I was just surfing through some pages on UK libel law and found this:
"It's not us saying it - we're just quoting him." One of the most common causes of libel actions is repeating statements made by people you interview and not being able to prove the truth of what they told you. In the early 90s newspapers had to pay damages to the Birmingham Six after they quoted former members of the West Midlands police as saying: "In our eyes their guilt is beyond doubt."
So, at least in the UK, maybe not such a good idea.
The law is a fact. The law implements the idea that the airwaves are a public trust. Equally real laws could have been written based on other ideas, and I have no doubt that various debates were held comparing those ideas back in the day.
I don't really mean to suggest that teenagers' lives are comparable, only that the government does not always find a compelling public interest in avoiding chaos. If you'd like a slightly more comparable view, note that while government does regulate many aspects of the public roads (signage, for instance, and the basic design of the cars and trucks,) no attempt is made to restrict the number of vehicles on the road -- roads are widened as needed in a system vaguely comparable to allocating more spectrum. When was the last time your government told you that you couldn't buy a second car because the roads were too chaotic? When did they suggest that perhaps you wouldn't be allowed to drive any longer because you weren't performing enough public service in your driving, like 2 hours a week for Meals on Wheels? And yet the highways and byways are, in fact, publicly funded and constructed, unlike the airwaves which are simply there -- it's not like the FCC constructed them.
Early TV, maybe. Amos & Andy, on the other hand, was non-operatic radio content beginning in, I believe, 1928. Painted Dreams first aired in 1930, sponsored by (wait for it) a soap company. That was also the year that the Shadow first learned what evil lay in the hearts of men.
I'll lay you a bet that there were people decrying radio as a cultural wasteland by 1935.
And no, that the airwaves are a public trust is not a "fact". Sure, without regulation there would be chaos. In fact, there was some chaos before regulation. That alone doesn't make them public property, anymore than a teenager's social life (typically more chaotic) is somehow therefore a public trust. I don't contest the utility of regulation, but don't make it sound like physicists detected radio waves and their public trust detectors went off as well.
There was a time in this country where the airwaves were devoted to serving the public interest. Exposing people to things they'd never see elsewise. Things along that line. Thats the intent of the public airwaves.
And just when the hell was that?
The FCC didn't create the airwaves, they just stepped in to regulate them. At best, they've encouraged / required broadcasters to provide some useful content. The argument was that the airwaves are a finite resource and that the public deserves some payback for their use.
However, if you think that David Sarnoff pioneered some sort of proto-NPR, then I'm afraid you're mistaken. Shock-jock stuff may be fairly new, but sitcoms, soap operas, and advertizing have been there pretty much from the get-go.
Well, if by, "a fine back in '92" you're suggesting that he's had an unblemished record otherwise, no, apparently not. In fact, it looks like he's had brushes with the FCC since 1988.
As for the firing, I was actually referring to his departure from WNBC in New York (paragraph 7, I think), a few years after the Air Florida incident (for which, I might add, I would have fired him myself.)
Do I care if he says "shitpissfuckniggerspicasshole" on the air? Not a lot. Like I say, I've been ignoring him for over 20 years, and since he ignores me as well, we get along fine.
(who is strongly anti-Bush, if that's a coinsidence I'll eat my shoe)
Well, he's had fines for this sort of thing going back to at least 1992, and lost a job over it as early as 1985, so I'd recommend lots of Worcestershire sauce.
As for me, I've been finding him unfunny since I lived in Ann Arbor in 1980.
Everybody says "Howard Stern was fined", but in fact ClearChannel was fined, not Stern. If the company chooses not to contest the charge, there isn't a hell of a lot that Stern can do about it.
I suppose that he could try to sue the FCC -- he did get fired over this stuff, so he's arguably an injured party.
The only reason it's illegal to buy a contest entry from a restaurant is that for-profit enterprises are not allowed to gamble in most states (and are heavily regulated in others, like Nevada.)
Elections are run by state and local governments, who are allowed to run gambling operations. How many states run lotteries even as we speak?
Well, that sounds like most places, really -- roughly half the population is below average.
I know jury consultants make money, but so do psychic healers and Congressmen. I'm just wondering if they really do any good. Just as my single datum may reflect the whole badly, the whole is often a terrible predictor of any one datum. Knowing that middle-aged single gay men of Asian descent responded positively to red paisley ties 73% of the time doesn't mean that you won't get the guy who's driven to seizures by the sight of paisley, and the world of marketing is littered with products that just didn't sell, in spite of all the audience surveys, test markets, and buckets full of statistics. I suspect, but don't know, that the jails are filling with guys moaning, "But the focus group responded so well...
Well yes, of course mine is a single datum. Still, given that anybody this side of the Amish gets pretty constant exposure to shiny things, I can't imagine that the people of Madison County will be awe-struck by a series of bullet charts with fades.
Has anybody ever really demonstrated that jury consultants have a clue? I suspect that, like advertising, it's largely voodoo.
I suspect that if you were a wrongfully-accused defendant, you'd be in favor of any and every means of presenting your defense, and why the hell not?
Presentation software isn't any more hypnotic than graphs and charts. I can't see where only allowing flip charts drawn by hand will do anything but favor the side with access to better graphic artists -- at least presentation software (PowerPoint, OpenOffice, or whatever) is within the means of any law firm with a PC.
Besides, I've been on a jury, and contrary to apparent popular belief the little stick-on "JUROR" badge does not immediately render one a drooling idiot -- Jury Duty was not a documentary. I found that my fellow jurors were at least as bright and reasonable as most people I've met, and a good deal more thoughtful than many. We all listened carefully, took our work seriously, and rendered what we believed to be a fair decision (which may be why we ended hung -- we split somewhere around 7-5.) I think most of that group had seen bullet charts before, and I doubt we would have been especially moved if the defendant had brought in pony rides, or if the state had put on a chorus line (although I've always found Esther Williams swimming extravaganzas to be very persuasive, especially with regard to fingerprint evidence.)
I think you're missing my point. I didn't dump any wine, and I enjoyed my burgers with French fries. Aside from the occasional teasing comment, I have nothing but respect for France.
My point is that people will disagree, and that when they do so, their responses can range from dumping wine bottles to, well, flying airplanes into office buildings. I prefer the former, and I think it should be encouraged. If you disagree with me on this, please burn me in effigy.
Well, I don't know about "millions", but certainly I've seen CNN cover anti-war demonstrations, and I suspect you have too (unless those demonstrators were marching past your window, I'm thinking somebody had coverage or you wouldn't have known about them.)
Actually, I still think the wine-dumping and yes, the renaming of French fries and toast, were entirely appropriate. These were peaceful actions of civilized people who disagreed with other civilized people and chose a symbolic response. No Frenchmen were harmed in the making of this protest. This is pretty much how this sort of thing should go, which is why I also support flag-burning -- angry people should express themselves in angry, yet peaceful, ways.
(Besides, I'll bet that all 12 of those people turned around and replaced those bottles of wine about 15 minutes later, so ultimately it slightly stimulated wine sales.)
Hmmm...I'm thinking you need to read back over the various posts in this thread. The original AC post asserted an ISP's property rights over email. I asked if he felt that way about phone calls as well, being reasonably certain that, in fact, he'd yell blue murder if his phone company did any such thing. In other words, and work through this as slowly as you need to, you and I were agreeing on this point, except for the part where you called me a moron.
Perhaps I should just make it completely explicit: I DISAGREE with the premise that an ISP has ownership over email passing through their servers, and I attempted to show a similar, older, set of circumstances, namely phone calls and the phone company, in which few would argue that the conversations are company property.
Thanks for not being AC this time, BTW. Nice to meet you.
All these comments and not one reference to The Puppet Masters? I'd be shocked at the decline in American literacy, but it's even been made into a movie.
Slashdot Mirror
So can I find you in the phonebook under "ducomputergeek"?
So, at least in the UK, maybe not such a good idea.
Well, they just might skip the Martha Stewart article this year...
I think you meant this.
Really? In the land of goatsex man, you can't imagine a worse logo? (shudder) How I envy you...
I don't really mean to suggest that teenagers' lives are comparable, only that the government does not always find a compelling public interest in avoiding chaos. If you'd like a slightly more comparable view, note that while government does regulate many aspects of the public roads (signage, for instance, and the basic design of the cars and trucks,) no attempt is made to restrict the number of vehicles on the road -- roads are widened as needed in a system vaguely comparable to allocating more spectrum. When was the last time your government told you that you couldn't buy a second car because the roads were too chaotic? When did they suggest that perhaps you wouldn't be allowed to drive any longer because you weren't performing enough public service in your driving, like 2 hours a week for Meals on Wheels? And yet the highways and byways are, in fact, publicly funded and constructed, unlike the airwaves which are simply there -- it's not like the FCC constructed them.
I'll lay you a bet that there were people decrying radio as a cultural wasteland by 1935.
And no, that the airwaves are a public trust is not a "fact". Sure, without regulation there would be chaos. In fact, there was some chaos before regulation. That alone doesn't make them public property, anymore than a teenager's social life (typically more chaotic) is somehow therefore a public trust. I don't contest the utility of regulation, but don't make it sound like physicists detected radio waves and their public trust detectors went off as well.
And just when the hell was that?
The FCC didn't create the airwaves, they just stepped in to regulate them. At best, they've encouraged / required broadcasters to provide some useful content. The argument was that the airwaves are a finite resource and that the public deserves some payback for their use.
However, if you think that David Sarnoff pioneered some sort of proto-NPR, then I'm afraid you're mistaken. Shock-jock stuff may be fairly new, but sitcoms, soap operas, and advertizing have been there pretty much from the get-go.
Well, some of us aren't very imaginative when it comes to nicks...
Thank you. I'll be here all week.
Hence the phrase, "second opinion."
As for the firing, I was actually referring to his departure from WNBC in New York (paragraph 7, I think), a few years after the Air Florida incident (for which, I might add, I would have fired him myself.)
Do I care if he says "shitpissfuckniggerspicasshole" on the air? Not a lot. Like I say, I've been ignoring him for over 20 years, and since he ignores me as well, we get along fine.
Well, he's had fines for this sort of thing going back to at least 1992, and lost a job over it as early as 1985, so I'd recommend lots of Worcestershire sauce.
As for me, I've been finding him unfunny since I lived in Ann Arbor in 1980.
I suppose that he could try to sue the FCC -- he did get fired over this stuff, so he's arguably an injured party.
Elections are run by state and local governments, who are allowed to run gambling operations. How many states run lotteries even as we speak?
That September will finally end?
Is that anything like breeding terrorism?
I know jury consultants make money, but so do psychic healers and Congressmen. I'm just wondering if they really do any good. Just as my single datum may reflect the whole badly, the whole is often a terrible predictor of any one datum. Knowing that middle-aged single gay men of Asian descent responded positively to red paisley ties 73% of the time doesn't mean that you won't get the guy who's driven to seizures by the sight of paisley, and the world of marketing is littered with products that just didn't sell, in spite of all the audience surveys, test markets, and buckets full of statistics. I suspect, but don't know, that the jails are filling with guys moaning, "But the focus group responded so well...
Has anybody ever really demonstrated that jury consultants have a clue? I suspect that, like advertising, it's largely voodoo.
Presentation software isn't any more hypnotic than graphs and charts. I can't see where only allowing flip charts drawn by hand will do anything but favor the side with access to better graphic artists -- at least presentation software (PowerPoint, OpenOffice, or whatever) is within the means of any law firm with a PC.
Besides, I've been on a jury, and contrary to apparent popular belief the little stick-on "JUROR" badge does not immediately render one a drooling idiot -- Jury Duty was not a documentary. I found that my fellow jurors were at least as bright and reasonable as most people I've met, and a good deal more thoughtful than many. We all listened carefully, took our work seriously, and rendered what we believed to be a fair decision (which may be why we ended hung -- we split somewhere around 7-5.) I think most of that group had seen bullet charts before, and I doubt we would have been especially moved if the defendant had brought in pony rides, or if the state had put on a chorus line (although I've always found Esther Williams swimming extravaganzas to be very persuasive, especially with regard to fingerprint evidence.)
My point is that people will disagree, and that when they do so, their responses can range from dumping wine bottles to, well, flying airplanes into office buildings. I prefer the former, and I think it should be encouraged. If you disagree with me on this, please burn me in effigy.
Actually, I still think the wine-dumping and yes, the renaming of French fries and toast, were entirely appropriate. These were peaceful actions of civilized people who disagreed with other civilized people and chose a symbolic response. No Frenchmen were harmed in the making of this protest. This is pretty much how this sort of thing should go, which is why I also support flag-burning -- angry people should express themselves in angry, yet peaceful, ways.
(Besides, I'll bet that all 12 of those people turned around and replaced those bottles of wine about 15 minutes later, so ultimately it slightly stimulated wine sales.)
No sweat. It's not hard to lose track of who said what and in what order amidst the elemental chaos that is slashdot.
Perhaps I should just make it completely explicit: I DISAGREE with the premise that an ISP has ownership over email passing through their servers, and I attempted to show a similar, older, set of circumstances, namely phone calls and the phone company, in which few would argue that the conversations are company property.
Thanks for not being AC this time, BTW. Nice to meet you.
All these comments and not one reference to The Puppet Masters? I'd be shocked at the decline in American literacy, but it's even been made into a movie.