If you believe that, you haven't been paying attention. They've always been fascist. They're just finding new tools that didn't used to exist.

The amount of money to be made leading the charge against the latest crisis guarantees that the people in charge not only won't make any effort to solve the problem, but they will actively prevent it from being solved. Once it's solved, you have to move on, and maybe (gasp!) get a real job.

It would be wonderful if there were any agreement on what "the right thing" is. But there never will be.

Your reply will demonstrate why.

I feel like I should point out that they didn't refuse to illegally surveil US citizens, they refused to surveil US citizens for the government. Their entire existence is built on surveilling everyone everywhere all the time to whatever degree they can.

I can't help but wonder if their reluctance to do so for the government is fear of a FOIA request revealing just how pervasive it is.

Of course it makes you less safe. When you use it, the government will know you're using it, and that automatically makes you guilty of something, so expect those jack books kicking your door in at 3:00 AM.

Block their own servers. Sigh.

Remember Roadrunner? They used to - regularly - both their own servers.

Some people should not be allowed to play with email servers.

You said something stupid, and got called out on it. In fact, you said something so stupid, there's no point of ever reading anything you have to say again.

I didn't realize that 15% is the "vast majority." Guess I must have flunked out of 5th grade.

Or are you running word processors and spreadsheets on servers for some, undoubtedly deranged reasons? Because I'm pretty sure that people who do that are an even smaller percentage of the overall market.

Didn't bother to read the rest, since your first sentence conclusively proved you shouldn't post to /. while mainlining heroin.

You kids and your fancy toys. DOS EDITOR was fine in my day, it's perfectly fine for you.

I would, and did.

There are many, many, many other forms of contracts.

Not on the basis of it being public domain. If it is otherwise a valid contract, entered into in good faith by both parties, it's enforceable.

Hence the part (that you ignored) about being the only source making it practical. And whether or not you have a copyright infringement claim is irrelevant, when you have a breach of contract claim.

Contracts cannot supersede copyright rights, but when there is - by definition - no copyright, that doesn't matter.

Then it would be alarming for everyone else.

You'd have to add a minimum amount of "your own stuff" to qualify for copyright , but it's not a high bar.

And a license covers you anyway, as that is entirely separate from copyright. You can sell public domain stuff under a restrictive license, and the license is enforceable. If you're the only source of the public domain stuff (like compiled software that requires some kind of activation to prevent redistribution, you know, like most games these days), it's even practical.

While the film or ad can't be copyrighted if it's AI generated, if the script was written by a person, it is copyrighted (automatically when it's created, registration is something different).

Of course, Hollywood is working diligently towards 100% AI generated movies at the click of an icon, with no human involvement (or pay) at all.

Perhaps they'll slow down on this, at this point.

Having it order me an anti aircraft missile battery would be pretty alarming.