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Not good enough. The person who got killed was not one of the people involved in the game. The guy who was the target to be swatted gave a false address to the person calling him out. Not playing the FPS would not protect you in this case.

That's what makes this so much worse - the guy who got killed never knew why the cops were there, which is presumably why he was confused and made the mistake that killed him. He died because he was innocent.

"I think the real longterm move for Netflix is to incorporate RottenTomatoes and IMBD into their business."

I understand the sentiment, but I can foresee problems with them getting a major studio brand and an Amazon property into their business ;)

I'm in Spain, and I know a lot of local Snapchat users. Not sure what he's on about.

No, Netflix are interested in providing a streaming service where you rent movies instantly from their catalogue for a fixed monthly fee. Nothing you said changes this.

You also didn't answer my point - if Netflix's model is doomed, why only them? You seem to avoid the idea that the entire sector runs on the same models, so what is Netflix not doing to protect themselves that Hulu, etc. are doing?

I can't speak for Wall Street as I really don't care about that side of things. You do seem to have a massive crush for them over their competitors, though, I'm just curious why that is.

"Netflix is trafficking in a commodity over which it cannot have monopolistic control"

So are a lot of businesses, online and offline. Especially service providers that run using someone else's content/platform. So what?

If LinkedIn are being that negatively affected by a single scraper, they should deal with it - block it, only allow a specific number of requests from an IP per day, anything that doesn't involve lawsuits. The problem is them trying to pretend that publicly visible content is really private if they say so, without them trying to protect it in any real way.

"The hurt occurs when people benefit from the work the original author put into creating that data without proper compensation"

Not necessarily. If I'm paying for print of some imaginative artwork that was created using the picture of the bike, that doesn't mean the bike owner lost anything, even if he spent time building the bike with his own hands. Similarly, if the only reason why people paid Hi-Q was for the extra work that they put in, LinkedIn didn't lose money because people would not have bought their product without that extra work.

There is certainly an argument that Hi-Q should have licenced the content first, but it's public data. If they want to make licence deals, don't put it in the view of the public street then whine when people are documenting what's in public.

"It's a straw man."

No, the straw man is pretending that a copy is the same as theft. Theft is theft because someone is depriving you of the original, not because you imagine you might have had more sales if the copy didn't exist. There's a reason why there are different words for different things, and pretending that a copy is the same as taking a physical object it a lie. Period.

"I place hours of working into something that doesn't put food on the table because you can clone my work, but I can't clone my food."

But, you put the price up too high, so I opted not to buy it. Maybe borrow the CD from a friend, or listen to something else. Or, you decided I couldn't buy it in the format or region I wanted. There are real issues, but pretending that a copy = a lost sale is utter bull that's been debunked time and time again, yet is regularly repeated by people trying to inject emotional arguments instead of facts.

"I'd say it's pretty obviously interfering with their business model"

Then perhaps they should address the business model or not put their content out there in public unprotected if it's that valuable to their income.

"LinkedIn could ban IPs that make unreasonable number of requests in a short amount of time."

Yes they could. Which would not have to involve the courts in any way. Or, they could protect the content in some other way that (for example) requires a log in and adherence to T&Cs, with which they could easily kick violators off their site for non-compliance.

The issue is that LinkedIn are trying to have it both ways - gathering the benefits of public content while blocking others who use the now-public content in ways that are usually acceptable for public content to be used. Sorry, not acceptable, you pick one - take the content away from the public street or accept that some people will use what has been shown to the public.

It goes both ways. If Thiel's money was necessary for Hogan to get justice, that is indeed a problem with the US legal system.

But, on the flipside, Thiel was financing numerous lawsuits against Gawker due to a personal vendetta, many of them much more frivolous and defensible than the Hogan case. He clearly intended to bury Gawker, the Hogan thing was just a way he found to do it quickly rather than waiting for their legal defense funds to run out.

Both of these are problems. What's troubling/chilling is that Thiel hasn't stopped, he's just agreed to finance other peoples' vendettas (in the first case, Shiva Ayyadurai, about whom Techdirt are telling the absolute verifiable truth when they say he's lying about inventing email). That's where it crossed the line, and created a dangerous precedent that has a real chilling effect.

Actually, the chilling effect is due to that the lawsuit against Gawker only went as far as it did because Hogan teamed up with Peter Thiel, who had a personal vendetta against them over a story they had written about him. By all accounts, the issue was going nowhere until he got involved and funded Hogan. Thiel has now turned his attention on other outlets, currently attacking Techdirt for the (true) stories they wrote about Shiva Ayyaduria (who Thiel was also helping in a lawsuit against Gawker, among numerous other suits he was financing). That's the important part here - lots of lawsuits, some much more frivolous than others - were being launched because a billionaire doesn't like the outlet. If the Hogan case didn't bury them, he had plenty more lined up until something did.

What's being exposed is a situation where pissing off the wrong guy can bury companies in court (and legal fees even if they're found innocent), and that it's too easy for one rich guy with a vendetta to do this. The issue is muddied because Gawker were clearly in the wrong, both legally and morally, with the Hogan tape. But, this will still have a chilling effect on people writing factually and morally correct articles if they fear they'll piss off the wrong guy. That's the issue - Thiel is going around trying to shut down media outlets he doesn't like, the fact that Gawker were a horrible outlet to begin with doesn't negate that.

"There is a monumental difference between that and writing a negative article."

Yes, and his current target wrote negative articles about his current client, articles that are backed by solid evidence that they are true. Nothing Techdirt has said is demonstrably false, and their attacks on Shiva's claims are always backed by verifiable evidence. The Techdirt case is far more defensible than the Gawker one, but the same principles apply, as does the chilling effect it will be having on other outlets.

The number of photos is irrelevant to the analogy, though, as is what people do with the photos afterwards. If the bikes are visible from the public street, people can take as many pictures of every bike they want, and then make money from them if they want. It doesn't affect the owners' usage of the bike (unlike the original analogy, where the owner loses access, which was what I was trying to correct)

Physical analogies for this kind of thing are always flawed, it's just dishonest/misleading to pretend that copying data is ever analogous to taking a physical object (the owner of the original is never deprived of the original when data is copied).

"I don't know the business model of linkedin"

Most of it is selling premium features to recruiters and other businesses. I'm not sure if Hi-Q's service interferes with that or not, but LinkedIn should not be trying to have their cake and eat it by leaving things in public then complaining when the public accesses it in a way they don't like.

You won't get DRM free, because Netflix don't sell you the content, they rent it. Or, more specifically, they sell you access to the platform to stream the rented content.

I'm all for DRM-free purchases, but you're never going to get DRM-free rentals.

"I also hate the suggestions and that I can't edit them and ban them."

If you thumb down a suggestion it will usually disappear from the suggestions list. Also, if you keep getting suggestions based on something watched that you didn't like, you can edit you viewing history and remove it.

"they are selling a very well understood, easily replicated goods - namely content"

No, they're not. They're selling a service that allows you to rent content and have it stream to you instantly. The content library is what attracts people, of course, but their core business is selling the service.

"Unless we went back to the big studio era when talent was locked up with multi year contracts"

Erm, they already produce Netflix Originals, which are exclusively locked up on there (and their competitors all do the same thing). How does that differ from your suggestion?

"nothing can stop a Hulu from poaching a great show runner from NFLX"

...and nothing can stop Netflix from getting the licence to a show that used to be on Hulu. Also nothing to stop them both licencing the same show at the same time.

"Its long term success is suspect to me, debt or not."

Just Netflix, or do you also think that Hulu, Mubi, Filmstruck, etc. are all doomed as well? (I left Amazon out because obviously Prime streaming obviously isn't their core market) If just Netflix, what differs in your view that makes them more vulnerable to their competition?

The bike example is a very poor analogy - the data isn't removed from LinkedIn, it's merely copied. It doesn't matter how many times the site is scraped, the data is unchanged and still available. A better analogy would be me taking a photo of the bike while walking past. It shouldn't matter how many times you tell me to stop, if it's on public property you can't really stop me from taking the photo.

If you have an issue with that, you should be moving your bike somewhere people can't take a photo from the public street. Not have someone creatively interpret a law that says where I am is suddenly not public property, because you asked me to stop using my camera.

I'd never heard of the investor.. I immediately thought "why are people asking him about investments, and didn't he die?"

"Isn't that the sort of thing that we have anti-trust laws for?"

I might be wrong, but the way I understand it is that anti-trust relates to abuse of a monopoly position, not the monopoly position itself. So, if Amazon were doing things to force Nike to sell through them or get less money elsewhere, they'd be in violation. However, simply being so big that Nike would lose lots of money by not selling there is not.

To put it another way, if I make a video and I decide that I don't want it on YouTube for whatever reason, Google aren't guilty of anti-trust if I then realise that I'm losing a lot of money by not having it there. They're simply the dominant player with the most customers. If, however, Google did something to reduce my revenue from other sources if I don't also have it on YouTube, they would be guilty of anti-trust.

Flawed analogy and IANAL, etc., but that's my understanding.

So, nothing happens in your world to drive older people into poverty though no fault of their own? It all has to be because of what they did? No financial crises, stock market crashes, stolen pensions, healthcare related bankruptcies, etc?

Some people voluntarily help some other people with some costs. There's a lot of people who don't get the care they need for whatever reason, even in a system where there's a lot of volunteers.

To get the best deal for everybody, governments in most countries step in to create a system where everybody pays in and the best deal for everybody is made (with the option for extra private care if you can afford it). You get a basic guaranteed level of healthcare in return for your taxes, as part of your participation in society. Corporations are prevented from deciding they need to charge you more than your annual income for the medication keeping you alive, while you're free to change jobs and start businesses when you wish, because you're not trapped in an insurance plan that you'll lost the moment you do something else.

Only in America is this seen as wrong. Everywhere else gets cheaper bills with zero chance of personal bankruptcy just because you got the wrong disease/got ill before/etc.

But, by then treating the addiction as a medical condition rather than as criminal activity, that makes it much easier to overcome, and it's easier to intervene with someone performing a legal vs an illegal activity. Portugal experienced a lot of positive results with its decriminalisation of drugs, with the number of heroin users having significantly dropped since that was introduced.

It doesn't magically stop being dangerous, but prohibition clearly doesn't work for any substance.

"for the general public, the concept of "anonymous hacker" is not associated with anything good"

An association that's largely created by these tabloids in the first place.

"that's what "general public" wants to read about"

Maybe, but if that's what's required, they should be requesting an interview with him and only reveal what he agrees to reveal. If he wishes to, that could lead to a more insightful look at a man and his motivations rather than random paragraphs about pizza and surfing.

If he chose not to reveal anything, a responsible journalist would accept that and understand that the man has reasons for wishing to stay anonymous. Not dig into his information and publish it anyway, leading to both him and his friends being needlessly harassed for preventing crimes. At the very least, this could lead to future would-be Samaritans from deploying fixes or publicly detailing their methods.

At least they manages to increase their clicks with some facts rather than just making things up, I suppose.

Why would he be capable of only addressing one issue at a time? If I fight against racial discrimination, for example, why does that mean I'm not also battling for workers' rights?

DRM might not be an issue any more (at least for purchases), but regional releases, platform exclusivity, etc. sure as hell are.

You boycotted Nintendo because of what Rare did to their own game when porting it? Do you also boycott Microsoft now that they own Rare or do you have some kind of weird double standard?

They fact that they included videos they had specifically authorised or uploaded themselves in the list of supposedly infringing videos couldn't have helped.

"the jet fuel that's used to transport all the world's hipsters to “experience the world”"

What about the jet fuel that's used for the other 98% of people who fly on a regular basis? Is that less polluting, or are you just jealous of the people who travel internationally for leisure? You're not making any sense, unless you're deluded enough to think that those are the only people who fly. "does that hit too close to home even for a person who doesn't own a car?"

Again, that makes no sense. Why would car ownership affect the impact of jet fuel pollution? If it's the "hipsters" you're concerned about, wouldn't those be the people who are already offsetting the environmental cost of air travel by using public transport and/or unmotorised travel and thus polluting less than car owners?

In other words, you seem to be more interested at attacking a threadbare strawman than evaluate what's actually happening. It's pretty sad, when the actual reason for taxation is pretty clear (to encourage less polluting methods of transport where one reasonably exists, which may not be the case for many air routes).

The real kicker? Jet fuel is actually taxed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_taxes_in_the_United_State...

"Data analyzed for this report reveals, however, that the U.S. led in many broadband metrics in 2011 and 2012."

Anything more recent? I can tell you from my experience in the south of Spain that investment and availability in broadband has improved massively since that report was provided (e.g. I personally was struggling to get the full advertised 10Mbps in my area 5 years ago, I've had solid 300Mbps for around €25/month extra for a year now). I wouldn't be surprised if the study took place shortly before fibre and other investment in certain areas really came to fruition.

I also see they seem to be hedging things in the summary descriptions (e.g. mentioning cost as a positive on the US side, but then making excuses while they admit that US access is only cheaper at slow speeds), so that doesn't seem particularly convincing.

"You spend 8 hours a day working. Why would you want to be isolated from other people?"

So that you can get the work done and not have to think about it when you go socialising with people you actually choose to spend time with?

"As a kid you go to school you are around people."

....and for a lot of people that was the most frustrating, difficult time of their lives that they wish to avoid reliving. Personally, I can't stand office politics, find smalltalk very distracting when it's happening around me and would much rather avoid the 1 hour commute each way.

I can't work from home in my current position, sadly, but I'd jump at the chance to do so. If I found myself feeling isolated from people, it would be much preferable to go somewhere with my laptop for lunch rather than fighting over the microwaves in the office kitchen every day.

I presume she means there's no such thing for the type of work she does. That is, if she did something else those things would be available to her, but they aren't for her line of work. So, she has to depend on pre-existing relationship with people who can protect her where she is.

FTA: "The company is relying heavily on innovation in battery technology continuing to improve at its current rate. If not, the firm will not be able to build in enough power to give the plane the range it needs."

So, it presumably can't work now but they're putting their money on the idea that it will in the near future.

That response assumes that "unwanted pregnancies" are the only reason a woman would want an abortion. There's plenty of medical reasons why it would be necessary.

"huge areas have been ghettozied in virtually every major city"

Yes, but not just Britain. You hear a lot of Polish around your local Lidl? Well, there's some Spanish bloke also complaining about the amount of English he's hearing in his local Lidl.