It's another part of the problem here. The FCC shiouldn't be making law, they should be applying it. Net Neutrality fails because, in no small part, it was something dreamed up and codified by the wrong people. When it's not an act of congress, it's just something that can be added and taken away at the will of the chairman.
Without something codified in law, it's all slippery and short term. The victory in creating net neutrality rules is easily lost because the rule was made by a chairman who is long gone. It wasn't the law, just his opinion.
It should be pointed out that had net neutrality actually gone fully into force, it's very likely that one or more ISPs would have taken the whole mess to court and the FCC quite possibly would lose.
If you want change, get your congress critters to pass laws that make sense. Notice Wyden isn't exactly tripping over himself to introduce the Final Universal Net Neutrality (FUNN) act? Even he knows this isn't going to work out.
Actually, here's the rub: net neutrality would actually harm Netflix business.
Netflix is a network hog. in prime rime (6pm to 10om local) it accounts for more than a third of all network traffic for most US ISPs now. It moves hard files on an 1 to 1 basis (1 file, 1 user, no "broadcast" methods available) and it really loads down the network and the peering points.
What the ISPs were asking for was payment to add more peering than they otherwise need without netflix.
Now, with net neutrality, Netflix cannot make such a deal anymore, and they would be subject to whatever limits exist based on what connections the ISP has.
Most important: As the ISPs are often cable companies with programming packages to sell, they have little interest in paying out a whole bunch extra to increase their peering to support Netflix. So they can subtly control how well Netflix can do while at the same time not at all violating the idea of net neutrality.
I am not claiming Zazzle anything. I am creating a simpler parallel so that people can understand it without any extra clutter in the way.
The point is that a copyright image does not suddenly lose it's copyright because it's been through the online wash. It's not magic. It's clear as clear can be. DMCA does not apply to meat world uses of copyright material.
There is so many strawmen in this post that it's like a bad night at the farm. But I will hit this one:
"Techdirt only exists because of the open internet. When I set it up almost 20 years ago, I didn't have to go and get permission."
Nobody (repeat nobody) will make you ask permission to run a website in the future either. ISPs make their money selling access to the internet, and they will continue to do so. They didn't need net neutrality to do it before, and they won't need it to do it in the future.
The first ISP that starts dropping or blocking websites en mass will be creating the perfect storm for competition. They would make it impossible for any sane politician to protect them or block competition at that point. It would be suicide.
Your point is pure strawman. Nobody is planning to make you ask permission to be on the internet.
Oh and before any goes off, I support the true idea of net neutrality, which could be best achieved by requiring ALL ISPS and all service providers to use their party interchanges. No direct deals, no direct peering, everything through third party peers. Net Neutrality as it stood was a crock, as Netflix, Google, and Facebook have all moved to bypass the internet by setting up their own private peering with ISPs. They don't pay for connectivity, but they give it away for free, and ISPs would be stupid to reject it. It's free bandwidth, and under net neutrality would be perfectly legal and acceptable. To the rich go the best connections, does that seem neutral?
Yes, and it makes sense that they should be liable. They have all the potential to stop infringement before it starts.
The problem you face here is that Zazzle enters into a defacto partnership with the shirt's "creator". That partnership puts them in a different category from say a "printer for hire". Zazzle takes care of all of the fulfillment, payments, and such, and pays a commission on the sale to the creator. That makes them the "publisher" if you will, and not just an innocent third party.
"How much time, money, and manpower must Zazzle dedicate to either preventing infringement or policing user uploads for potential infringement?"
Actually none. They only have to worry when they enter into a partnership to actually print them onto shirts and things. Then they have real world problems that any partnership would have.
Section 230 protections are exactly that: They don't have to remove anything, they cannot be forced to remove anything short of a court order, and that court order will only come if Karl goes to court and gets an order against the person who posted it.
The problem? Section 230 pops up again and says "and the FCC doesn't have to provide details of the user who posted". So now Karl can't even go to court to get an injunction because he can't get one against the FCC, they didn't post it.
This, of course, is all in keeping with everything discussed here on Techdirt.
As for parody, that is subject for a court of law. Of course, that would require that Karl first jump over all the ection 230 hurdles in his way, which might take a while. *snicker*
I don't support defamatory statements. Stop trying to twist my words. I don't care about the message as posted one way or the other - only pointing out that it's legally about impossible for Karl to get rid of it because of all of the things Techdirt supports.
Nice try through. You guys really can't handle when the shit lands on your side, can you?
I agree too. DMCA is "digital" once you move an image into the physical world (printing it) it becomes subject to all the other normal copyright laws that don't have a "take back" like DMCA.
You just have to think it through. Imagine for a minute that you want to print T-shirts with copyright images of rappers and rock stars on them. Since you can't use the copyright images directly, legally, do you think it would be acceptable to (a) ask a friend to upload them to a file sharing site, and then (b) download them and use them to print shirts? Do you honestly think the images on the shirts would suddenly not be subject to copyright?
DMCA creates a crater size exception in copyright related only to things in the digital realm. It isn't a magic copyright eraser, nor does it negate the need to secure rights before re-using the image.
Court got it exactly right, perfectly balancing it.
No backing away, far from that. Rather, trying to correct your misunderstanding that laughing at someone from Techdirt suffering under section 230 means I somehow support it.
Section 230 also means that they are under no obligation to remove the content short of a full court order, and moreover, they have no obligation to proving information on the person posting them either, so getting that court order would be all but impossible.
Parody is a wide concept. Making fun of someone's extreme position by taking the opposite is pretty much classic parody. You have to remember that part of the humor in all of this is how quickly Techdirt tends to excuse almost everything as parody.
Techdirt has a laundry list to excuse almost anything, so I am just applying them, and laughing when Karl finds himself locked in a legal dead end with pretty much no way to make it right. So yeah, it's a gotcha, which is the type of story Techdirt loves!
You don't think that the people posting to the FCC are sort of a self-selecting group? Nobody is specifically anti net neutrality, at least not as a theory. In practice, it may end up driving up prices and take away some of the impetus to build out the networks longer term, but in theory, it sounds all nice.
So the only ones like to be against it publicly are the telecom companies. None of them appear to have any interest in being a dead end utility company with no chance to have value added services or product differentiation.
So yes, of course 90% will "support"... even if they have no clue what they are supporting.
"Polls indicate the majority of consumers do support net neutrality protections."
See, this is where you make a mistake and miss the point. ifyou ask people "do you support net neutrality" the majority say "yes". You are correct. Pat on the head.
The point is that most of them don't appear to know what net neutrality actually means! In many discussions I have read, it's people thinking that usage caps will go away and the internet will turn into an even bigger free lunch. They have no clue what it means in reality.
So asking them the buzz word, they say yes. Asking them what the buzz words mean gets you random answers. So are they actually supporting net neutrality, or just the buzz word.
I think you are too biased to hating on the telecoms to care.
"The reality is a bipartisan majority of Americans support net neutrality protections because they are very familiar with the anti-competitive behavior of giant companies"
Based on what I have read on various discussion groups online, the vast majority of Americans have no real clue what net neutrality really means. Most of them seem to think it means their ISP will have to drop usage caps, from what I could see.
So I think your closing statement is rather biased and based on nothing more than your personal hatred for these companies. Stuff like that makes the rest of your post suspect.
Yes, but section 230 means that (a) the FCC has no obligation to remove the comments from public view, and (b) the FCC normally should deny and refuse to provide any information that could lead to tracking down the source. After all, it's a form of free speech (parody).
No, not on the record as supporting it. Just laughing at Karl suddenly having to face the reality of a law that is entirely stacked against someone put in his position.
Parody is one of those things. Considering how strident Karl is on one side of the situation, posting as him on the other side is pretty much a parody of his position. Again, I am mostly getting a chuckle out of using all of the excuses typically used around her to excuse all sorts of things you like, just to show you how it works when you are on the other side of the situation.
My opinions remain unchanged: Section 230 is over broad, prior restraint shouldn't apply to unprotected speed, and parody is in the eye of the beholder.
The point is with section 230 at play, the FCC has absolutely no responsibility because they are just an "innocent host" and nothing more. They didn't make the post. Moreover, they are under no obligation to provide information related to whoever might have made the post.
Basically, the things that Techdirt so proudly stand for have bitten Karl in the ass.
Oh Karl, you have been bitten by section 230. The FCC has no obligation to remove the comments or to provide you any information regarding the poster. That is the nature of section 230 and websites.
Also, consider that the comments made under your name may be a parody protected by the first amendment. Having them removed and blocking any future posting might be prior restaint. You certainly wouldn't want that to happen.
Bottom line: Suck it up, buttercup. Enjoy your free speech, someone else clearly did!
Of course, if you also did a study of "how many American households live at least 20 miles from a major center" you would find that it's remarkably going to come up to something like 50 million.
If you want to live in the sticks, you have to pay the price somewhere. There really isn't any money in dragging the internet to houses 20 miles out of town a mile or more apart, and there certainly isn't enough money in it for two or more companies to do the same.
You want to live low density, you get low density problems.
Still not feeling it. Your objections seem entirely based on the theory that adding support for any extension in the HTML5 standards is a bad idea.
The truth is you consider DRM to be some sort of death sentence for the internet. Yet, I haven't seen or read anything here that explains it. Rather than going off on a soft of general "DRM sucks" rant, can you perhaps explain what specifically you think is suddenly going to break if DRM is (optionally) available to be supported in the HTML5 standards, no different from a whatever is currently replacing flash?
If you are worried about exploits, don't use the internet. The amount of code you have to use just to view this page, there is likely some bug in there somewhere that could delete your entire hard drive!
Seriously, a single framework is generally a whole lot better than piecemeal creation and re-creation of unchecked and untested individual hacks to get DRM to "work". By your logic, everything beyond the basic html 1.0 tags is too exotic and risky to use.
To use the techdirt phrase, you appear to be freaking out over DRM.
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Answer me this (everyone except Thad)
Actually, what is funny here is that you guys seem to be confusing a single DRM with a DRM framework. The framework itself isn't going to be some state secret.
Interesting effect of streaming sites though is that people don't tend to download the content, which means they can't as easily re-share it with strangers.
Streaming is also a way easier target to take down, as it always depends on someone with a server somewhere actually serving the stuff. Unlike P2P, the root source of the stream can almost always be traced down. That is why most of them have been hiding in haven countries, such as Spain. Now Spain isn't interested in being that idiot anymore, so streaming sites are being shut down.
it's sort of like what has happened with Roku boxes - as soon as someone shows up and starts applying a little heat, the guys who were profiteering off of other people's work quickly disappear.
On the post: If You Want To Protect The Internet, Look To Congress
Re: Isnt?
Without something codified in law, it's all slippery and short term. The victory in creating net neutrality rules is easily lost because the rule was made by a chairman who is long gone. It wasn't the law, just his opinion.
It should be pointed out that had net neutrality actually gone fully into force, it's very likely that one or more ISPs would have taken the whole mess to court and the FCC quite possibly would lose.
If you want change, get your congress critters to pass laws that make sense. Notice Wyden isn't exactly tripping over himself to introduce the Final Universal Net Neutrality (FUNN) act? Even he knows this isn't going to work out.
On the post: If You Want To Protect The Internet, Look To Congress
Re: Re: Calling BS
Netflix is a network hog. in prime rime (6pm to 10om local) it accounts for more than a third of all network traffic for most US ISPs now. It moves hard files on an 1 to 1 basis (1 file, 1 user, no "broadcast" methods available) and it really loads down the network and the peering points.
What the ISPs were asking for was payment to add more peering than they otherwise need without netflix.
Now, with net neutrality, Netflix cannot make such a deal anymore, and they would be subject to whatever limits exist based on what connections the ISP has.
Most important: As the ISPs are often cable companies with programming packages to sell, they have little interest in paying out a whole bunch extra to increase their peering to support Netflix. So they can subtly control how well Netflix can do while at the same time not at all violating the idea of net neutrality.
On the post: Court Says DMCA Safe Harbors Disappear Once Infringing Images Are Printed On Physical Items
Re: Re: Re:
The point is that a copyright image does not suddenly lose it's copyright because it's been through the online wash. It's not magic. It's clear as clear can be. DMCA does not apply to meat world uses of copyright material.
On the post: If You Want To Protect The Internet, Look To Congress
Calling BS
"Techdirt only exists because of the open internet. When I set it up almost 20 years ago, I didn't have to go and get permission."
Nobody (repeat nobody) will make you ask permission to run a website in the future either. ISPs make their money selling access to the internet, and they will continue to do so. They didn't need net neutrality to do it before, and they won't need it to do it in the future.
The first ISP that starts dropping or blocking websites en mass will be creating the perfect storm for competition. They would make it impossible for any sane politician to protect them or block competition at that point. It would be suicide.
Your point is pure strawman. Nobody is planning to make you ask permission to be on the internet.
Oh and before any goes off, I support the true idea of net neutrality, which could be best achieved by requiring ALL ISPS and all service providers to use their party interchanges. No direct deals, no direct peering, everything through third party peers. Net Neutrality as it stood was a crock, as Netflix, Google, and Facebook have all moved to bypass the internet by setting up their own private peering with ISPs. They don't pay for connectivity, but they give it away for free, and ISPs would be stupid to reject it. It's free bandwidth, and under net neutrality would be perfectly legal and acceptable. To the rich go the best connections, does that seem neutral?
On the post: Court Says DMCA Safe Harbors Disappear Once Infringing Images Are Printed On Physical Items
Re: Re: Re:
The problem you face here is that Zazzle enters into a defacto partnership with the shirt's "creator". That partnership puts them in a different category from say a "printer for hire". Zazzle takes care of all of the fulfillment, payments, and such, and pays a commission on the sale to the creator. That makes them the "publisher" if you will, and not just an innocent third party.
"How much time, money, and manpower must Zazzle dedicate to either preventing infringement or policing user uploads for potential infringement?"
Actually none. They only have to worry when they enter into a partnership to actually print them onto shirts and things. Then they have real world problems that any partnership would have.
On the post: The FCC Insists It Can't Stop Impostors From Lying About My Views On Net Neutrality
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Good to know
The problem? Section 230 pops up again and says "and the FCC doesn't have to provide details of the user who posted". So now Karl can't even go to court to get an injunction because he can't get one against the FCC, they didn't post it.
This, of course, is all in keeping with everything discussed here on Techdirt.
As for parody, that is subject for a court of law. Of course, that would require that Karl first jump over all the ection 230 hurdles in his way, which might take a while. *snicker*
I don't support defamatory statements. Stop trying to twist my words. I don't care about the message as posted one way or the other - only pointing out that it's legally about impossible for Karl to get rid of it because of all of the things Techdirt supports.
Nice try through. You guys really can't handle when the shit lands on your side, can you?
On the post: Court Says DMCA Safe Harbors Disappear Once Infringing Images Are Printed On Physical Items
Re:
You just have to think it through. Imagine for a minute that you want to print T-shirts with copyright images of rappers and rock stars on them. Since you can't use the copyright images directly, legally, do you think it would be acceptable to (a) ask a friend to upload them to a file sharing site, and then (b) download them and use them to print shirts? Do you honestly think the images on the shirts would suddenly not be subject to copyright?
DMCA creates a crater size exception in copyright related only to things in the digital realm. It isn't a magic copyright eraser, nor does it negate the need to secure rights before re-using the image.
Court got it exactly right, perfectly balancing it.
On the post: The FCC Insists It Can't Stop Impostors From Lying About My Views On Net Neutrality
Re: Re: Re: Good to know
Section 230 also means that they are under no obligation to remove the content short of a full court order, and moreover, they have no obligation to proving information on the person posting them either, so getting that court order would be all but impossible.
Parody is a wide concept. Making fun of someone's extreme position by taking the opposite is pretty much classic parody. You have to remember that part of the humor in all of this is how quickly Techdirt tends to excuse almost everything as parody.
Techdirt has a laundry list to excuse almost anything, so I am just applying them, and laughing when Karl finds himself locked in a legal dead end with pretty much no way to make it right. So yeah, it's a gotcha, which is the type of story Techdirt loves!
On the post: Telecom Industry Feebly Tries To Deflate Net Neutrality Protest With Its Own, Lame 'Unlock The Net' Think Tank Campaign
Re: Re:
So the only ones like to be against it publicly are the telecom companies. None of them appear to have any interest in being a dead end utility company with no chance to have value added services or product differentiation.
So yes, of course 90% will "support"... even if they have no clue what they are supporting.
On the post: Telecom Industry Feebly Tries To Deflate Net Neutrality Protest With Its Own, Lame 'Unlock The Net' Think Tank Campaign
Re: Re:
See, this is where you make a mistake and miss the point. ifyou ask people "do you support net neutrality" the majority say "yes". You are correct. Pat on the head.
The point is that most of them don't appear to know what net neutrality actually means! In many discussions I have read, it's people thinking that usage caps will go away and the internet will turn into an even bigger free lunch. They have no clue what it means in reality.
So asking them the buzz word, they say yes. Asking them what the buzz words mean gets you random answers. So are they actually supporting net neutrality, or just the buzz word.
I think you are too biased to hating on the telecoms to care.
On the post: Telecom Industry Feebly Tries To Deflate Net Neutrality Protest With Its Own, Lame 'Unlock The Net' Think Tank Campaign
Based on what I have read on various discussion groups online, the vast majority of Americans have no real clue what net neutrality really means. Most of them seem to think it means their ISP will have to drop usage caps, from what I could see.
So I think your closing statement is rather biased and based on nothing more than your personal hatred for these companies. Stuff like that makes the rest of your post suspect.
On the post: The FCC Insists It Can't Stop Impostors From Lying About My Views On Net Neutrality
Re: Re: Re: Re: Section 230
On the post: The FCC Insists It Can't Stop Impostors From Lying About My Views On Net Neutrality
Re: Good to know
Parody is one of those things. Considering how strident Karl is on one side of the situation, posting as him on the other side is pretty much a parody of his position. Again, I am mostly getting a chuckle out of using all of the excuses typically used around her to excuse all sorts of things you like, just to show you how it works when you are on the other side of the situation.
My opinions remain unchanged: Section 230 is over broad, prior restraint shouldn't apply to unprotected speed, and parody is in the eye of the beholder.
On the post: The FCC Insists It Can't Stop Impostors From Lying About My Views On Net Neutrality
Re: Re: Section 230
Basically, the things that Techdirt so proudly stand for have bitten Karl in the ass.
On the post: The FCC Insists It Can't Stop Impostors From Lying About My Views On Net Neutrality
Section 230
Also, consider that the comments made under your name may be a parody protected by the first amendment. Having them removed and blocking any future posting might be prior restaint. You certainly wouldn't want that to happen.
Bottom line: Suck it up, buttercup. Enjoy your free speech, someone else clearly did!
On the post: 50 Million US Homes Can't Get 25 Mbps From More Than One ISP
Numbers game
If you want to live in the sticks, you have to pay the price somewhere. There really isn't any money in dragging the internet to houses 20 miles out of town a mile or more apart, and there certainly isn't enough money in it for two or more companies to do the same.
You want to live low density, you get low density problems.
On the post: Tim Berners-Lee Sells Out His Creation: Officially Supports DRM In HTML
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Answer me this (everyone except Thad)
The truth is you consider DRM to be some sort of death sentence for the internet. Yet, I haven't seen or read anything here that explains it. Rather than going off on a soft of general "DRM sucks" rant, can you perhaps explain what specifically you think is suddenly going to break if DRM is (optionally) available to be supported in the HTML5 standards, no different from a whatever is currently replacing flash?
On the post: Tim Berners-Lee Sells Out His Creation: Officially Supports DRM In HTML
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Answer me this (everyone except Thad)
Seriously, a single framework is generally a whole lot better than piecemeal creation and re-creation of unchecked and untested individual hacks to get DRM to "work". By your logic, everything beyond the basic html 1.0 tags is too exotic and risky to use.
To use the techdirt phrase, you appear to be freaking out over DRM.
On the post: Tim Berners-Lee Sells Out His Creation: Officially Supports DRM In HTML
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Answer me this (everyone except Thad)
On the post: Study: Dutch Piracy Rates In Free Fall Due Mostly To The Availability Of Legal Alternatives
Re: Re: Re: Re:
Streaming is also a way easier target to take down, as it always depends on someone with a server somewhere actually serving the stuff. Unlike P2P, the root source of the stream can almost always be traced down. That is why most of them have been hiding in haven countries, such as Spain. Now Spain isn't interested in being that idiot anymore, so streaming sites are being shut down.
it's sort of like what has happened with Roku boxes - as soon as someone shows up and starts applying a little heat, the guys who were profiteering off of other people's work quickly disappear.
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