heads...
I've got a feeling that there are a number of things we find perfectly acceptable today - are going to be considered morally repugnant by future generations. Likewise, many things we find morally repugnant now, will become the 'freedoms' that future generations will enjoy and defend as righteous causes.
On the post: Sony Issues The 'Bob Dylan Copyright Collection Volume' Solely To Extend Copyright On Dylan's Work
Financial Incentive
Just think, we wouldn't have had those songs if copyright was not extended for another 20 years in 2011!
On the post: Racist Apps In Google's Play Store Test Just How Free You Want Speech To Be
Re: Re: Poor quality writing on techdirt.
On the post: Racist Apps In Google's Play Store Test Just How Free You Want Speech To Be
Racist or just having fun with differences?
Comedians like Lenny Henry dress up as different races all the time, a number of Hollywood movies (of varying success) have done the same thing for laughs - Soul Man, White Chicks.
I just can't see an app that changes your facial features to see how you would look as another race being offensive.
To me it would be fun to see how I look - I've already had a go at making myself Old, Fat, Zombie, Ghost... unless they're using insensitive/offensive words to describe the race, I'm lost here.
On the post: Danish Court Orders Spanish Site Blocked Because It Uses Trademarked English Word 'Home' As Part Of Its Name
Re: Re: Re: Re:
On the post: Confusing Value And Price, Choir Demands £3000 Per Download
Study it out!
Bargain, I'd say.
On the post: Danish Court Orders Spanish Site Blocked Because It Uses Trademarked English Word 'Home' As Part Of Its Name
Re: Re:
Because the majority of the world believes abstract concepts and ideas can be owned and protected, that's why.
It's getting worse because courts are losing sight of the fact that trademarks exist (unlike copyright and patents) to protect consumers, not corporate brands.
On the post: Sony Patent Application Takes On Used Game Sales, Piracy With Embedded RFID Chips In Game Discs
Tim, Tim, Tim...
By attempting to file a patent on this technology, they're trying to prevent anyone from actually inventing and implementing it. That's the whole purpose of patents, is it not?
Here's to more patents on DRM technologies - please keep filing them!
On the post: Australian Government Finally Begins Treating Gamers Like Adults; Approves New 'R18+' Rating
Is there any point to ratings agencies?
Personally I'd prefer to see the reverse enforcement - everything is available and select products should have a label that simply states "Certified safe for Kids and/or Teens".
I mean, the standards of ratings agencies have fallen in line with changes in culture (some 12A rated movies would have been 15/18 20 to 30 years ago), which kind of makes them arbitrary to me, and hypocritical in trying to assert any moral meaning.
Ironically my parents ignored any ratings and let me watch whatever I wanted apart from The Exorcist because my mum believed it screwed people up. I loved watching horror movies as a kid, when I finally got to see The Exorcist, I was left disappointed that it wasn't really as scary or mind-altering as my mum hyped it to be.
Ratings are a waste of time. The parents who want them are too lazy to engage with or monitor their kids exposure to media, and then the parents who ignore them it has no effect on anyway.
Has Australia banned the Bible? There's far more sex, violence, gore, incest, murder, blasphemy, curses and rape in it than any videogame currently on the market.
On the post: Blowback From Publication Of Gun Owner Data Continues -- Threats, Lawsuits And Rejected FOIA Requests
Re: The paper is clearly using the information to instigate hate crimes.
On the post: Virginia Supreme Court Says Court Was Wrong To Force Woman To Change Yelp Review
Re:
Perhaps someone needs to attempt a DMCA takedown of the Wikipedia article in order to get it more attention?
On the post: Amazon Pulls Down Memoir Because Cover Mentions 'Star Wars'
I hope they got permission...
In fact, I hope Pirate Mike manage to get permission from "Amazon" (trademarked term) to mention them in his post.
On the post: FTC Now Likely To Admit That Google Does Not, In Fact, Violate Antitrust
It's about choice, not being the first result...
The problem is when you list results, a list, by definition, will contain a first result. Otherwise it wouldn't be a very useful list... You would have to code the page to just throw words and links at the searcher... it wouldn't be a very popular search engine.
And this is where the fight is. To be top of the search results. Somehow, competing vertical search engines feel that it is their privileged entitlement to be top of the list of results. They also think that Google's own algorithm should be weighted towards their own site, despite the fact the algorithm is the core of Google's search and not a democratic voting process or a contract.
It's like saying Microsoft shouldn't just offer alternative browsers, it should cripple it's own browser and run Firefox when you click on the IE icon.
Finally it does come down to convenience and effect on the user. IE was not an easy thing to disable or uninstall, it was made a core part of the OS. Google search on the other hand can be "uninstalled" as fast as it can take you to type in another URL. You are free to click on an advertisement, the Google service, the top result or a result further down the page on Google's "platform".
I'd much more prefer to see the FTC take on Microsoft on the bundling of its OS with hardware, it's skulduggery over secure boot and it's patent trolling over Linux.
On the post: Who Knew? Apparently Censoring Terrorists From Using Social Media Doesn't Suddenly Make Them Love Us
Nowhere is this more obvious than this idea that terrorists would simply announce themselves and their intentions on social media.*
Did the terrorists need Twitter or Facebook to plan the 9/11 attacks? Did the CIA get their intel from MySpace when they warned the Bush administration of an imminent attack on 22 June 2001?
No the terrorists organised the same way armies, freedom fighters and insurgents have organised for thousands of years before them.
How WW2 would have been won if America led the war front I do not know. Rather than try and crack secret messages, they would have just accepted them as innocent love letters and gibberish, whilst looking for the real enemy messages broadcast in clear understandable English.
*Unless your redefining terrorism to include speech that is critical of your endless war.
On the post: Belgian Newspapers Agree To Drop Lawsuit Over Google News After Google Promises To Show Them How To Make Money Online
Re: We used to not feed the trolls
I've noticed this too.
On the post: Sega Goes Nuclear On YouTube Videos Of Old Shining Force Game
Re: Re:
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