Funniest/Most Insightful Comments Of The Week At Techdirt

This week, our first place winner on the insightful side is a simple response to an attempt to defend Elon Musk’s reinstatement of an account that posted CSAM, on the basis of the motivations for posting:

I hate to tell you this, but legally speaking the intent doesn’t matter – even if it was done to condemn it, it is still very much illegal to post. This is a matter that’s literally been discussed in rulings on cases where people shared material for reasons that aren’t meant to be titillating.

In second place, it’s Stephen T. Stone with an even more robust response to that notion, taking it apart piece by piece:

One account, that may or may not have actually uploaded kiddie porn, and if did so very definitely did so to shame the pedos in question.

Whether they’re trying to “shame pedos” is ultimately irrelevant to the fact that they posted CSAM (or links to it). How do you even need that shit explained to you? Also, the fact that the account was unsuspended⁠—presumably on orders from Elon Musk, if not by Musk himself⁠—after posting CSAM (or links to it) sends an implicit message: Anyone Musk likes can break even the one rule that every other social media service agrees is The Line That Can’t Be Crossed and not be punished for it. (See also: Kanye West’s recent return to X-Twitter, also presumably on orders from or by direct action of Musk.)

As allowed under the policy

If X-Twitter actually allows people to post/link to actual CSAM without punishment so long as they justify that act with “I was trying to shame pedos”, that says a lot about X-Twitter. Not a single syllable of what that says is good.

So some of the notoriously lefty mods of reddit made a political virtue signal?

Prove the mods of r/law are all “lefties”. And even if this is a virtue signal: What, you’d rather they vice signal like you by being a complete asshole?

This is what you’re writing a post about?

His site, his choice in content. Don’t like it? Door’s to your left.

You are a liar.

You literally tried to justify someone posting/linking to actual CSAM. You don’t get to high-road anyone when you’re already in Hell.

For editor’s choice on the insightful side, we start out with a comment from Gregory Maxwell about the suicide of Backpage executive Jim Larkin:

Lets not forget whose ambition this prosecution served.

Being dragged through court is no less a threat to you welfare than being robbed at gunpoint. Yet it occurs in slow motion with everyone watching, often unable to help including the institutions that you thought were tasked with protecting you. And when it’s all over and you’re vindicated, assuming you make it to the other side, that’s it. There is no compensation, no recovery, no justice. In a civil suit you might get some of you direct costs reimbursed, but nothing for your time and sanity.

We created our courts and their procedures our prosecutors, — the process is something we built, not a force of nature. We ought to take more responsibility for it and not let it be used for malice or ambition.

Next, it’s ke9tv with a comment about the state of copyright after an academic book about emojis was prevented from including the emojis it talks about:

Copyright is no longer about protecting intellectual property from plagiarism. It’s about publishers with deep pockets using their money to purchase the power of imprimatur. No piece of information, fragment of text, or work of art shall appear without their blessing.

Over on the funny side, our first place winner is DJ with a comment about the New York Times profile of Mike:

What you should have done is post a very angry article here decrying it as a hit piece asking people to ignore it and see if you could have Streisand effect it to an even bigger audience.

In second place, it’s Stephen T. Stone with a comment about the legal subreddit that banned all links to ExTwitter due to the safety risk:

With all due respect and love for the original tweet…

Elon Musk: [destroys 15 years’ worth of brand recognition for an attempted “take that” aimed at Peter Thiel]

Musk fanboys: Masterful gambit, sir.

For editor’s choice on the funny side, we’ve got two anonymous comments about the New York Times profile, and specifically the offhand line about the dated design of Techdirt. First, it’s a list of suggestions:

I guess Techdirt could get closer to modern media standards if it

• included a 10 MB CSS file download, that wasn’t ever referenced, with every page
• had non-optional audio playing while the front page was open
• inserted advertisements every 3 paragraphs
• used AI to generate every 7th article and posted it without human editing, and without any telltale notes or bylines.

I mean, it’s turn the place to S**t, but it’d look more like a “modern media site”.

Next, it’s another user who chimed in with some more ideas:

Some more notes:
multi page posts
“click here to continue reading”
checking that javascript is enabled before the page loads or completely breaking the site without javascript
the RSS feed is too easy to find

That’s all for this week, folks!