Posts by Moz
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Hard News: MegaBox: From f**k-all to zero, in reply to Freddie Fleetstreet,
Nobody can sensibly argue that megaupload was not a file sharing business that provided users with an alexandra library of free copyright material.
I didn't think anyone was trying to. But the claim that by stopping MegaUpload something has been done about piracy is one that seems to be made distressingly often by people who seem otherwise rational. I think it's just another iteration of one of a variety of schemes to protect legacy media and they have all failed. It looks as though "ads next to the content" is going down the same drain.
Like I/S, I'm blocking all the ads I can. I don't know what he does, but I pay for a chunk of content every year. I prefer to do that by directly sending money to people I choose, rather than having my bandwidth and attention taken by intermediaries who promise to pass on a cut to whoever claims to own the content. When I see Russell say that he gets effectively nothing out of that misappropriation that makes me even more inclined to block ads.
Maybe I'm too much of an anarchist or nihilist, but to me if a system is not working but lingers around like prawn juice soaked into the carpet, the best approach is to help its demise. Block ads, don't buy ads, actively look for better ways to monetise your content.
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Legal Beagle: The hopeful disallowance…, in reply to John Holley,
(quoting Graeme, not John)
There are also very good reasons to suppress identity in disciplinary proceedings relating to doctors and other medical professionals. They decisions are appropriately made on a case-by-case basis.
I would generalise that to any disciplinary proceeding. Doctors are not more special than judges or bus drivers. As you say (repeatedly) the legal system has ways to deal with this.
To me it's of more concern that those methods are often ineffectual. and commonly fail completely since the spread of the interwebpipething (to use the legal term). Unfortunately it's all too easy to bypass legal secrecy with a little work, and public interest generally leads to crowdsourcing of the effort.
To me, that's an argument for working on the social license part of the legal system rather than the technical/theoretical side. Crowdsourcing relies on social license and to a large extent I think that democracy in action. As with things like music "piracy", once the majority of the population not only disagree with you, but don't understand why you're still going on about it, it's time to accept that you have lost the argument.
I'm more interested in how we can on the one hand understand what secrecy most people think is reasonable, and on the other hand how we can persuade ourselves to accept more secrecy than we have now. Well, I do, because I think there's too much disclosure too often right now. Or maybe more accurately, I think the disclosure is too random and inconsistent. That leads to fairness issues, where someone with social power can significantly harm their enemy by publicising information, and their victim cannot respond for fear of legal repercussions.
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Legal Beagle: The hopeful disallowance…, in reply to Graeme Edgeler,
Now if only I could invoice someone for it! You out there, Bryce Johns? I'm very reasonably priced :-)
In the context of this report I think you should be cautious about wanting to invoice someone for absolutely everything you do that is related to legal practice...
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Hard News: The mathematics of marriage, in reply to BenWilson,
BenWilson: Bob McCoskrie comes hurtling down in his speedos...
I imagine him to be more of a stripey full body one-piece kind of guy, possibly with a bathing hat.Something like this? http://www.anorak.co.uk/234387/news/flashback/winston-churchill-a-life-in-rare-and-memorable-pictures.html/?pid=4808#img
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Hard News: The mathematics of marriage, in reply to BenWilson,
Now that I've been off and done some work I return and there's so much talking behind my back going on! I am horrified at you people. Honestly!
Moz, I'm curious where you draw a line of calling something a poly relationship, as compared to merely causal and non-monogamous. Is there a line?
My line is largely a personal one, with a bit of "however you want to describe your situation" thrown in. I don't think I know any really "no strings attached" sex people, everyone seems to be somewhere on the line between fcukbuddies and one true love. I've definitely started relationships with people I barely knew by jumping into sex with them, but I use the same term to describe the woman that's been sleeping in my bed for the last 10 years.
There's also a gap between how I describe what I'm doing and how I use terms to describe other people. I stayed with one group who had an open marriage where one non-married couple had been together for about 20 years and they had lived together for almost as long. But they weren't polyamorous, and definitely not in a de facto marriage. Whatever. Fine, you're not even a couple, you're just Sam and Bob (names have been changed to irritate the difficult).
To me it's partly about respect. I've had partners be unfaithful to me, once from within a polyamorous relationship, and to me that was damaging to the relationship. Other partners have not made that promise, and that's been fine. At heart to me polyamoury is about having some level of commitment to your partners. It doesn't have to be much, but it has to be kept. So fuckbuddies who do the "use barrier contraception and disclose risks" count to me if they want to. Someone "dating around" without being explicit about it, probably not.
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Hard News: The mathematics of marriage, in reply to Craig Young,
Moz, what's the debate like within the bisexual community? Other bifolk have told me that it's between serial monogamists and polyamorists. The serial monogamist contingent seem to support (deep breath) monogamous civil marriage equality because it will mean that their own same-sex relationships will be entitled to equal recognition.
I dunno, I'm only on the fringe of one little part of it. I'm more "will campaign a bit, but not hugely active", so I'm not seeing the full gamut of opinions within the supporters camp. And the part that I'm on the fringe of seems to match the Canadian stats - it's mostly white, educated etc. Obviously enough I'm on the poly side of the debate and tend to hang out more with the poly crew (where all the women are bisexual and all the men are frustrated horndogs :) than the bi crew. I do meet monosexuals in this context, but they're almost always poly. Or "not poly but in a poly relationship" [1]
There's also a bit of a gap between the youf, some of whom are not so much into rigid gender/sexuality roles, and the older generation (me!) who like nice solid boxes to put ourselves in. I know more under-25 people who identify as genderqueer polyamorous than as GLB. But that's possibly because mostly I meet them via poly groups. It's also a useful identity when you're young and growing/ changing/ exploring, as well as being so new that anyone over 30 is unlikely to really have had the opportunity to use it. When I was at university I knew people who fitted the description and behaviour to some extent, but having a more overtly known description and label makes it easier to reveal the behaviour.
So, for me, marriage equality is about trying to find something that works for more people, rather than drawing a line and saying "this far, and no further. Ever!" My lived experience is that being recognised as a monogamous bisexual is hard and I cannot for the life of me see how being a gay-married, monogamous bisexual would make that easier. I haven't seen it happen with straight-married monogamous bisexuals. The desire among many marriage advocates is very much for traditional rigidly defined marriage, just with one little tweak to the rules. And there are a lot of bi/poly/queer kids going "meh, not relevant to me or anyone I care deeply about". Some of them are active in the campaign anyway, because they are incrementalists or simply because they're in activist circles and this is the current campaign. I suspect a few are even "this will screw up marriage, bring it on".
[1] whether it is "a poly relationship" or "some poly relationships" is an interesting question. I tend to count one relationship per couple, because IME that's what it ends up being. Triads are rare (and seem to be fluid when they happen), more common are V's, W's etc. So a monogamous monosexual can be in a relationship with a polyamorite who is in multiple relationships with people of multiple gender identities.
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Hard News: The mathematics of marriage, in reply to Keir Leslie,
For that matter, not everyone wishing to engage in a same-sex marriage is gay or lesbian, and it is a bit annoying to subsume those other identities into that when discussing this issue.
I'm not sure how they are not subsumed. The change extends legally privileged serial monogamy to same-sex couples of either gender, it does not allow for anything more. So "I'm bisexual/genderqueer/asexual/poly" doesn't come into it, legally you are only one of male/female, married to only one of male/female. We've long lost the legal requirement for fidelity/monogamy, so I can't see how that enters into it, since this bill doesn't extend legal privileges to anyone outside the marriage.
But I'm curious to hear how other arrangements and identities are being recognised in this bill. -
Hard News: The mathematics of marriage, in reply to TracyMac,
If you want to share finances/property/kids guardianship/power of attorney yadda yadda yadda, then make contracts for each of those things
But we're a long way from having that debate. Even Bob McKroskie isn't throwing his toys to that extent. There doesn't seem to be any desire in the borader population to abolish marriage, but the "equal rights" argument holds considerable sway.
Also, in practice there would be a stock bundle of verbiage for the situation one way or another. In the same way as very few people actually read the terms and conditions in full and obtain legal advice on any areas that are unclear, most people don't bother about the legal foowah around marriage either. So we'd be trading one established set of verbiage for another, similar one, but at great expense.
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Hard News: The mathematics of marriage, in reply to Graeme Edgeler,
What is marriage equality?
To me, the ability of anyone who can give informed consent to marry anyone who is also capable.
That's the core requirement for any contract, and I haven't been persuaded that any of the other requirements make sense. I realise that's a huge jump, because our society isn't really on board with consent as a requirement in general, and informed consent is almost unheard of. So I favour incrementally knocking away silly requirements whenever we can.
(consent is one of those things that legal theorists like to drag out when they've run out of other arguments, but it's a weak consent barely better than the Hobbsian "obey me and I will refrain from killing you")
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Hard News: The mathematics of marriage, in reply to Keir Leslie,
Was there anyone that seriously thought civil unions were anything but a nose-under-the-tent for marriage equality?
Gay-and-lesbian marriage is not marriage equality, and it's kind of annoying to see someone equate the two in a discussion of poly marriage.