Microsoft knows very well that people will just write "thep!!!!!ratebay.se/slug".
Microsoft Censors Pirate Bay Links in Windows Live Messenger
81–90 of 188 posts
Re: Microsoft Censors Pirate Bay Links in Windows Live Messenger
#82Earlier quoted context omitted.
Because people consider what they send in their email to be theirs , not something a faceless corporation has graciously allowed them to utter. People are also beginning to correlate these mega-companies with government-type power, especially over information (hense the use of the word "censor"). Combine these, and you get the outrage.
But IM providers censor malware links and other scams all the time, and your email provider censors or outright blocks spammers for probably up to 50% or more of your mail volume. Clearly people do actually expect certain classes of communication to be actively intercepted.
People expect something that was not intentionally sent by their friends to be actively intercepted. While making the technical distinction may sometimes be tricky, the emotional distinction is fairly straight forward.
Re: Microsoft Censors Pirate Bay Links in Windows Live Messenger
#83Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm disappointed to see the destruction of property rights (intellectual or otherwise) being lauded on HN. The RIAA and MPAA make deals with artists to distribute their music, and you want to interfere and just steal it instead. It's dishonest, it's juvenile, and it's eroding at the basis of society (equality under the law, property rights, basic respect and goodwill towards others, etc.).
What is fascinating to me is the hypocrisy. Most HNers probably believe some sort of property rights for software (or even blog designs). May here would argue that the GPL is a great license and violators should be punished. You can also often read that Hollywood and the Music Industry are producing worthless crap, but yet The Pirate Bay is dominated by commercial entertainment, not by Creative Commons content. Much…
I really don't see much/any hypocrisy in the comments I've read. There aren't exactly many people just saying "Pirate ALL the things!".
There are legitimate reasons to be concerned by these constant attempts to attack certain technology or websites. Personally, I think that having a society that thinks that censorship is a good way to deal with ideas you dislike, which is where we're heading if this keeps up, is a lot more dangerous than intellectual property theft.
Hell, it has been known for years that certain ISPs even go as far as to throttle ALL bittorrent traffic and despite what the MPAA would like people to believe some of the bittorrent use is perfectly legal. World of Warcraft actually uses bittorrent for their patches.
As well, there are the facts that: -Laws have been passed that are so excessive in punishment that judges are actually slashing the penalties, and there are even stronger laws that lobbyists are trying to get passed. -This idea of protecting intellectual property at all costs has led to modern electronics devices being very rigidly controlled to the point that if you try to modify YOUR device to just install linux or something, you might be a criminal. -Copyright lasts a ridiculously long time. There should definitely be some rights so that the creator can benefit, but almost a century is too long.
Re: Microsoft Censors Pirate Bay Links in Windows Live Messenger
#84We'll be seeing a lot more of this in the next couple of years. The RIAA and the MPAA will get more and more desperate and will call in more favors with industry buddies as they get closer to the recognition that they are losing the war in spite of winning a couple of battles. In the Netherlands 'Brein', one of the rights organizations has done more to promote the pirate bay than the pirate bay ever could have hoped…
We'll know it's over when the music industry distributes music via torrent, by which time they'll be lobbying against direct brain transfer from band to listener.
Sheet music, records, radio, TV, VHS, CDs, DVDs, ...
What makes you think that pattern has finished?
Re: Microsoft Censors Pirate Bay Links in Windows Live Messenger
#85The world has gone mad.
Re: Microsoft Censors Pirate Bay Links in Windows Live Messenger
#86While I'd be willing to bet this is due to some malware flag (as that pretty much always ends up being the case with IM provider X is censoring Y), I am baffled as to why people would consider it scandalous that a multi-billion dollar company who makes pretty much all of its revenue from selling intellectual property licenses might drop links conveyed using its free service to a site that is unabashedly one of the wo…
Because now they have taken a role of pro-active censorship/moderation of private communication. Will Hotmail allow such links for long? How about Bing? Can I paste these links in an Excel/Word file on Office365? What about non-free services like MS Lync, Exchange, and Outlook? Forget the need for deep-packet inspection. If major web services stop users from linking to TPB and other sites, MPAA etc. will have accompl…
Microsoft has done stuff like this with MSN messenger for as long as I can remember. At least five years. The specific sites that are blocked frequently includes entirely harmless ones.
Between blocking messages "for users' own good" and other technical issues (80% of message I send to certain users are dropped silently), MSNM is by far the least reliable messaging system out there. Nobody should be using that piece of shit in the first place.
Re: Microsoft Censors Pirate Bay Links in Windows Live Messenger
#87Earlier quoted context omitted.
We'll know it's over when the music industry distributes music via torrent, by which time they'll be lobbying against direct brain transfer from band to listener.
Sheet music, records, radio, TV, VHS, CDs, DVDs, ... What makes you think that pattern has finished?
Itunes sales figures.
Re: Microsoft Censors Pirate Bay Links in Windows Live Messenger
#88Re: Microsoft Censors Pirate Bay Links in Windows Live Messenger
#89Earlier quoted context omitted.
But IM providers censor malware links and other scams all the time, and your email provider censors or outright blocks spammers for probably up to 50% or more of your mail volume. Clearly people do actually expect certain classes of communication to be actively intercepted.
People expect something that was not intentionally sent by their friends to be actively intercepted. While making the technical distinction may sometimes be tricky, the emotional distinction is fairly straight forward.
You're right, it's an emotional distinction. Let me illustrate. A man operates a gay rights message board that includes private messages. He tolerates alternate viewpoints, but after a particularly bad flamefest he uses a plugin to ban linking to a hate speech site that is especially contrary to the aims of the forum that he pays for out of his own pocket. It extends to PMs. He explains that if you want to trade such links you're welcome to go elsewhere.
Reasonable?
Re: Microsoft Censors Pirate Bay Links in Windows Live Messenger
#90Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you don't like the words, good, go look at the moral foundation that underlies the idea. It is a fact of reality that it is morally right to give people ownership rights for things they produce (besides, again, being the basis of society). And why not? Paying for something rather than stealing it (or changing the law so it's not officially "stealing" anymore), just isn't that big of a deal.
A "fact of reality", like physics? You need to justify your arguments using logic, not incredible assertions.
Yes, precisely, like physics.
I can't justify that claim on HN, for the same reason I can't prove the contents of Physics 101 on HN. If you're curious about my claims, you'll have to go investigate more on your own.