Have they directly endorsed hate speech at freenode or not? As I said in my second post, I don't really give a flying f about what they may or may not have done elsewhere. I only care about what their official policy is at freenode.
And here I officially give up. You have clearly not read the thread. You are clearly refusing to read the thread. You have once again skipped through the posts about evidence, logs, and explicit acts of endorsement. And you've neatly cut out my linking to those posts about evidence in this very post you just quoted.
You are misunderstanding what I meant there. Those were not me asking you "where's the evidence?" as in me doubting there is any. Those were related to the statement in the original post about "implicit endorsement".
Let me rephrase: "Instead if accusing them of "implicit endorsement", the post should have kept to the facts and state the direct evidence to the stated freenode site policy." When I write something in the form of a question, like "have they directly endorsed hate speech or not?" what I mean is "show in the original arguments that they are endorsing hate speech, if they indeed have".
Since previous mods tried and failed to rerail the conversation and failed, I'm going to give an official warning. If I get another post that repeats this pattern, I will remove your ability to post.
Although one could question why it's necessary. I think everybody understands that certain degree of civility and good manners is to be expected. I highly doubt that someone scours such rules pages with a fine tooth comb and if they don't find something explicitly forbidding "hate speech", they take it as sign that they can freely engage in it, but if they see the sentence there, they will abstain from doing it. Forbidding something in some rules page isn't really any sort of deterrent.
It's a bit like saying "murder is not allowed here". Well, duh. I think that's clear to anybody without having to explicitly state it.
It's not how this works. People who care read it and act within those rules. Those who don't, get reminded and warned. And if someone ignores explicit mod warnings, they get banned.
I honestly don't understand what you mean. I'm being completely honest here, not confrontational.
I don't think that any person would go through the rules of the site, see that "hate speech" has not been explicitly forbidden, and then proceed to, for example, attack someone in the forum with racist slurs expecting it to be tolerated and not get banned. Even if someone came here to throw racist or other type of objectionable stuff, I highly doubt he would have scoured the rules of the site first in order to see if it has been explicitly banned or not. Such people don't usually read site rules and policies.
Likewise it's not like someone comes here, reads through the rules, sees that "hate speech will not be tolerated" and think to themselves "oh shoot, and I was going to throw racist slurs at people. Oh well, I suppose I can't do that now, since it has been explicitly banned. I'd better restrict myself."
I honestly cannot understand why such a statement in the rules is needed. As mentioned, there are literally thousands of different things that would not be tolerated here, and they are not all meticulously listed in the rules (that would make a quite long list indeed). From the literally thousands of things that could be listed in the rules, why is that one particular thing brought up?
It's a completely self-evident thing that wouldn't need to be stated. Everybody knows it without it being explicitly said.
Well, I know why it's there. It's a political statement. Deny it all you want, it still a political statement. It's not there because it needs to be. It's there to send a message. A political message. It's a message aimed primarily at people of a particular political disposition, I would say.
And this ties closely to my original objection: Political statements, and assumed political positions based on things not being said. If explicitly saying "hate speech is not tolerated" sends a political message, then some site not making that statement in their policy is assumed to be sending the opposite message.
I would seriously ask: I don't think the site rules needs that statement. Do you believe that this means I'm endorsing hate speech?
The only aspect that makes the post "very politically charged" according to this, is a decry of hate speech.
And there you go again, distorting what my objection and point was, and making yet again another politically charged and provocative statement, this time putting words in my mouth, words that I never said nor implied.
What is the objection here?
You are implying there that I objected to you "decrying of hate speech", when that's not what I did. What I objected to was the assumption that removing a part of a policy is "implicit endorsement of hate speech", as if something that's not being said is an endorsement of the opposite. It's the accusation that I was objecting to. An accusation based on something that's not being said rather than something that is being said. In other words, with the "implicit endorsement of hate speech" you are putting words in their mouths, words they haven't said. And by implying that I'm objecting to your "decry of hate speech", you are putting words in my mouth and distorting what I said.
Is the "politically charged content" not about the hate speech we decry?
No, it's about making accusations based on "implicit" words that have not been said. Implying policy that has not been stated. The whole "if they don't ban thing X, they are endorsing it" BS.
Also, is decrying hate speech a "provocative statement" now? This is your own words again, I'm not sure how else I should be interpreting those.
And you are doing it again. You are once again putting words in my mouth (quite directly this time), claiming that I have said something I have not. You honestly cannot see it?
I did not say that "decrying hate speech is a provocative statement".
At no point in this topic have your posts been about asking for facts and evidence.
My very first post was asking to keep to the facts rather than making implications and assumptions based on things that have not been said.
This is easy to notice, because facts and evidence have been spread plenty throughout the first few pages of this topic
Then why is the original post still making the exact same statement about "implicit endorsement of hate speech"? What's "implicit" about it if, according to you, there are so many facts?
Have they directly endorsed hate speech at freenode or not? As I said in my second post, I don't really give a flying f about what they may or may not have done elsewhere. I only care about what their official policy is at freenode.
You have come to this topic with the interest of debating the principles of free speech, sure.
I didn't originally come here to debate free speech. I originally objected to that one accusation of "implicit endorsement" in the original post. The free speech thing came when someone asked if I "like hate speech".
The first post of the thread is a stated reason as to why we are moving away from Freenode. Do you believe that we shouldn’t have a stance against hate speech because it’s political in nature? Is it not part of our freedom of speech to reject hate speech?
I said that if the thread starts with politically charged statements and accusations, it shouldn't be surprising to get politically charged responses. If the thread is supposed to be solely about moving a service to another host and nothing else, then don't then complain about someone commenting on the politically charged parts of the post.
The argument "why are you criticizing the original post for its political statements? It's his right to free speech to be able to make those statements" is nonsensical. If it's his freedom of speech right to make those statements, then likewise it's my freedom of speech right to scrutinize and criticize those statements.
I'm getting tired of that line of asinine argumentation. Like this:
Acumenium wrote:
But here you are trying to control other people's speech?
Asking for facts and evidence is not "trying to control other people's speech". That's just asinine. It's like:
"The defendant entered the house illegally."
"Do you have any factual evidence of this?"
"Why are you attacking my right free speech?!? Why are you trying to control my speech?"
"WTF?"
I have explained in great detail what freedom of speech is, but apparently completely in vain.
The only aspect that makes the post "very politically charged" according to this, is a decry of hate speech.
And there you go again, distorting what my objection and point was, and making yet again another politically charged and provocative statement, this time putting words in my mouth, words that I never said nor implied.
You just can't help it, can you? That's the thing about politics. Especially this particular kind of politics.
You made this about politics, not me. Don't whine when someone responds and criticizes when you make such politically charged statements and allegations. If this thread is not supposed to be about politics, then keep politics out of it. If you can't do that, then don't complain when it becomes political and heated.
This thread was meant to provide information on the process and the background, and collect feedback on the decision.
Given that that conversation is quite clearly over, do we have your permission to continue the conversation that was actually going on?
Given that the original post is very politically charged, it's unreasonable to not expect people to talk about related politics, dismiss it as "derailment", and stifle it.
If you want to create a topic related solely to the logistics of moving the IRC channel to another host, then by all means do so. To avoid political discussions, it's a good idea to make it as apolitical and neutral as possible. Overtly political statements elicit discussion and disagreement. If you make strong politically charged statements and accusations, expect equivalent feedback and criticism.
I wouldn't ever think to apply copyright to a speedrun. That would be vague at best (trying to copyright a strategy or form of playing a video game?) and disastrous at worst since you're... kind of saying you own a copyright of a copyrighted video game...
The question is not whether the speedrun itself is copyrighted, but whether the data file containing information about the timed key presses is copyrighted.
That file is original work, but whether it falls under copyright, I don't know.
Because I hate it when people are being accused base on assumptions and words put into their mouths. The accusations being presented here are quite serious. There's no place for assumptions, only facts. That's why.
The original post would have been just fine without that one tidbit.
Note that hate speech is a criminal offense in many jurisdictions.
This is a rather new development (in fact, that term "hate speech" is quite a neologism in itself) and in serious danger of being abused because the notion is poorly defined. Such laws can too easily be abused for political persecution, especially when they aren't clearly and narrowly defined and delineated, and especially when even the little definition there is, is based on what people "feel" and how they "perceive" something.
As I mentioned earlier, there are, and must be, limits to freedom of expression, but these limits should be as narrow as possible and very, very carefully considered. If the limits become too lax and too fuzzy, they inevitably lead to abuse and political persecution via the legal system.
If you don't defend other people's freedoms, one day you might find yourself on the receiving end of the punishment system that you helped create.
TASVideos appears to have similar rules. Are they also "some BS social justice language"?
It's one brief sentence that's far from the worst I have seen out there. It's fine.
Although one could question why it's necessary. I think everybody understands that certain degree of civility and good manners is to be expected. I highly doubt that someone scours such rules pages with a fine tooth comb and if they don't find something explicitly forbidding "hate speech", they take it as sign that they can freely engage in it, but if they see the sentence there, they will abstain from doing it. Forbidding something in some rules page isn't really any sort of deterrent.
It's a bit like saying "murder is not allowed here". Well, duh. I think that's clear to anybody without having to explicitly state it.
Warp, you're conflating the principle of free speech with entitlement to having your opinion be welcome. For instance, if I get on a phone call with you, and start going off about some subject that you don't care about, or otherwise make you bored or uncomfortable, you aren't in any way obligated to indulge me and keep listening to me.
No. Nobody can be forced to listen to someone's opinions if they don't want to. They are free to stop listening, leave, or if they are within the private property of the unwilling listener, the speaker can be trespassed.
I have never said otherwise.
Where your principles start playing more of a role is if you are offering a public forum for people to express their opinions, but then silence opinions you personally don't like. The forum might be your personal property and you may have 100% the legal (and even moral) right to ban anybody you want for whatever reason you want, but your banning actions reveal your attitude towards other people's free speech. If two people, other than you, are having a conversation in your forum, the conversation is relatively civil, no insults and threats are being posted, no illegal material is being posted, do you intervene if the conversation is about topics you abhor? Do you have an attitude of "this is my forum, owned by me, I decide what topics are allowed", or do you have an attitude of "as long as the conversation remains civil and legal, I'm fine with the expression of any opinion, even if I personally don't like it." Do you defend their right to express their opinions, or do you want to restrict what is being discussed in your forum because you don't like certain topics?
The principle of free speech entails many things. Among others:
- You are free to express your (non-illegal) opinions in a public forum without negative repercussions, and without being impeded or silenced. (Swearwords are not opinions. Not even if phrased as if they were opinions)
- You are free to comment on and criticize other people's opinions (preferably in a civil manner) without negative repercussions.
- You are not forced to listen to someone if you don't want to.
- You cannot be stopped nor interfered from listening to someone you want to listen to. The message being said cannot be censored or interfered with (eg. with noise), with the intentional purpose of making it harder to understand or listen to.
- You are not compelled, forced or coerced into saying something (or performing any other form of messaging) you don't want to.
If you think that when someone says something you don't like he should be punished in some manner, you do not support free speech. You support restricted speech.
You had to dig all the way back to 2015 to find something? Am I not allowed to change my opinion during these 6 years?
Anyway, did you read what I wrote about acting on behalf of an organization? I already addressed that previously. I was commenting on the behavior of a member of the site staff acting in his official capacity in the website.
You could perhaps have had more of a point if I had posted back then something like "I found this post by this tasvideos staff member that he made in 2003 in a forum about knitting that I really don't like, please fire him from the staff and ban him from the site."
No, but I'm a constitutionalist and free speech absolutist.
Absolute freedom of speech does not exist anywhere in the world and no one would even want that, including you. Or else, things like death threats would have to be legal.
"Free speech absolutism" does not mean "absolutely everything is allowed to be said." It means "free speech is unconditional, inalienable". It's the principle that you retain your right to free speech regardless of what you may or may not have done or said. Your right to free speech is not conditional on anything. Past (or even present) crimes and infractions do not affect it. You don't lose your right to free speech because you may have committed a heinous crime. Your right to free speech is absolute, irrevocable, inalienable, unconditional. Your right to free speech should not be restricted nor limited because of your past actions. If you allow person A to express opinions, you should also allow person B to express opinions even if you find that person B to be absolutely detestable because of past actions.
There are limits to free speech, but those limits should be as narrow as possible and very carefully considered. A balance should be found that maximizes freedom while restricting criminal activity.
"Free speech only binds the government" is just an excuse.
There are two aspects to free speech: The legal meaning of "right to free speech", and the principle of free speech. If you say "free speech only binds the government" you are not actually supporting free speech. You are not subscribing to Voltaire's sentiment of "but I will defend to the death your right to say it".
If you think that when someone says something you don't like he should be punished in some manner, you do not support free speech. You support restricted speech.
When someone says "freedom of speech does not mean freedom from consequences" that's absolutely incorrect: That's exactly what it means. That's because if there are negative consequences to you because of your expression of opinion, that's not free speech. That's restricted speech. It's punishable speech. It doesn't make any difference whether the punishment comes from the government or from the people around you, the end result is the same: Your speech has been restricted. Your expression of opinion has been restricted. The people who are punishing you are not defending your right to free speech, and are instead actively trying to restrict your free speech, to silence you.
This is not about criticism. Criticism in itself is part of the fundamental right to free speech. Trying to silence criticism is trying to restrict people's fundamental right to free speech. However, there's a huge categorical difference between criticism and punishment (eg. in the form of shunning, silencing, discrimination or even violence). Criticism is not a "consequence". It's the free exchange of ideas, without limitation and impediment. I can express my opinion, you can express your opinion, even if it disagrees with me and is about my opinion. Criticism should be welcome.
If you are yelled at, boycotted, have your show canceled, or get banned from an internet community, then your free speech rights are being violated. You are being punished for your expression of opinion. It doesn't make one iota of a difference that it's not the government that's punishing you. It doesn't really matter who is punishing you. The end result is the same.
People have the legal right to ban you from their property (or any property that they have the right to manage). They can ban you from that property if you are being disruptive, or even if they merely don't like what you are saying. That's their right as property owners. However, if they are merely banning you because they don't agree with your opinion and find it detestable, they are not adhering to the principle of free speech. Sure, they can build their private bubble where they don't have to listen to what they find detestable, and that's fine. But the degree to which they are willing to kick people out because of expression of opinion is a measurement of how willing they are to defend people's freedom of speech, to say whatever they want.
With "cancel culture" I'm referring to this notion that people should not be employed, or taken as members of some organization or group, if they have expressed some disagreeable opinions in the past or done something objectionable. The notion that if you employ such a person you are somehow endorsing what that person has done, said or believes. This whole thing about finding out what some staff members have said somewhere and holding it against the organization.
Allowing some of your employees to hold Communist beliefs is not an endorsement of Communism. Allowing some of them to hold conservative beliefs is not an endorsement of conservatism. Allowing some of them to hold far-right beliefs is not an endorsement of far-right ideology. As long as they keep their opinions to themselves and don't act according to those beliefs on behalf of the organization, that should be fine. People are free to think and say whatever they want, even if you find those things absolutely despicable. Employing those people is not an implicit endorsement. It only crosses the line when the person expresses those beliefs while representing the organization.
Reread the situation understand the situation an don't have your head up rasengan's ass cause that's what he is claiming it to be.
I have made zero claims about him, or freenode, or anything. I have not even claimed that his official public policy is not one of far-right extremism or whatever. The only thing I have said is that accusations should be based on direct facts, not on assumptions, speculation, putting-words-in-mouths, and implied intent.
Unless Warp you actually like hate speech?
No, but I'm a constitutionalist and free speech absolutist. I fully subscribe to the principle that Evelyn Beatrice Hall attributed to Voltaire: "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it."
But if you want facts, I've posted plenty of them in this thread, backed with sources and logs, including documented actual hate speech by newly-assigned freenode staff. Anything else you want to negate as "assumptions"?
To be absolutely honest, I don't give a flying f*** about what the staff may or may not have said in the past in other contexts. I only care about what the official stated policy of the site is. The current cancel culture can go to hell for all I care and I don't give a f*** about it. What matters is what the staff is saying in the context of the site now, not what they may have done or said elsewhere in the past. I don't assume intent. I only care about facts. I don't care what the employees of some company may have done in their free time. I only care what the company policy is, and what the employees say and do on behalf of the company.
There is no "implicit endorsement of hate speech". They either endorse it or they don't. Show me where they endorse it and I'll agree with you. Removing some BS social justice language from some random policy page is not endorsement of anything.
Just keep to the facts, and keep your assumptions out of it. You had tons of facts in your original post. Those were fine. The assumption was completely superfluous and unnecessary.
*Sigh*
Criticize them for what they have actually done and said. Don't put words in their mouth, if they haven't actually said those words. Keep to the facts. Don't speculate. Don't assume implication. Don't assign blame for something that has not actually been done. Facts, no assumptions.
There was recently (once again) a discussion about "arbitrary goals" (and "arbitrary restrictions"), and when is a goal too arbitrary.
IMHO this categorizes as such.
A co-author should be someone who directly contributed input to the run.
As I mentioned, when talking about timed key press files, "copyright" is a fuzzy area which, as far as I am aware, has never been tested or even opined about by copyright attorneys. It's not absolutely self-evident that it's copyrighted material.
Consider, for example, that the game recording (eg. in algebraic notation) of a chess game by two people is not copyrighted, even if it's novel and unique. This example comes awfully close to the keypress recording of a speedrun.
(For example, the text and illustrations of a food recipe falls under copyright, but not the recipe itself. Anybody can copy the recipe and republish at as long as they use their own wording and, if there are any, their own images.)
And this is why the recipe of Coca Cola is kept in grand secret.
That might be patentable (at least in some countries, like the US), but such a patent would have expired like half a century ago. So yeah, basically the only way for them to protect it is to keep it secret.
I submit movies allowing others to use my ideas as long as credit is given, per CC.
Creative Commons is a set of copyright-based usage licenses. "Ideas" do not fall under copyright. The way of doing something (eg. algorithms, instructions and game mechanics) do not fall under copyright. The exact text of a set of instructions, for example, would fall under copyright (with some exceptions and caveats) but not the algorithm or idea that the text conveys. (For example, the text and illustrations of a food recipe falls under copyright, but not the recipe itself. Anybody can copy the recipe and republish at as long as they use their own wording and, if there are any, their own images.)
Giving credit to someone else's work if it was used as a basis for a new original work may be the polite and honest thing to do, but there's usually no legal obligation to do so (with the caveat of so-called "derivative works", which is such a legal swamp that probably even most copyright lawyers don't fully understand it).
Even if it were public domain, there is still plagiarism protection.
No, there isn't. What you call "plagiarism protection" is just copyright, and "public domain" means literally "no copyright", which means no protection.
In addition, most jurisdictions do not recognize publishing works under "public domain" (with, usually, the exception of some governmental publications). All copyrightable works are copyrighted automatically and, in most jurisdictions, are in fact forcefully copyrighted no matter what the author may say or wish. The author may say "this work of mine is not copyrighted" but that doesn't make it so. "Public domain", in other words, "has no copyright", has a very specific meaning, and it's not a publication nor usage license. It is not a synonym for "you-can-do-whatever-you-want-with-it license".
(That being said, most judges would probably judge an author stating "this is published under public domain" to mean "this is published under a copyright license where I allow you to do anything you want with it, and I will never sue you for copyright infringement", and would thus strike down any lawsuit attempting to sue someone for copyright infringement of something that the author published as "public domain". But I don't think this has ever been actually tested in court, so it would depend on the jurisdiction and the judge.)
"Romeo & Juliet by DreamYao" would be plagiarism of Shakespeare's work
It would technically speaking be plagiarism, but it would not be illegal, as it's in the public domain and you can do whatever you want with it (other than claim copyright on it). There's no "plagiarism protection".
Likewise, you cannot steal the entire plot, setting, conflict, and structure of R&J and claim it is your own work just because you changed the characters' names.
Actually you can, because it's in the public domain. You may be considered an a-hole by doing so, but it's not illegal.
Anyway, this is rather irrelevant to the question at hand. We are not talking about PD works here. (For all intents and purposes no work that's newer than around 100 years is under PD, with the exception of some governmental publications, and some 40+ year old works that fell under PD by accident due to copyright law being different back then.)
To my knowledge (although I could well be wrong) no copyright attorneys have ever given their opinion on whether TASes fall under copyright or not (especially since TASes play games that are copyright to third-parties, ie. the game publishers). It's a fuzzy area, and it's not completely clear-cut. I suppose that until this is officially decided in a court of law (which is unlikely to ever happen) it's safest to assume that they do fall under copyright and thus using a copyright-based license (such as Creative Commons) is legit.
However, as mentioned before, describing a way of doing something (such as, for example, how to perform a particular glitch, or describing the most optimal route in a game) does not fall under copyright. A particular set of key inputs might (or might not), but the "algorithm" that this set of inputs implements in itself does not. You cannot claim copyright on a way of playing a game, or the way to do something. That just doesn't fall under copyright.
One of the classical original "objections" to special relativity is that of the beam of light moving on a surface. I think the original thought experiment is a circular screen of very large radius around a rotating spotlight, with the light spot on the screen seemingly moving faster than c. A more modern variant is beaming a laser onto the surface of the Moon and moving it around, the spot moving faster than c.
I have always found this objection quite simplistic and naive because anybody can understand why it's not valid. What I don't understand, however, is the refutation pretty much always given. I think it was originally given, and it's blindly repeated to this day. This refutation talks something strange about "information" and how it can't move faster than c, and yada yada.
I don't know why they came up with that strange argument about "information". The explanation is a lot simpler than that: Nothing is moving from point A to point B on the surface. There isn't anything, not a particle, not energy, nothing, that's moving from point A to point B. The appearance of movement is just an illusion that our brain creates, it's not something that's actually moving on the surface, from one place on the surface to another. It's merely light hitting the surface on a spot and reflecting back to the viewer. Any appearance of "movement" is just a visual illusion in our brain, not something actually physically moving on the surface. It's no different than if you flashed the spotlight for a millisecond to one direction and a microsecond later to a completely different direction. You'll see this spot of light suddenly "jump" from one place almost immediately to another, but nothing moved between those points. Any sense of "movement", or "jumping from one place to another" is just an interpretation of our brains.
I have no idea what "information" has anything to do with this. It's just much simpler to say "nothing is moving from one point to another on the surface".
I'd say that "you can't move information" explanation, while in some sense might be technically correct, is a rather non sequitur explanation, and a misleading one at that. It kind of implicitly admits that something is indeed moving from point A to point B on the surface, but due to some weird magic you can't transfer information between those points that fast, as if the thing moving on the surface magically moved faster than information. This is just all a huge red herring. "The limit of moving information" has nothing to do with this. Nothing is moving on the surface. I don't even understand why this is even brought up.
Yet, you still hear this strange explanation to this day, even from brilliant science popularizers like Neil Degrasse Tyson.
