Irish Judge Orders 'The Internet' To Delete Video 243
New submitter edanto writes "A young Irish man wrongly accused of jumping from a taxi without paying the fare has secured a judgement from an Irish court ordering the video removed from the entire Internet. Experts from Google, Youtube, Facebook, and others must tell the court in two weeks if this is technically possible. The thing is, the video is accurate, it is only a comment that wrongly identified Eoin McKeogh as the fare-jumper in the video that is inaccurate. It's not clear if the judge has made any orders about the comment."
Overstepping your jurisdiction much? (Score:5, Funny)
Stupid judge, you can't order that, you ignorant ninny...
By the powers vested in me, by myself, I hereby order you (the ninny) to stop breathing now and forever. You may be using oxygen I'll need later in my life.
It's only wasted on you.
Re:Overstepping your jurisdiction much? (Score:5, Insightful)
Google and them do a lot of business through Ireland, it might not be so easy for them to just ignore an order from an Irish judge.
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I doubt Google is concerned about any political fallout in Ireland, even after than stop laughing at this request. Ireland has a crappy enough job market as it is, without punishing the companies who are there for something like this. They'd be shooting themselves in the foot.
Re:Overstepping your jurisdiction much? (Score:5, Funny)
... Ireland has a crappy enough job market as it is, without punishing the companies who are there for something like this...
Clearly - people can't even afford to pay their taxi fares.
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You know, maybe Google should offer this guy a job to delete the video himself AND he will be able to afford cab fare. Kill 2 birds with one blarney stone.
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It's not about Google ignoring the order. Google could diligently remove all copies of the video from their servers. They can't remove it from mine, or yours. For that, the judge would have to order me and you to remove it, and not being under his jurisdiction, I expect I could ignore him with impunity (as long as I don't travel to .ie ever).
Re:Overstepping your jurisdiction much? (Score:5, Funny)
I also don't plan on ever traveling to Internet Explorer.
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
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Really? The IT sector is booming in Ireland, along with numerous other sectors like pharma and agriculture. Most of the unemployment is in the construction and related sectors, like furniture shops, and they should never have been allowed to balloon to the prominence they reached, the banking regulator authorising mortgages was imo deliberately asleep at the wheel. And even with all that mess the country would still be in great shape right now if the minister for finance at the time (now dead) hadn't issue
Re:Overstepping your jurisdiction much? (Score:5, Interesting)
Thomas Jefferson was wrong, in this case, as several economists argued later. Merchants without a country tend to fare really bad when the merchants that do have ties with the rulers (or are directly in control of) another country make laws banning the first group from doing business in the country of the second group. If the first group of homeless merchants don't have strong ties with rulers somewhere they're up shit creek without a paddle.
While multinationals often have their "head office" in a tax haven for tax reasons, the *real* headquarters is always located in a spot close to political power, where the owners of said company have cultural, personal and financial ties with the people having political power.
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"Google and them" is not "the internet".
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Here's the real problem though: The Internet is sovereign. Granted parts of it are controlled by certain governments. The DNS roots are controlled by the U.S. But The Internet, as a whole, is sovereign. It is the manifestation of the democratic will of the people of planet Earth. And One does not simply delete something from the Internet. The Internet is a self-healing, electric hydra. Once you upload something, It's there forever. Ireland does not have jurisdiction over the Internet any more than the U.S.
Re:Overstepping your jurisdiction much? (Score:4)
Re:Overstepping your jurisdiction much? (Score:5, Insightful)
Except Google uses Ireland as a tax haven, so first they'd need to find another jurisdiction in which it would be beneficial for them. And I'm not sure they'll easily find one.
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Easy.
The Netherlands.
Biggest tax-haven of Europe, at least if you are big corporation.
If you are a normal citizen or a small company the Dutch tax department will suck you dry.
Low-tax jurisdictional arbitrage for Google etc. (Score:3)
Lots of big corporations have more complicated tax liabilities that can't be handled by being registered in just one company. It's not uncommon to have multiple layers of corporate shells, with different layers being the ones that officially do some part of the business in that country so as to minimize overall taxes. One such approach is the Double Irish Arrangement [wikipedia.org] often with a "Dutch Sandwich" in between, and Wikipedia identifies Google as one of a number of well-known large companies doing things like
Re:Overstepping your jurisdiction much? (Score:5, Funny)
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Meh, this affair doesn't hold a candle to the billions they save and make through Ireland, it wouldn't make financial sense. And even if they did I'm fairly sure the order would hold throughout the entire EU, at least if it went to the European courts, and it most assuredly would.
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Google threatening to relocate its business to a friendlier European state is probably enough to make Irish politicians crap themselves and change the law to suit Google.
You're kidding, right? There are no friendlier states.
Ireland does have low corporate tax rates, but that isn't enough for Google and other large companies (for example, my company's VMware purchases are bought on paper from an Irish subsidiary).
There's a technique called the double Irish Dutch sandwich which lets you create corporate struc
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Google threatening to relocate its business to a friendlier European state is probably enough to make Irish politicians crap themselves and change the law to suit Google.
You're kidding, right? There are no friendlier states.
Ireland does have low corporate tax rates, but that isn't enough for Google and other large companies (for example, my company's VMware purchases are bought on paper from an Irish subsidiary).
There's a technique called the double Irish Dutch sandwich which lets you create corporate structures resident in Ireland but Ireland considers them non-resident for tax purposes.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_Irish_arrangement [wikipedia.org]
And this is perfectly legal. The European Union's tax code is specifically designed to foster competition between tax jurisdiction. You want business, lower your tax.
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Now if that judge was located in the US, then he could have had it deleted from the entire Internet.
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Stupid judge, you can't order that, you ignorant ninny...
Well, actually given that he's Irish and all the tax dodging companies seem to like residing in Ireland (don't you know, google doesn't actually do any business in England!), he actually has a measure of power over a considerable number of large companies.
Well, that'll serve them right.
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Any company that does business in europe would have to try and find a way to comply though.
And the thing is, if most instances of 'the video' are actually links to a small number of hosted copies of the video on say google and facebook servers then it may not actually be that hard to hunt down on the big companies servers.
One of the things Megaupload did was it ran some sort of a hash on uploaded files, and if they already had the file they just created a new symbolic link to the same file. I would not be
Re:Overstepping your jurisdiction much? (Score:4, Insightful)
Stupid judge, you can't order that, you ignorant ninny...
Sadly this is not that uncommon. In the UK last year there was a spate of so-called "super injunctions" being issued to various celebs; these were meant to not only prohibit publishing details of the subject under injunction but also any reporting of the mere fact that an injunction had been granted.
At one stage the High Court granted a permanent injunction against the "whole world" to prevent details of a married celebrity’s affair from being revealed (Super injunctions and the law [stephensons.co.uk]). Much hilarity ensued.
what's powdering that wig, judge? (Score:3)
the Webizens hereby order The Law to get a clue, cease and desist from idiocy. if we hold you in contempt, your face will be pasted on millions of cat pictures. woot.
Quick! (Score:5, Funny)
If you've got a Microsoft Surface, download the video from YouTube - pronto!
Re:Quick! (Score:5, Funny)
If you've got a Microsoft Surface, download the video from YouTube - pronto!
only one man is our last hope then
Re:Quick! (Score:5, Funny)
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No, not even crickets would touch that.
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... or just use keepvid instead. [keepvid.com] Cheaper!
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Cue the Streisand effect in ..... (Score:4, Insightful)
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But why? It's not like it's some celebrity using the judicial system as a bully. And there's not really any amusing or interesting content to the video. Is it just cause we don't like judicial orders here?
Re:Cue the Streisand effect in ..... (Score:4, Insightful)
But why? It's not like it's some celebrity using the judicial system as a bully. And there's not really any amusing or interesting content to the video. Is it just cause we don't like judicial orders here?
True, but there's no denying that that video will be viewed a few more times than it would have been before the poor lad went to court to bitch about it. What he should have done is fire back on Facebook, Twitter, and various other social media. You know where all the people who care about useless shit like this will see it and know he's innocent.
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I don't want to give them that power, but they already have it. International injunctions go like this: you can ignore them, but then you face the full legal authority of the issuing nation against all your interests in said country.
Don't like the legal system of a country? Don't operate there.
Re:Cue the Streisand effect in ..... (Score:5, Informative)
Also a testament to the stupidity of mob justice. Before it emerged that this guy had been wrongly identified, you had people posting his home address on busily trafficked sites, his phone number, metaphorically throwing nooses over lamp posts, the works. Afterwards, the same people were still trying to pin something on him somehow because he had the temerity to make them look like trigger happy vigilante clowns without a clue, which is what they are.
I don't blame him for trying to strike back through the legal system but since the video doesn't in fact identify him I'm not sure why he wants it pulled down. Renamed maybe might be a better option.
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Sounds like they should go after these vigilantes instead. That's one area where I'd fully support "making strong examples of." Internet vigilantism has only started to make an impact but will get tragically big real quick, it needs to get nipped in the bud asap.
Re:Cue the Streisand effect in ..... (Score:4, Insightful)
Internet vigilantism can't be nipped as long as "tough on crime" remains popular, since it's the same thing in different guise: people like letting their sadistic impulses out every now and then, and if they can pretend they're doing it for the sake of justice it's all the more enjoyable.
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In a more rational world, we'd try to find ways to get low crime rates without spending too much. Imprisoning people is expensive. Other countries seem to get low crime rates while imprisoning many fewer people.
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Re:Cue the Streisand effect in ..... (Score:5, Insightful)
I... um. Ok. (Score:3)
Judges can order this sort of thing. It's effectiveness will come down to whether anyone cares enough to re-upload it multiple times in multiple places. The judge is in the wrong for misunderstanding the source of the slander, but I'm not sure what that means for "my rights online"
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It means that we have yet another shining example of the last bastion of justice in a 1st-world legal system demonstrating their complete incompetence when it comes to making decisions about the most powerful tool ever devised by humans.
Not only does it show an outright scary lack of understanding of how the internet works (in the organizational sense), but it also proves him as so out of touch with the reality of the modern world that he doesn't even
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Not only does it show an outright scary lack of understanding of how the internet works (in the organizational sense), but it also proves him as so out of touch with the reality of the modern world that he doesn't even recognize the sort of memes we pretty much take for granted - In this case, the "Streisand effect".
Thats a bit unfair really. A lot of older people will have no idea about recent memes on the internet, despite being quite knowledgeable about computers. I know people who have worked in IT since they started out repairing mechanical counting machines, and if I ever need help with a tits-up RS-6000 I'll go straight to them for help. I doubt they'd know what the Streisand effect refers to. Why should a judge?
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And your motive in doing so was what? I'm not sure what principle you're taking a stand on, but I guess as long as you think you're doing the right thing?
Re:I... um. Ok. (Score:5, Insightful)
Taking a stand against ridiculous court orders. Civil disobedience to promote awareness and justice. Defiance of an illegitimate order from a lawful authority.
Basically, to point out the futility of what is frankly an idiotic order. The experts ought to tell the judge that once it's on the internet, it's there for all time.
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I wish that were the case, I went looking for a blog I used to enjoy last week and it was nowhere to be found. It went tits up in 2011 it seems and even the usual archives haven't got more than a few pages of it.
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Just because you can't find it doesn't mean someone, somewhere doesn't have a copy posted.
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Well, that's true - but I wasn't talking about literally everything. But viral videos, or other popular content tends to stick around. The internet has this potential: if people want it, it will be available. Hence the utter failure of DRM and copy protection. So stuff can be removed, or just drop off, but no one can guarantee permanent removal of anything.
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an order that is both idiotic and futile is not necessarily illegitimate and an injustice. It's just dumb. if you've been libeled and the judge orders the libel removed it's not injustice if it's impossible to actually remove the libel. it's just not possible (and in this case it's not).
I don't necessarily disagree...
I'm not sure how many other ways I can put this. It's not justice making sure slander cannot be removed upon order. The guy didn't do it. So you're saying it's a corruption of justice if we can't see a video and comments that finger him as the perpetrator? That's justice to you? It isn't to me, but you've got your own style, I guess.
If ordering the removal of the video infringes on YouTube's, Facebooks, and whoever else's rights, then yes, it's unjust. I totally understand the libel/slander issue here - but the focus should then be on those doing the libeling/slandering, not YouTube/Facebook/etc. I wasn't there for the hearing, and I don't know Irish laws, so there may be no equivalent of DMCA safe-harbor provision, but I don't see any rational way that merely focusing on the hosting of the video addres
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Believe it or not, google(in Dublin) has assets that the Irish government can act on as a means of enforcing their laws. Facebook doubtless has bank accounts for deals with advertisers based in Ireland too.
There's no international immunity when you act within the nation giving the ruling. They'd probably have a harder time going after vimeo or pirate bay, which are both out of their jurisdiction.
Good luck with that... (Score:4, Insightful)
Eoin McKeugh just became immortal. . . . (Score:4, Funny)
Somebody obviously knows NOTHING about how the 'net works.. . This is, after all. . . . serious business. [knowyourmeme.com].
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1. The movie industry is constantly getting their stuff taken down, but at a rate that is slower than it gets put back up. That's clearly working very well for them.
2. It's not likely they would file a DMCA notice this is an Irish citizen and an Irish judge in an Irish court, and the DMCA is a US law. Also, it's a copyright law, and this isn't a copyright action. The judge could attempt a restraining order, but those need to be targeted; and good luck with that on the Internet where jurisdiction can ch
Imprecise. (Score:2)
Which one of the Internets does he mean?
With no power comes no responsiblity (Score:5, Informative)
By the power invested by my lion tamer hat, I order unicorns to stop farting rainbows.
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Rainbows don't fart. Unicorns fart rainbows. Read the post again, please.
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It's ambiguous. I choose to read it as the unicorns are ordered to stop the farting rainbows. Rainbows do fart, just watch a Skittles ad.
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Ok, re-read, got the message that the unicorns need to stop the farting rainbows.
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By the power invested by my lion tamer hat, I order unicorns to stop farting rainbows.
That would at least make sense, as that is a serious public safety issue. [youtube.com]
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clueless judge (Score:2)
Re:clueless judge (Score:5, Funny)
There should be an authority that can prevent Slashdot from being trolled by a summary that seems to have no basis in the original story. We could call this hypothetical super-being an editor.
A different perspective (Score:5, Insightful)
Sure, the obvious spin the summary evokes is that the judge is one of those numbskull government bureaucrats, who thinks the Internet has a central authority that can respond to such requests. Let's all laugh at the silly judge and reinforce our anti-government hivemind.
On the other hand, the judge likely ordered that the video be taken down, knowing perfectly well that it's impossible to be removed completely. However, those big companies make up the majority of the video's audience, so if they take down the video (and its associated accusation of Mr. McKeogh), the effect is to substantially reduce the harm to Mr. McKeogh's reputation... which is exactly the goal. Since the ruling is in Ireland, where those companies keep their double-Irish tax avoidance entities, the companies will of course want to stay in the good grace of the Irish courts.
Re:A different perspective (Score:5, Informative)
Except that even if it's completely removed once, it will resurface widely and immediately. If reducing the harm to Mr. McKeogh's reputation is the priority, they should leave all known copies up, but add a note that the person is NOT Mr. McKeogh, possibly with a link to this case.
I'm sure the judge is not a numbskull, but the whole problem is not the video, but the misinformation accompanying the video.
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I'm sure the judge is not a numbskull, but the whole problem is not the video, but the misinformation accompanying the video.
If the judge knew that the misinformation was the problem, and he ordered the video taken down, then he is either a numbskull or evil, in that he is abusing his power to attempt to unnecessarily suppress information that does not belong to him. There's no third way.
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Since the defendants in the suit (the big companies hosting the video and comments) are operating in his court's jurisdiction, he has the legal right to order them to remove the lies and obviously-false information linking McKeogh to the crime he didn't commit. Since those lies and false accusations are causing unjust harm to McKeogh, the judge has the moral right to order them removed, as well.
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How well would that work, though? By now, the comments on the videos apparently have McKeogh's home address, phone number, and other personal details. A small note of sanity won't stop the self-righteous asshats of the Internet from making this man's life hell. Even through this discussion, there's already many commentors promising to perpetuate the man's suffering, just out of spite for being told that not to libel others.
The problem is the Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory. Someone's personal life has been
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How well would that work, though? By now, the comments on the videos apparently have McKeogh's home address, phone number, and other personal details. A small note of sanity won't stop the self-righteous asshats of the Internet from making this man's life hell. Even through this discussion, there's already many commentors promising to perpetuate the man's suffering, just out of spite for being told that not to libel others.
And these people would then be liable for whatever legal recourse there is for online stalking/harassment, and deleting the video probably wouldn't curb that much anyway.
The problem is the Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory. Someone's personal life has been severely harmed by the information these companies continue to publish. When they're asked to stop publishing such lies, the schmucks crawl out to protest this affront to their ability to screw up others' lives, and they promise to just screw up the man's life even worse than before.
This is not civilization. This is unbridled sadism masquerading as vigilantism.
And by "shmucks" are you referring to Google/Facebook/et al., or the people actually doing the harassing? I just don't think there's a feasible way, nor should there be, to prevent all future potential harassment. The GIFT (ironic, heh) is an unfortunate but necessary by-product of a free internet.
By commenting I can delete videos? Cool! (Score:5, Informative)
So, if there's some video I don't like on the Internet, I just go there and add a comment saying that it is this Irish dude doing whatever it is that is in the video? I can think of lots of embarrassing videos that various celebrities would like to see go away. Just add "Hey! That's Eoin McKeogh!" to the video and then sue in Ireland.
This is just one of many problems I see with this ruling. It just was the most interesting one.
Comments owned by the poster. (Score:3)
Let the poster explain to the judge that he "owns" the comment, but doesn't have a delete or edit button.
Judge might rule Slashdot be taken off the internet.
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It can't be that hard - the Internet is right here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iDbyYGrswtg [youtube.com]
It's a complicated thing, but (Score:5, Funny)
I wouldn't be the one to risk that, tbh. What if you, say, forget a gear, or mismatch the pressure release valve?
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It's simple just screw up the global BGP tables and no one will be able to access it. no where did is see where the order required zero impact to anything else.
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Better solution: Disconnect the internet connections of anyone involved in the case, *including* the judge. As far as they'll be able to tell, the video was removed.
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What if you, say, forget a gear, or mismatch the pressure release valve?
I'm pretty sure there is content on the internet that is specifically geared towards pressure release valves that go both ways...
And The Answer Is: (Score:5, Funny)
No.
This has been another edition of Simple Answers to Simple Questions: Simpleton Edition.
Schwab
A big opportunity (Score:3)
Just thinking here... (Score:2)
Confucius says... (Score:2)
Irish judge thinking he can censor whole Internet spend too much time in Irish pub.
Hmmm ... (Score:2)
Methinks the judge may have little understanding of both how the internet works, and what his jurisdiction actually is.
If a judge in Ireland believes he somehow has the authority (let alone the technical ability) to order this, he's grossly mis-informed.
He can make rulings on what happens in Ireland, but for the rest of the world ... well, Iran can make all of the demands they want about taking stuff off the internet too, but nobody will care either.
This basically demonstrates he doesn't understand either t
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I did read it. And while he can legally put pressure on Google et al to remove it in Ireland, if someone has put it on any server outside of Ireland (which by now I'm sure they have out of sheer spite), then there is nothing at all this judge will be able to do about that.
Trying to take stuff down from the internet tends to be a losing battle, because people then immediately start sharing copies of it.
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So, why do you seem to believe that Google's servers are in Ireland? Last I checked, Google had servers on every continent but Africa and Australia...
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Which, oddly enough, was my entire point ... the Irish judge can make judgements about what they have to do on the servers located in Ireland. And all of those servers not in Ireland are, unsurprisingly, not under the jurisdiction of an Irish court.
Why do you seem to believe that I believe all Google servers are in Ireland? Because I sure as hell never suggested that.
suitable punishment (Score:2)
Inother news (Score:2)
People of Earth, who by their access to the Internet are arguably connected to the internet are served with a court order to forget this information.
A good way to defend his own name (Score:2)
When this incident happened, it was a huge new story (in Ireland at least) and a fair few people that I know were unaware that his name was cleared, when the dust settled. This, to me, seems like an effective use of a modified Striesand effect.
Is the judge a descendent of ... (Score:2)
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Where's the popcorn (Score:2)
This could get interesting... With some 3rd-world nothing of a country, they'd just be adversarial and pull out of the country if things got bad.
But since Ireland is the EU tax haven for these companies, how far are they willing to go to humor the Irish courts and keep their billions of dollars each year safely out of the hands of the governments they rightly belong to?
I'm betting Google is only too happy to be incredibly evil, to keep their tax haven happy with them...
Impossible (Score:2)
It's quite impossible to delete anything from the Internet. Once it is uploaded, it is there forever. I read that on the Internet, so it must be true.
One possibility exists though: all you need to do is intentionally clog things up, or maybe install a couple of clamps. That way, you can isolate the video and it will not be able to flow anywhere.
After all, the Internet is just a series of tubes, right?
streisand effect punks please handle properly (Score:2)
Now that this video will uploaded to youtube, usenet, bittorrent, file hosting until the end of time, please ensure to label and put the incorrect name "Eoin McKeogh " in all filenames, labels and descriptions. Also address each post to the attention of Mr Justice Michael Peart. thank you.
You got the title wrong (Score:3)
Should be titled:
"Decent Man vs. The Douchebag Mouthbreathing Adult Children Of the Internet And Their Coddling Surrogate-Parent Corporate 1% Elite"
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I think Streisand Effect is the innocent man's intent.
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