I'm never sure if it's really a slow news day when these things happen, after all it seems like there's lots to talk about right now, but today seems one of those days where the irrational and illogical take over our news. Let's summarise a few stories right now:
Yes, yet more people think they're hilarious by entering Jedi into a religion box on a form. Except this time it's eight police officers and two police staff. I know these surveys are stupid and infuriating but surely we should expect the police to have some restraint? Possibly not actually...
Yes, apparently Nicola Fisher is in the papers today comparing the UK police to the Taliban. Because the Taliban are famous for allowing large protests like the one Ms Fisher took part in outside the G20. Oh but wait! Apparently Ms Fisher was so traumitised by her ordeal she hired Max Clifford to sell her story for £50k. I bet that's just the the Taliban too.
Seriously, I'm far from supporting the police in this one. As I say above, they should have some self-restraint, but, well, having watched Ms Fisher you can't say she did nothing to provoke the guy.
Yes, she does ignore him when he tells her to step back, instead lunging at him screaming that she's a "fucking woman". In fact she seems to get in his face three times in that video. Does that excuse the officer? Nope, but at least he's accepting some responsibility for his part in that fracas.
Swedish file-sharing site Pirate Bay is confident they'll win their court case because the site can be used in both a legal and illegal manner
. Yes, and with a name like "Pirate Bay" they're not at all promoting the illegal side of it? According to Daniel Westman (who is apparently a Swedish legal brain):
Their big argument in defence is that they are doing exactly the same as Google; that is, simply linking to files.
The most fundamental legal question to answer is were they grossly negligent if they continued to offer the service once they knew it was being used to infringe copyright.
It is a hard question and from a legal and political sense the question is to what standard do you ask a prosecutor to show intent?
Yes, because a website founded by an anti-copyright group with a name like Pirate Bay obviously has no intent to promote copyright infringement. I fully agree that most file-sharing sites and software have a valid defence of being usable legally even if the majority of users use them illegally, but Pirate Bay? They're mocking this legal loophole by taking that defense and they're likely to just get file-sharing tarnished further.
So there you have the daily dose of willful stupidity and mockery that has become people in the news these days. Well, a small portion of it anyway.