YouTube Reposts Anti-Scientology Videos 435
Ian Lamont writes "YouTube has reposted anti-Scientology videos and reinstated suspended YouTube accounts after receiving thousands of apparently bogus DCMA take-down notices. Four thousand notices were sent to YouTube last Thursday and Friday by American Rights Counsel, LLC. After YouTube users responded with counter-notices, many of the videos were reposted. It turns out that the American Rights Counsel had no copyright claim on the videos, and the group may not even exist, although the text of the DCMA notices have been linked to a Wikipedia editor. While filing a false DMCA notice is a criminal offense, prosecution in these cases rarely comes about."
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Should be worth pressing charges. (Score:5, Interesting)
This is an arguable criminal case and a criminal prosecution would be a waste of time. It is going to be near impossible to prove anything beyond a reasonable doubt.
It is, however, a clear abuse of rights granted by the copyright law. The fitting punishment is revocation of those rights.
Please save the nitpicking arguments about if there is such thing as copyright "rights", that is beside the point. If a child can't be trusted with privileges, you take those privileges away.
Re:Should be worth pressing charges. (Score:5, Interesting)
revoking the copyrights would be moronic.
if that's all it took, then people would start posting fake notices (ie committing fraud) for the groups they OPPOSE, thus preventing the legitimate copyright holder from keeping their copyright.
punish the criminal.
in this case that is whoever sent the notices.
Re:Should be worth pressing charges. (Score:5, Insightful)
If they can establish that it actually was someone from the scientology church with authorization to send these notes, Google could refuse to take down any more videos without investigating the claims first. Their takedown notices, if they have merit, would still be honored, but the takedown would be delayed until they get a chance to look into the issue.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Unfortunately, those who submit counter-claims must do so under penalty of perjury. There is no perjury threat for submitting the original claim.
Re:Should be worth pressing charges. (Score:5, Interesting)
There is no perjury threat for submitting the original claim.
Yes, there is, though AFAIK, no one has ever been prosecuted for it.
Re:Should be worth pressing charges. (Score:5, Interesting)
You can be subject to perjury charges if you submit a claim and you do not have authority to represent the party you name as claimant. You are *not* subject to perjury charges if you submit a claim and it turns out that the claimant does not have a valid copyright claim against the content. The law was very carefully worded that way.
Re:Should be worth pressing charges. (Score:4, Insightful)
Actually, companies are only required to comply with valid DMCA notices, for fairly obvious reasons. A company has every right to verify that a notice is valid before taking action. YouTube would have been entirely in its legal rights to ignore the requests it got. It is unfortunate that large internet companies have no interest in defending their users' right to free speech.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
No. Valid means that it is a legally valid notice. If YouTube fails to comply with a notice, the noticee can sue them - a notice without any follow up is just a piece of paper. But if the noticee doesn't have the right to file the notice, or if the notice isn't valid, he's obviously not in any position to sue.
Companies like YouTube choose to comply with every DMCA notice they receive without checking because it's easier and safer for them.
Remember (Score:5, Informative)
there's no such thing as a "rogue $cientologist" - this guy was obviously pulling this stunt with the knowledge/approval of cult leadership and organization.
It was probably along the lines of something like this [torymagoo.org] - his "auditor" told him this was what he needed to do to "clear" something, so he did it.
Of course, Wikipedia's completely bombarded by pro-$cientology stooges [wikipedia.org] who try to whitewash whatever they can from articles on the cult. I'm not surprised one of their stooges popped up trying this on Youtube to remove videos by people who expose the cult for what it is.
Followup (Score:5, Informative)
Remember L. Ron's first rule of dealing with the media - "Never Defend, Always Attack." [xenu.net]
And of course, any "Suppressive Person" is "Fair Game. [wikipedia.org]" (also here [xenu.net]). Note the following: "May be deprived of property or injured by any means by any Scientologist without any discipline of the Scientologist. May be tricked, sued or lied to or destroyed."
From the Wikinews article:
Certainly looks like typical lying/"fairgame" $cientology behavior in action, doesn't it? I doubt one thing Schaper said about himself is true - and certainly doubt the idea that the FBI would be "involved" in the lies of a $cientologist. But that never does stop the Cult of $cientology from going about its business.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Of course, Wikipedia's completely bombarded by pro-$cientology stooges [wikipedia.org] who try to whitewash whatever they can from articles on the cult. I'm not surprised one of their stooges popped up trying this on Youtube to remove videos by people who expose the cult for what it is.
Although if you had read the RA (I know, I know) you would have found out that the wikipedia editor is Olaf Schaper and the scientology person is Oliver Schaper. Wikinews seems to find it suspicious that somebody called O. Schaper should be able to get the user name oschaper, and seems confused between wikipedia handles and email addresses (where I would agree that the chances of anybody getting an initial-surname address nowadays is slim unless they own the domain!)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Look at the Article-For-Deletion pages on the ones "Oschaper" created.
Wikipedia itself seems to pretty clearly be unconvinced that "Olaf Schaper" exists - the evidence is that Oliver Schaper used the "Olaf Schaper" lie as a dodge when he was called out for writing articles about his own little scientology-promoting "organizations."
I'd say that the chance that an "Olaf Schaper" would happen to create wikipedia articles on not one, but TWO pro-$cientology setups created by "Oliver Schaper", AND would have bee
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
This may be largely true, but at the VERY least, a DMCA take-down notice needs to be verified in terms of origin. Actual ownership of a copyright or representation of a copyright owner is another matter, but at the very least, allowing what amounts to an anonymous (that is to say unidentifiable) complaint to be accepted is simply inappropriate. All DMCA notices should at the very least be required to be notarized so that the person who issued the claim could be identified for future legal reference.
The cl
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Should be worth pressing charges. (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Should be worth pressing charges. (Score:5, Funny)
A DMCA take-down notice contains a sword statement
En garde!
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
thus preventing the legitimate copyright holder from keeping their copyright.
punish the criminal. in this case that is whoever sent the notices.
This is slashdot. Don't you know that around here simply owning a copyright considered a criminal act and illegitimate.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Should be worth pressing charges. (Score:5, Insightful)
Exactly. It might be economically worth their time for Google to set the precedent that bogus DMCA notices en masse will lead to a lawsuit, so that they can limit the number of staff they'll have to hire to handle requests.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
It's not a matter of how bad the violation of law is. It has to matter to the prosecutor and also to a potential jury (called "jury interest"). Nobody will prosecute the case if the only impact was $20,000 of Google's money spent on handling the notices.
My suggestion would be to temporarially take down the requestor's videos if they submit a false takedown request. It wouldn't cover small businesses, but it would cover the Viacoms and the CoS.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Should be worth pressing charges. (Score:4, Interesting)
But it looks bad on his rap sheet to the scientologists embedded in public sphere who are needed to help him get into that office.
Re:Should be worth pressing charges. (Score:5, Insightful)
Replace 'scientologists' with 'corporate oligarchs' and you'd be right. Scientology is rich and powerful, but it's nothing compared to the automobile industry, or the recording industry, or pharmaceutical industry, etc.
Re:Should be worth pressing charges. (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Should be worth pressing charges. (Score:4, Funny)
Not to worry -- they'll just get 4000 thetans to serve the sentence.
Re:Should be worth pressing charges. (Score:5, Interesting)
They are honestly going to let Scientology get away with this bollocks? Wow. That sucks. It'd be funny to finally see themselves sucker punch their own faces by trying.
Now I'm left wondering if it was even them that sent them out in the first place.
Does anyone know anything about the "group" that sent them, and is there anything that actually ties it to them?
For all the reasons they'd have to do it, there's also a lot of people who'd like to embarrass that group by acting in their name.
Re:Should be worth pressing charges. (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Should be worth pressing charges. (Score:5, Interesting)
Does anyone know anything about the "group" that sent them, and is there anything that actually ties it to them?
Notice the name: American Rights Counsel. Have you heard of Scientology's "ARC Triangle"? If not, Google it. I won't pretend that this is proof, but it sure is an interesting fluke event.
Re:Should be worth pressing charges. (Score:5, Informative)
They are honestly going to let Scientology get away with this bollocks? Wow. That sucks. It'd be funny to finally see themselves sucker punch their own faces by trying.
Nobody knows if this was done by official Scientology, by some scientologist who got carried away, or by some prankster who thought it would be fun. No matter who it was, the DMCA act states very clearly that claiming that you are acting for the copyright holder when you are not is _perjury_. Which is quite a serious matter. Which needs to be multiplied by 4000. Which means whoever did this needs to be caught and thrown into jail to discourage any repeats of this.
Imagine he or she gets away with it, and next week 8000 videos about flower arranging get a DMCA takedown notice. Which would be even more disruptive, because people putting up those videos probably have less experience handling such a situation.
Re:Should be worth pressing charges. (Score:4, Interesting)
A 'prankster' bothered to search out and send notices for 4000 videos? He'd have to be pretty dedicated to his prank.
No, I think it's much more likely that it was a scientologist that did it. Slightly less likely is that it's a scientology hater trying to make them look bad. (As if they can't handle that on their own.)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
It could be mostly automatic. The search would be simple:
http://gdata.youtube.com/feeds/api/videos?vq=scientology&start-index=1&max-results=50 [youtube.com]
Just repeat for different start-index values and slightly different searches, and you can easily rack up a few thousand unique videos.
Re:Should be worth pressing charges. (Score:4, Informative)
Take that Xenu! (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm glad that the YouTube users fought back.
We really need to make people aware of the criminal actions of this cult.
Outed? (Score:5, Insightful)
But now, anyone who filed a counter-response to the Take Down is "outed" on documents that Scientology can subpoena.
First? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:First? (Score:5, Funny)
Is there some kind of rule that if it's in a hyperlink, it's spelled 'DCMA', but if it's plain text, it's 'DMCA'?
Get with the program. Today is Transposed Tuesday.
Re:First? (Score:5, Funny)
Wow! I am behind on my Ubuntu distro then. I am still on the J's.
Re:First? (Score:4, Funny)
Jittery January
Fabulous February
Mirthful March
Anaphylactic April
Merciful May
Justified June
Jubilant July
Ardent August
Sepia September
Objective October
Nibbling November
Douceur December
Also comes with the days:
Sanguinely Sundays
Manic Mondays (Sorry, had to)
Transposed Tuesdays
Whimpering Wednesdays
Traumatic Thursdays
Fuck-yeah Fridays
Superimposed Saturdays
Order now!
Teach them a lesson (Score:5, Informative)
While filing a false DMCA notice is a criminal offense, prosecution in these cases rarely comes about.
Sounds like this would be a good time to start.
I can't think of a nicer group of people to sue.
Re:Teach them a lesson (Score:5, Interesting)
Actually, it would be "prosecute", not sue, as this is a criminal offense, and requires a criminal prosecution.
All nitpicking aside though, I agree. It sounds like the crazy Scientologists are at it again, and SOMEONE needs to take those crazies down a few notches.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
While filing a false DMCA notice is a criminal offense, prosecution in these cases rarely comes about.
Sounds like this would be a good time to start. I can't think of a nicer group of people to sue.
You *know* that if one of us violated the DMCA we'd be jumped on in a heartbeat. The DMCA is a farce to begin with, but when they only enforce the provisions one-sidedly they are really exposing it for piece of crap, purchased fraud that it is.
Isn't it also illegal (Score:5, Insightful)
Not just to file fraudulant DMCA notices, but also to do so in the name of a Business that doesn't exist? I'd think someone, somewhere would want to take this opportunity to finally push back and sue for false allegations filed by a fradulant company in the name of an entity that was not part of the original notice. Might make a statement, (especially from YouTube) that we won't simply allow people to negligently file take down notices on material they don't even own the copyright to.
Interesting case of censorship (Score:5, Interesting)
Earlier this year radio talk show host Michael Reagan called for the murder of Mark Dice [youtube.com] live on air. Mark Dice uploaded a 3 minute clip of the death threat to youtube. Reagan's lawyers filed a DMCA claim on the clip [jonesreport.com], youtube took down Mark Dice's entire channel which had a lot of original content and over a million views. Dice tried to counter claim but youtube did NOT reinstate his channel. Dice had to make a new channel and upload his content back.
The FBI or police would not charge Reagan for his death threats and Reagan is still on the air.
Re:Interesting case of censorship (Score:5, Interesting)
While calling for this guys death is over the top and uncalled for, Mark Dice is a to be kind not the nicest of people.
And I am a go to church every Sunday kind of guy. He is way far to the right by my standards.
"Dice founded an organization,[1] variously called The Resistance,[2] The Christian Resistance or The Resistance for Christ, which espouses fundamentalist Christianity and professes conspiratorial beliefs about the Roman Catholic Church,[3] the Illuminati, freemasons, Skull and Bones, Bohemian Grove, the 9/11 attacks and Satanism, and which has been reported to "flood the airwaves of call-in radio and television shows"[4] to promote them. His 450 page book, The Resistance Manifesto details these beliefs.
Dice's activities have been covered by national media outlets. His focus is primarily on political activism, culture jamming, boycotts, and pop culture criticism.
He has called for the Georgia Guidestones to be removed from public property,[4][5] protested a Jessica Simpson music video,[1] called for a boycott of the VeriChip,[1][6] called for Duke University to change the name of its sports team (the Blue Devils),[7] called for rapper 50 Cent to stop wearing a cross,[8] and claimed that Scientology is a satanic cult.[9]
He recently launched a boycott against Starbucks, calling the company "Slutbucks", after featuring a logo of a topless mermaid-type figure.[10][11] He also endorsed Ron Paul's candidacy for president in 2008.
Dice is featured in Alex Jones' film The 9/11 Chronicles, which documents the activities of the 9/11 truth movement."
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
He also endorsed Ron Paul's candidacy for president in 2008.
Well, I was on the edge till I read that, but now I know he's nuts.
Google Should Sue (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Which was quite annoying. Google video had a much better interface at the time, and the videos seemed less crappy (encoding-wise...). I'm certain they would've overtaken youtube as "what youtube ought-to have been" if google had given it half a chance.
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah, because what the US needs is more power for people to hit each other over the head with lawsuits. It's one thing to be hit with fairly bullshit claims in civil court, in worst case you're out some cash. Now private prosecutors that can land your ass in jail with a criminal record? Even if the charges don't stick, unless they're so bogus you can countersue it's going to cost you a shitload of time and money to defend yourself. Besides prosecutors alone are fairly inept, the next step will of course be
Mission Accomplished (Score:5, Insightful)
They now have the names and addresses of the posters who responsed with DMCA counter-notices, and those individuals are now free to be "fair-gamed".
DING DING DING DING!!!!! (Score:3, Informative)
We have a winner. This is most likely the real reason for the mass takedown.
Mod parent up.
Wrigley Field Trick? (Score:3, Insightful)
How hard would it be to do what the Blues Brothers did, and supply a bogus address to the authorities? If you are swinging against CoS, you probably already know about the fair gaming thing, and may be using a front. It's funny that CoS used a front too. Then you've got two fronts going against eachother, and the authorities just toss the case into a cardboard box to be shredded at some date in the future. The only real victims would be the poor saps who criticise such an organization without realizing
Top Scientologists (and "Church") face fraud trial (Score:4, Interesting)
You did know that "Top Scientologists" and the church are facing fraud charges?
http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europe/09/09/france.scientology.trial.ap/index.html [cnn.com]
Unfortunately they are being charged in France, I don't know if they are in the country or if they will have to be extradited. If so, I don't know if the U.S. will agree. After all, they could claim "religious" persecution.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
In some ways it doesn't matter. If the case is put against the church and won then (as per previous rulings about them getting into trouble again) Scientology France could be dissolved.
Typical behaviour of the Scientology sect (Score:5, Informative)
See e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_Game_(Scientology) [wikipedia.org], http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_Game_(Scientology)#Court_cases_involving_.22Fair_Game.22 [wikipedia.org], http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karin_Spaink [wikipedia.org], http://www.xs4all.nl/~kspaink/ [xs4all.nl], http://www.xs4all.nl/~kspaink/cos/idx_coskit.html [xs4all.nl], http://home.snafu.de/tilman/j/general.html [snafu.de]
See also this quote from Wikipedia:
In 1994, Vicky Aznaran, who had been the Chairman of the Board of the Religious Technology Center (the Church's central management body), claimed in an affidavit that Because of my position and the reports which regularly crossed my desk, I know that during my entire presidency of RTC "fair game" actions against enemies were daily routine. Apart from the legal tactics described below, the "fair game" activities included break-ins, libel, upsetting the companies of the enemy, espionage, harassment, misuse of confidential communications in the folders of community members and so forth.
This is one of the good reasons why the sect tends to be viewed with suspicion in Western Europe (the sect is currently defending itself in France against a charge of fraud (see http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/7604311.stm) [bbc.co.uk]). I'm still unclear as to exactly how sect has been able to secure the tax-exempt status of "church" with the US authorities. I have read that it was by successfully harassing the relevant officials, but that's quite hard to prove of course.
What's Scientology? (Score:5, Insightful)
Growing Immunity (Score:3, Insightful)
Google should be developing a resistance to invalid censorship attempts like these meritless DMCA takedown notices. It should be much harder to trick Google into even temporary suspension. Soon enough, Google should learn that the burden of proof is on the censor, and leave content untouched until the attempting censor proves their case on facts and logic, not screeches and innuendo.
And Google's lesson should be the model for the rest who have to compete in the environment so influenced by Google in it.
FWIW, the DMCA should be amended to require takedown notices to first notify the accused infringer, and include the counternotice procedure and framework, before even notifying a 3rd party like Google (or any other independent publisher of other people's content). That reform would go a long way to making the DMCA less a club with which to intimidate without merit, and closer to some kind of protection of "progress in science and the useful arts" that is any copyright action's only legitimate basis.
Notarized documents? (Score:5, Informative)
Now that it looks like this "American Rights Council" doesn't exist, I wonder if Google is going to start to require notarized DMCA take-down notices. Prior to this 4000-long list of notices, Google might not have had the evidence to show that DMCA notices were being abused, but this should provide ample evidence should Google ever get in legal trouble if they only accept notarized DMCA take down notices in the future.
The benefit for Google is obvious, as is the benefit for all of their users, etc. It's a big enough win to make me wonder if someone didn't just plan this as a way to weed out the chaff that is getting sent to YouTube legal; this event should hopefully send a warning to the RIAA and other groups that shoot from the hip with take-down notices: abuse of the DMCA's provisions will have negative ramifications.
Re:Racial Bigotry (Score:5, Interesting)
I knew they claimed to be a religion, but I wasn't aware that Scientologists now claimed to be a "race"...
Was this done to claim additional protections?
Re:Racial Bigotry (Score:4, Funny)
Do races get protections? Unless they claim some first people's type of race (i.e. the Thetos or whatever they're called were here before us all), I imagine they wouldn't.
Otherwise, I will be claiming protections as well. I am a member of the human race, the Canadian race and I was shortlisted to be on the Amazing Race.
Re:Racial Bigotry (Score:5, Insightful)
I meant that they probably want to portray themselves as a "oppressed minority" or something like that...
Although I seriously doubt the ACLU would fall for it
Re:Racial Bigotry (Score:4, Informative)
I meant that they probably want to portray themselves as a "oppressed minority" or something like that...
Ironic, since isn't it their intention to genocide the Thetans or something bizarre like that?
If someone were to prosecute them for persecuting Thetans, what would their defense be?
Re:Racial Bigotry (Score:5, Insightful)
Great - another 600 bigoted posts about Scientology.
Scientology is a great, true faith. But you guys don't know anything about faith, do you.
I'm an atheist, and while I think the middle eastern religions are pretty horrid, Scientology is pure insanity. Xenu? DC10s? Thetans?
LOL, psyco.
Re:Racial Bigotry (Score:5, Funny)
Wait, you mean the crap they showed on South Park was really was these people believe?!
Re:Racial Bigotry (Score:5, Informative)
Yes. Did you miss the big scrolling letters running across the screen?
The odd thing about Scientology is although that is what they believe, Scientologists are only told it after they have spent an awful lot of time and money on Scientology.
Re:Racial Bigotry (Score:4, Insightful)
Unfortunately the human mind is easily manipulated and by then you'll have been so effectively brainwashed that you will be more than happy to believe it.
Re:Racial Bigotry (Score:4, Interesting)
Sadly, I had spoken with my wife in passing about Scientology a few times and she zoned out whenever I got into the whole Xenu/Thetan thing. I guess she thought it was some bad sci-fi story I had read. Then I showed her the South Park episode and told her that (animation aside) what was presented during that segment is actually what Scientologists believe. Now she's right along with me in ridiculing the "religion." It is really telling when South Park doesn't need to alter anything at all to make fun of a religion's story.
What's really sad (Score:5, Insightful)
What's really sad is that your wife's way of thinking is typical here in America.
It's not real unless you saw it on TV.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Actually, it wasn't that she believed it because she saw it on TV (actually, Comedy Central's South Park website ). She's too intelligent for that. Her first response upon seeing the clip was: "This isn't real, is it?"
The real reason that South Park succeeded where I failed was that South Park laid out the Scientology beliefs in an easily understandable fashion. I couldn't seem to do that. So while it sounded like some stupid sci-fi story coming from me, she was able to easily understand the point that
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, stories about aliens flying planes across space to dump other aliens into our volcanoes... that's insane.
A story about an ark carrying two of every animal in existence with enough food and supplies to last them forty days and forty nights... Well, guess that's pretty insane, too.
Most religions have their crazy stories. I find it odd that, as an atheist, I'm less critical of scientologists' beliefs than people of other faiths that have crazy beliefs of their own.
Re:Racial Bigotry (Score:5, Funny)
To be completely fair, they were DC-8s.
Re:Racial Bigotry (Score:5, Funny)
Yea, DC-10s just makes no sense at all!
Well, it's as legitimate as my religion (Score:5, Funny)
May you be touched by His Noodley Appendage.
Re:Racial Bigotry (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, because a zombie born by a virgin and fathered by sky-guy is sane.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
* Zombie Jesus (Resurrection)
* Cannibalism (Transubstantiation)
* Human / Deity Chimeras (Son of God)
Re:Racial Bigotry (Score:5, Insightful)
Lol, who gives a crap about the faith? They can believe what they want, it's the bullying, censorship and child maltreatment that gets me.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
heh. Except you don't actually have to give the Catholic church ANYTHING, and you can still belong. Insightful? I think not.
Re:Racial Bigotry (Score:5, Interesting)
Let me fix that for you:
The Catholic Church enjoyed a monopoly on Christianity in part because it was damn expensive to reproduce books and most people couldn't read latin even if they had a copy. This gave them control over everyone who didn't want to go to hell. And they made damn sure everyone didn't want to go to hell.
The Church of Scientology doesn't have that luxury. Most people are literate, the information is in the common language (actually, I'm guessing more than one), and books are cheap to reproduce. So they have to use legal means to establish their monopoly. But they are using the same basic formula as the Catholic Church to control members and gain money.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Good heavens. If you're pointing at one case and declaring the organization to be murderers, I'm assuming you couldn't possibly be part of any church. Show me a church that has spilled no blood in its history, and I'll show you empty pews.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
I'm pretty sure that the Quakers [wikipedia.org] have a distinct lack of blood [wikipedia.org] in their history.
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:Idiot mods (Score:3, Funny)
In Soviet Scientology, meme +1 Funny you!
(Do I get mod points now?)
Re:Of course. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
What is evil here is the law. Imagine an anonymous poster, somewhere on the front lines of a war, exposing some monumental lie or an atrocity by filming it and posting on YouTube. The government or any other entity who wishes for the public to remain ignorant simply issues a DMCA take-down notice. YouTube complies instantly and uncritically. The anonymous whistle-blower will not reveal himself to issue a "counter-notice" because doing so exposes him/her to being "taken down" himself, via a bullet to the hea
Oh pulllllleeeze (Score:5, Insightful)
Totalitarian control is the only outcome of IP? And this got modded up to 5?
I've seen some pretty ridiculous shit from the anti-IP people; but that's one heck of a strawman you've got there. IP is a tool like any other. A totalitarian government will use it as a tool to enforce draconian discipline. A better government will use it to secure rights for creative people. Let's have some fun:
IP is nowhere near as deadly as road construction. That is why, as I keep pointing out, the so called "transportation infrastructure" has the ulitmate effect of creating a totalitarian society. It happens via the deadly mix of technological progress creating increased mobility for both the populace and the military, and resulting in the ever more draconian incursion of armed troops into daily life. That impacts society so because the ability to move troops is the control of our everday lives (as is the only logical outcome of road construction) and must lead to a totalitarian society as a whole.
Re:Southpark's Scientology Video (Score:5, Informative)
Here is their own link
http://www.southparkstudios.com/episodes/103804/ [southparkstudios.com]
Re:What's with the scientology hatred? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:What's with the scientology hatred? (Score:4, Insightful)
At the moment, Christianity isn't run for profit (Roman Catholic church notwithstanding).
Citation needed.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
'At the moment, Christianity isn't run for profit (Roman Catholic church notwithstanding).'
When was the last time that you attended a members meeting for any curch? They always try to run at a profit, in North America anyway. I can vouch for this having been a 'Member in Good Standing' of the Protestant Church.
Re:What's with the scientology hatred? (Score:5, Insightful)
If you're an old usenet geek, you have plenty of reason to hate them. If you're an old slashdot geek, you also have plenty of reason to hate them. If you're a YouTube user, you also have plenty of reason to hate them. I'd wager that large parts of /. fall into all three categories.
There's been no large, concentrated legal attack on internet freedom from the other religions, to my knowledge, so I feel Scientology is rightfully getting attacked. If you also take the threats of violence, the stalking by PIs, the systematic exploitation of their own members and everything else into account, then it's an even easier choice.
Also of note is that Scientology is just as hateful towards gays as the Big Three religions, so I'm not sure where you're going with that.
Re:What's with the scientology hatred? (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, for one, Scientology has nothing to do with science. It's beliefs are straight out of L. Ron Hubbard's science fiction books. The beliefs of most established religions are much more plausible than Scientology, plus many of those established religions are able to adapt themselves to modern science. Believe it or not, most modern Christians (non-evangelicals) believe that the Big Bang happened and God caused it, and the 7 days thing is because God lives outside of our time. I, though, do not follow this belief, but it's a very valid one that is compatible with known science. Scientology doesn't do that. They deny science and lay out their own beliefs that supersede science, according to them.
Two, they love oppressing all they can. The DMCA takedowns of opposition videos is just one thing. They love to threaten and harass opposition because that's all they can do to protect themselves.
Third, it's a money-making cult. Scientologists brainwash people into believing their hogwash and then bleed them dry. I forget the actual figures but you're supposed to give a substantial amount of your income to the 'church', and this isn't like tithes to a Christian church that benefit the church as a whole and also the community around it. These just get sucked back into the pockets of the Scientology upper echelons. Also, in Scientology you're supposed to buy your way into enlightenment. The more money you give to them, the more access to the basis texts you have. And, as I said, they brainwash people into believing their hogwash. They take in those who are most impressionable and have low self-esteem who can easily be molded. It's sad, really, on how such an evil (I do think of Scientology as evil like any other cult, but not so much so with religions) organization will prey on people and take advantage of them.
Also, flame me if you will for not hating on other religions, as is often the style here, but they aren't all that bad. Sure they've mostly all done some bad stuff in the past, but the also have all done some good stuff too. And at least with them you're free to leave and not totally brainwashed.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I think it needs to be more than $250K.
Take the maximum fine for willful copyright infringement. Triple it (ala RICO). That should be the fine, per notice.
Re:Great, another cult that brainwashes everyone (Score:5, Informative)
No ... it's more like, they can't think of a better, more LUCRATIVE scam than the one they've cooked up!
How many nation-wide con-artist operations do you see out there that are protected by federal legislation (organized religion status)?
Just 2 days ago, I received some propaganda piece in the mail from their "church". It was trying to recruit new members with false "scientific findings" they published. (Basically, the premise was that all the chemicals we encounter in our daily lives are permanently lodging themselves in our bodies and poisoning us. By signing up with their group, they could put you through a "cleansing" process to restore your body's "natural state". They actually claimed that it was a *scientific finding* that common anesthesia drugs were discovered permanently stored in people's fat tissue, among other things. Citation was conveniently left out on that, though.)
Re:E-meter videos? (Score:5, Funny)
This probe goes in your mouth.. This one goes in your ear. This one goes in your butt..."
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:E-meter videos? (Score:5, Informative)
An e-meter isn't a voltmeter, it's a potentiometer (it measures resistance not voltage). It's based on a Wheatstone bridge design, and is a very sensitive way to measure the resistance between the probes. Since hydration levels, stress, sweat, etc., can all change the resistivity of human skin, an e-meter will measure these changes, which can then be (fraudulently) be interpreted as being of religious significance.
It's nothing more than a half-assed lie-detector.
Re:E-meter videos? (Score:5, Funny)
It's nothing more than a half-assed lie-detector.
And since lie-detectors themselves are no more than a half-assed lie-detectors, I'm curious as to exactly what fraction of an ass an e-meter has...
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
You'd think, then, that it'd be more effective in detecting the half-assed lies of the people promoting it...
It all depends on interpretation. The Roman Catholic Church tried something similar by keeping their holy texts locked in a (mostly) dead language. The flaw to this was that is was possible to learn the language. Scientology has managed to remove the flaw by replacing the language with a black box.