Funniest/Most Insightful Comments Of The Week At Techdirt

This week, our first place winner on the insightful side is an anonymous comment about Elon Musk’s hypocrisy on the subject of boycotts:

Advertisers fleeing Twitter aren’t even boycotting it. They’re just each making their own decisions for themselves. A boycott is a group action in the group’s longer-term interest, even if it is against the immediate self-interest of each participant individually.

Advertisers aren’t joining forces to put pressure on Twitter, they’re just each saying “it’s not in our individual interest to be here”. GARM didn’t organise a boycott, they just said “hey, consider whether it’s still in your individual interest to advertise there”.

Advertisers aren’t boycotting Twitter, any more than cinemagoers are “boycotting” Joker 2. Calling it a boycott is unnecessarily ceding to Musk’s spin.

In second place, it’s another anonymous comment about the boycott, this time in direct response to the claim that it “was clearly collusion”:

I heard for 4 fucking years of the last Trunt administration that ‘collusion was not a crime’ when it was that piece of shit and his toadies working with Russia.

Take your righteous indignation and shove it up your ass, Koby. If advertisers collectively don’t want to advertise on Shitter, it’s because it’s not a crime not to do so.

For editor’s choice on the insightful side, we start out with a comment from williamperry about social media fearmongering that invokes “dopamine hits”:

Oh no! The Fearsome Dopamine Hit!

People that talk about “Dopamine Hit” are totally misdirect/sleight-of-handing you, it sounds so much like free-basing it must be bad for you! But literally everything you do in life that is positive gives a ‘Dopamine Hit’

Shame,depravity – Ive become addicted to experienceing things. Why did no one protect me from this?

Next, it’s David with a comment about the concept of “creeping authoritarianism”:

Well, you have to admit one thing:

The authoritarianism has stopped bothering with creeping.

Over on the funny side, our first place winner is Ethan Probst, who responded to a comment using Biblical language about Trump by asking AI to write some more:

I couldn’t help but complete this, because it was just too funny. So, I went to our AI overlords and it did quite a good job. I especially like the last few verses. Read on if you want a bit of a laugh.

And Trump saw the stupidity, that it was good: and he divided the stupidity from the wisdom. And Trump called the stupidity MAGA, and the wisdom he called Fake News. And the evening and the morning were the first day. And Trump said, Let there be a wall in the midst of the land, and let it divide the people from one another. And Trump made the wall, and divided those who believed from those who questioned: and it was so. And Trump called the wall Great, and the division he called Tremendous. And the evening and the morning were the second day. And Trump said, Let the lies under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry wit appear: and it was so. And Trump called the lies Alternative Facts; and the dry wit he called Sad. And Trump saw that it was good. And Trump said, Let the land bring forth supporters abundantly, the base yielding loyalty, and followers believing the same: and it was so. And the land brought forth supporters abundantly, some yielding rallies, and others spreading tweets after their kind: and Trump saw that it was good. And the evening and the morning were the third day. And Trump said, Let there be misinformation in the firmament of the internet to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for elections, and for years. And let them be for misinformation in the firmament of the internet to give light upon the base: and it was so. And Trump made two great sources; the greater source to rule the day, and the lesser source to rule the night: he made the social media also. And Trump set them in the firmament of the internet to give light upon the base, and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the truth from the falsehood: and Trump saw that it was good. And the evening and the morning were the fourth day. And Trump said, Let the internet bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fake profiles that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of the web. And Trump created great trolls, and every living meme that moveth, which the internet brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every bot after its kind: and Trump saw that it was good. And Trump blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the feeds in the seas of information, and let fake news multiply in the earth. And the evening and the morning were the fifth day. And Trump said, Let the land bring forth the living creature after his kind, supporters, and sycophants, and beasts of the base after their kind: and it was so. And Trump made the beasts of the base after their kind, and supporters after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the rallies after his kind: and Trump saw that it was good. And Trump said, Let us make followers in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the facts, and over the truths, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. So Trump created followers in his own image, in the image of Trump created he them; biased and unquestioning created he them. And Trump blessed them, and Trump said unto them, Be loyal, and multiply, and replenish the rallies, and subdue the reasoning: and have dominion over the facts of the sea, and over the truths of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth. And Trump said, Behold, I have given you every promise bearing tweets, which is upon the face of all the internet, and every empty word, in which is the fruit of a promise yielding emptiness; to you it shall be for believing. And to every beast of the base, and to every follower of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the rallies, wherein there is loyalty, I have given every half-truth for sustenance: and it was so. And Trump saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good for him. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day. Thus the base and the rallies were finished, and all the host of them. And on the seventh day Trump ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. And Trump blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his tweeting which Trump created and made.

(To be honest I find this kind of laborious riffing by an LLM to be extremely tiresome and unfunny, but the votes have spoken!)

In second place, it’s Stephen T. Stone with the first comment on our post about how nobody seems to be concerned about Big Tech colluding with government anymore:

Let’s see here…

• “This is more anti-Musk hate speech!”
• “You’re just mad because it’s not your side getting to do this!”
• “You’re overblowing things.”
• “Go cry about it, f⸺t.”

Does that about cover all the potential troll comments, or am I missing something?

(Also: Fuck Elon Musk.)

For editor’s choice on the funny side, we start out with a comment from MrWilson in response to someone complaining we never wrote about their pet issue:

Seriously. When is Techdirt going to weigh in on the fact that the Spokane City Council canceled the City Council Meeting for March 20, 2023?!? And what about the Muscovy Duck invasion of New Port Richey? The temperature high for Taos, New Mexico was 73° on May 21, 2020 and Mike hasn’t written a goddamn article on it at all!

It’s like Techdirt writers don’t write about what randos on the internet want them to write about or something! Shit.

Finally, it’s an anonymous comment on our post about receiving a copyright takedown from a VPN company over a post advertising their services:

You are publishing this copyrighted comment, please remove it

That’s all for this week, folks!