Comment

I doubt most of what you said. An a-la carte system would not affect channels like HBO and Showtime, which generate their profits independently. Similarly, Netflix has more than managed to be profitable despite making several high budget shows this year. They plan to continue doing so in the future.

A more likely scenario would be the disappearance of most of the special interests channels, and some of the less watched channels. Some will still be carried by a company’s more succesful offerings. Other companies will bundle their varying channels into cheaper paid packages like the current movie channels. Good TV would survive just fine.

You are right about one thing however. Trash TV would most definitely survive, maybe even thrive, in such a system. But hey, who am I to tell people what to watch. I’ll take the good with the bad.

6 days ago on At the Cable Show, an industry fights cord-cutting with technology 1 reply 2 recommends

Comment

So I go to Comcast’s website to pay my bill yesterday, only to find out that it was a jaw-dropping $100 higher than usual! So I call their customer service, and I am informed that I had been under a special “12 months promotion” (strange how nobody told me), and that the current bill is the regular price.

I promptly, but calmly, asked her to cancel my cable service all together, and just keep the internet. She responded by trying to convince me to keep this astronomical bill for 3 more months, at which point I’d qualify for another promotion.

Needless to say, I am now, and forever will be, cable free! I can’t understand for the life of me why I kept it for so long. Better late than never I suppose.

6 days ago on At the Cable Show, an industry fights cord-cutting with technology 2 replies

Comment

What a dream! I’m glad someone has the courage to build a community where you can do all the free things you can’t do in current SLAVE nations, like partying, drinking, and smoking weed!

This isn’t the juvenile anti-tax impulse that has become the de facto groupthink of tech culture. This is seriously and thoroughly examined philosophy about building productive and innovative societies, free of government impositions like the rule of law and helping the needy.

12 days ago on Seasteading Institute lives out its libertarian dream of ocean-cities without rules 1 reply 1 recommend

Comment

If I could give you a hundred recommends, I would.

13 days ago on Apple, Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Yahoo, and more deny providing direct access to PRISM surveillance program 4 recommends

Comment

I enjoyed reading the comments, and I think this is a good discussion. Here’s my take on this.

I don’t see a problem with keeping the website open in order to gather more information. It is worrying when viewed in the context of less and less accountability by government entities (like the drone issue), but it isn’t entrapment as their actions did not cause someone to view the contents of the site when he wouldn’t have otherwise (or she, but who are we kidding?).

The problem is indeed in the victimless-crime angle that the original article brings up. The reporting of the issue is also troubling. Nobody outside the statistical outliers we call sociopaths thinks abusing children is okay. So writing an article almost completely in emotionally charged language is unnecessary.

The article quotes an FBI agent who urges people not to consider mere viewing of offending material as a victimless crime. Why? Because the material is horrible…

That’s not how laws and morals work. Fact remains, those who produced the pictures are the ones who committed the acts. If someone paid for the material, then they too are complicit. But for those who are browsing a forum to look at the stuff? Well, we know they’re probably attracted to children, but that, by itself, is not a crime. How have they contributed to the crime? The agent explains that each time someone looks at the photo, the child is raped once again. Really? Then you better lock up all of those people who look at other forms of shock content. After all, each time they look at a picture of a murder victim, they committed a murder themselves. Or at least, they enjoy watching people murdered, and are bound to eventually murder themselves!

That’s obviously a bunch of nonsense. And I say this as a person who will get traumatized for so much as hearing descriptions that type of content (remember that Verge article on shock websites? Gave me nightmares for weeks). If I am to let my emotions run my opinion on the matter, I’d be calling for their heads. All of them!

But the fact remains, considerable effort, money, and manpower were expended on this operation and others like it. What was the result? More money and effort to keep those who looked at the stuff locked up for a very long time, and HOPEFULLY a producer or two.

The whole thing just stinks when you try and understand the issue objectively. It’s another example where going after the small fish is vastly easier than tackling the roots of the problem, so the roots are wholly ignored, while the small fish fill more and more, um, aquariums.

22 days ago on FBI ran child porn site for two weeks in attempt to identify over 5,000 pedophiles 1 recommend