Tempers Flare Over Ill-Tempered Sword Remarks

msaulters writes "The Austin American Statesman is reporting on Daniel Watson, a Hays County swordsmith who is suing a group of San Francisco-based techies, charging that they extorted him by posting negative comments regarding his sword-making business on the discussion forums they host and then offering to clamp down on such comments if he bought advertising with them. On the one hand, this sounds very chilling, as the defendants, Sword Forum International, are very well-known and respected in the world of sword-making, and abuse of that position would be very un-cool. On the other hand, they make some valid points in the article, and historically, the ability to express your opinions freely online is one aspect of the internet that arguably should never be curtailed."

Comments

The Angel Sword website.

[immanis]

A look at their website should excite this thread (knowing geeks anyway).

It's hard to take this lawsuit seriously looking at this. And with terms like "Avatar of Techno-Wootz(TM) Damascus steel".

I wonder if we'd get sued for slashdotting their server.

so that 99 dollar ninja sword I got at the mall

[Sevn]

is a piece of junk? But it chops carrots in half
so easily.

Seriously though. Swords are really neat and all,
but what practical use do they have? NONE. There is
so much more I could spend 10 grand on that would
see actual use.

Old 240sx, sr20det engine, some mods, POW!
11 second car to scare the ricekids with for barely
8 grand

So yeah, a car isn't quite the same thing as a
sword, but I'd see more use out of the car. What
am I going to do with the sword? I can't carry it
conceiled. If I pull out my sword when 4 guys
jump me in an aly, I'm dead when they start
shooting me with their jennings 22 autoes and
tec-9's. A kid with a bb gun is going to fuck me
up pretty badly until I can get within sword
striking range. So a sword is kinda pointless in
light of current technology. It's "for pretty".
Or it's to satisfy that "I just gotta have one"
thing that happens after you rent Highlander.
But you can placate that need with a 99 dollar
flee market sword. So the moral of the story is,
don't spend 10 grand on a sword. Instead, make
yourself a Silvia clone with an old 240sx and a
sr20det crate motor instead. With the couple of
grand left over, get a membership at a decent
gym, buy a good handgun (like an HK USP Compact),
and take some martial arts and marksmanship
classes. Not only will you have a great car that
will annoy the hondahahaha crowd, you'll have a
great gun and know how to beat people up and
be all muscled and stuff. Sure beats the hell out
of laying in a pool of blood dying while someone
walks off with your 10,000 dollar sword.

Living Steel

[CritterNYC]

For the curious, here is a link to the "Living Steel" section of the angelsword.com site which no longer appears to be there, courtesy of archive.org.
Living Steel