Tech Columnist Calls Model 'A Hero' For Exposing Anonymous Blogger

from the someone-should-explain-the-first-amendment dept

Last we checked in on David Coursey, a long-time tech columnist, he was claiming that The Pirate Bay made money selling subscriptions to users and didn't seem to understand the difference between "theft" and "infringement" or the difference between a search engine and a user. So... I guess we shouldn't really be all that surprised that he's about the only person around who seems to think it was a good thing that a court forced an anonymous blogger to be revealed for referring to model Liskula Cohen as a skank. Apparently, Coursey is unfamiliar with the fact that the US has a strong history of protecting anonymous speech as a part of our First Amendment rights, and this ruling seems to go against that entirely. And, yes, you can be unmasked for truly defamatory speech, but calling someone a skank hardly qualifies. And, of course, he doesn't even acknowledge the fact that almost no one would have seen that particular anonymous blogspot blog if Cohen hadn't freaked out and sued.

It's difficult to see how that makes her a "hero." Thin-skinned? Short-sighted? Perhaps. Hero? Please.

Oh yeah, Coursey then goes on to suggest this should be a warning sign for Google to start censoring the blogs it hosts:

It should also make Google take a hard look at the kinds of sites its Blogger service is willing to host. A "Skanks of NYC" blog may give jealous people a chance to vent their frustration, but hardly seems to ennoble the human spirit.

I don't know. I think Coursey's column should make PC World take a long hard look at the kinds of columns it's willing to host (and, one imagines, pay for). A David Coursey column may give a clueless tech columnist a chance to state his opinion with little knowledge of the facts or history, but hardly seems to ennoble the human spirit. (And, yes, I'm joking, but the point is that this is almost, but not quite, as ridiculous as Coursey suggesting Google needs to monitor and censor blogs).

By the way, the Coursey column does reveal that the anonymous blogger was revealed to Cohen, and it was some woman she didn't know (big surprise there). So, I'm curious how this is a good thing for anyone involved or how Cohen is somehow a hero. If she ignored this site, no one would have seen it or cared (and those who saw it wouldn't have thought that it was some sort of NY Times report on the skankiness of Liskula Cohen). They would have dismissed it as a lame venting from someone who didn't like Cohen for whatever reason. But, now with a lawsuit, lots of people aren't just questioning whether or not Cohen is "a skank" but about her rather sensitive reaction to the slightest criticism from a nobody. How does that make Cohen better off?

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Fact Checking? Reporter Claims It Costs $27 To Use The Pirate Bay

from the fact-checking-is-for-sissies dept

One of our readers, going under the name "slogger," pointed out that a recent column by PC World writer David Coursey had some amazing factual errors in it -- though, by the time I read the original it had been "corrected" without any mention of the correction. Apparently, the big professional press not only doesn't need to fact check, it also can just "disappear" the false info when it comes to light and pretend it didn't happen. Except... PC World syndicates its content to other publications, and the San Francisco Chronicle republished the mistaken column in full.

The two big mistakes? First, claiming that The Pirate Bay sells $27 lifetime memberships, and second, that The Pirate Bay's founders are in jail. Neither is true. The second mistake remains in the "corrected without a correction notice" column at the time of this posting -- but perhaps it, too, will soon disappear. The actual column is a misguided rant by someone who doesn't quite understand how The Pirate Bay actually works and what it does (basically: he thinks "stealing" is evil and he'll never support the site even if it goes legit because he can't support the brand). But, considering that he can't get the basic facts right, perhaps it's not surprising that he doesn't understand the difference between "theft" and "infringement" -- and, more importantly, doesn't seem to understand the difference between search engines/trackers and actual infringing content. These are the sorts of basic tidbits of info you'd think that a famed tech reporter/columnist like Coursey (who's been around for ages) would take the time to get right. After all, aren't we told that the professional press is necessary because it's the bloggers who make up stuff?

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