5 ms·

NZ goes even further, threatening 10 years prison for a “possession of a video”. Kiwis have gone bananas. https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-03-16/nz-threaten

NZ goes even further, threatening 10 years prison for a “possession of a video”. Kiwis have gone bananas. https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-03-16/nz-threatens-10-years-prison-possessing-mosque-shooting-video-web-hosts-warned https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-03-16/nz-threatens-10-ye...

huffmsa 8y ago
It still strikes me that it can be illegal to be in possession of a device which has a certain combination of positive and negative polarities embedded in it. Shakespeare's typing monkeys come to mind.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- gbear605 8y ago
  In the end, everything is just subatomic particles arranged in different ways, so why should anything be illegal? If you’re going to reduce one idea to its base elements, you should at least be consistent. On the other hand, perhaps if we think about everything at a more reasonable level, we can see why some digital things should be illegal, just as some physical things should be illegal.
  - internet_user 8y ago
    Illegal physical things? illegal digital things? What's next, illegal source code? Maybe you should just start with illegal thoughts right off the bat?
- darkpuma 8y ago
  Does it also strike you as strange that it can be illegal to make certain cuts on a piece of metal? (e.g. machine gun manufacture laws that exist on nearly every corner of the planet) I find that these kind of reductive arguments floated for digital subjects fall apart when you remove the computer from the equation.
  - colejohnson66 8y ago
    > I find that these kind of reductive arguments floated for digital subjects fall apart when you remove the computer from the equation. The “illegal numbers” concept is something I find interesting. Just because a certain number can be used to decrypt BluRays, it’s illegal
    - dTal 8y ago
      That only seems odd because it's a flawed intuition pump: a "number" feels like a small, innocent, abstract and singular thing, while "data" feels large and complex and rich with potential. But a "number" can be any size. A dump of Wikipedia is a "number". All information, and hence all secrets, are "numbers". The notion of an "illegal number" is just a weird way of phrasing the idea of government-enforced secrecy. 128 bits is about the threshold where a "number" stops behaving like our intuition of a number, and starts being rare enough that you won't arrive at an "illegal" number by counting or chance, i.e. it is now a "file" for all practical purposes: https://qntm.org/number https://qntm.org/number
  - huffmsa 8y ago
    Yes actually I do think they're ridiculous for physical things too. I take a pretty libertarian lean on most things.
- chillacy 8y ago
  A living body and dead body have the same number of particles and mass, why do people make a big deal about it?
ihuman 8y ago
What law makes possession of the video illegal? The post mentioned "possession of objectionable material" is illegal, but that sounds way to vague.
- microcolonel 8y ago
  Vagueness doctrine is an American innovation, as far as I'm aware.
  - danso 8y ago
    Was curious to see if it drew from somewhere like British common law, but didn't see it in the Wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vagueness_doctrine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vagueness_doctrine > The following pronouncement of the void for vagueness doctrine was made by Justice Sutherland in Connally v. General Construction Co., 269 U.S. 385, 391 (1926): > [T]he terms of a penal statute [...] must be sufficiently explicit to inform those who are subject to it what conduct on their part will render them liable to its penalties… and a statute which either forbids or requires the doing of an act in terms so vague that men of common intelligence must necessarily guess at its meaning and differ as to its application violates the first essential of due process of law.
- wbl 8y ago
  NZ and Australia have censorship laws. Needless to say LGBTQ texts were censored far more than straight ones.
bigJails 8y ago
Imagine how big the jails would need to be to realistically support such a policy. Furthermore, I think we all know almost no one is going to do the full ten years. I mean what a waste. Any jail time at all, over a video saved on a device, is patently unjust, but the idea that anybody’s not getting commuted to probation after maybe one night, 30 days for mouthing off or even a whopping 6 months possibly for violent behavior behind bars is a joke. Unless, of course, you’ve got for-profit prison corporations in the mix...
eclipxe 8y ago
When did zerohedge become so...bad. The comments on that thread are atrocious. It wasn’t always like that.
- sjcsjc 8y ago
  ZeroHedge's comments have been appalling for several years. They made a switch some time ago so that they don't show by default. Frankly I don't see why they don't simply ditch their comments section, but that's there business not mine.
- pessimizer 8y ago
  around 2011, insanely racist; around 2012-13, fully anti-semitic
internet_user 8y ago
Insanity.
andyv 8y ago
... and for about the millionth, time I'm glad the US has that pesky First Amendment.

huffmsa 8y ago

It still strikes me that it can be illegal to be in possession of a device which has a certain combination of positive and negative polarities embedded in it. Shakespeare's typing monkeys come to mind.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
gbear605 8y ago
In the end, everything is just subatomic particles arranged in different ways, so why should anything be illegal? If you’re going to reduce one idea to its base elements, you should at least be consistent. On the other hand, perhaps if we think about everything at a more reasonable level, we can see why some digital things should be illegal, just as some physical things should be illegal.
- internet_user 8y ago
  Illegal physical things? illegal digital things? What's next, illegal source code? Maybe you should just start with illegal thoughts right off the bat?
darkpuma 8y ago
Does it also strike you as strange that it can be illegal to make certain cuts on a piece of metal? (e.g. machine gun manufacture laws that exist on nearly every corner of the planet) I find that these kind of reductive arguments floated for digital subjects fall apart when you remove the computer from the equation.
- colejohnson66 8y ago
  > I find that these kind of reductive arguments floated for digital subjects fall apart when you remove the computer from the equation. The “illegal numbers” concept is something I find interesting. Just because a certain number can be used to decrypt BluRays, it’s illegal
  - dTal 8y ago
    That only seems odd because it's a flawed intuition pump: a "number" feels like a small, innocent, abstract and singular thing, while "data" feels large and complex and rich with potential. But a "number" can be any size. A dump of Wikipedia is a "number". All information, and hence all secrets, are "numbers". The notion of an "illegal number" is just a weird way of phrasing the idea of government-enforced secrecy. 128 bits is about the threshold where a "number" stops behaving like our intuition of a number, and starts being rare enough that you won't arrive at an "illegal" number by counting or chance, i.e. it is now a "file" for all practical purposes: https://qntm.org/number https://qntm.org/number
- huffmsa 8y ago
  Yes actually I do think they're ridiculous for physical things too. I take a pretty libertarian lean on most things.
chillacy 8y ago
A living body and dead body have the same number of particles and mass, why do people make a big deal about it?

ihuman 8y ago

What law makes possession of the video illegal? The post mentioned "possession of objectionable material" is illegal, but that sounds way to vague.

microcolonel 8y ago
Vagueness doctrine is an American innovation, as far as I'm aware.
- danso 8y ago
  Was curious to see if it drew from somewhere like British common law, but didn't see it in the Wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vagueness_doctrine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vagueness_doctrine > The following pronouncement of the void for vagueness doctrine was made by Justice Sutherland in Connally v. General Construction Co., 269 U.S. 385, 391 (1926): > [T]he terms of a penal statute [...] must be sufficiently explicit to inform those who are subject to it what conduct on their part will render them liable to its penalties… and a statute which either forbids or requires the doing of an act in terms so vague that men of common intelligence must necessarily guess at its meaning and differ as to its application violates the first essential of due process of law.
wbl 8y ago
NZ and Australia have censorship laws. Needless to say LGBTQ texts were censored far more than straight ones.

bigJails 8y ago

Imagine how big the jails would need to be to realistically support such a policy. Furthermore, I think we all know almost no one is going to do the full ten years. I mean what a waste. Any jail time at all, over a video saved on a device, is patently unjust, but the idea that anybody’s not getting commuted to probation after maybe one night, 30 days for mouthing off or even a whopping 6 months possibly for violent behavior behind bars is a joke. Unless, of course, you’ve got for-profit prison corporations in the mix...

eclipxe 8y ago

When did zerohedge become so...bad. The comments on that thread are atrocious. It wasn’t always like that.

sjcsjc 8y ago
ZeroHedge's comments have been appalling for several years. They made a switch some time ago so that they don't show by default. Frankly I don't see why they don't simply ditch their comments section, but that's there business not mine.
pessimizer 8y ago
around 2011, insanely racist; around 2012-13, fully anti-semitic

internet_user 8y ago

Insanity.

andyv 8y ago

... and for about the millionth, time I'm glad the US has that pesky First Amendment.