Man. I like Felicia Day, but some of the facial acting in this was super lame. Her expression when throwing the dagger at the end was just unbelievable.

Dude, we have patents so that you can't steal an *idea*. How on earth do you think that you can't steal data? We have industrial espionage laws. Duplicating someone's data is still stealing.

This whole layout is so overworked and larded on with needless features that I'm sure that the developers had their hands full dealing with a bunch of changing requests and demands for the design.

Apparently, it is a big enough hassle that people are proposing that it is preferable to steal instead. Isn't that enough to demonstrate that it is different?

Maybe it requires a new way of thinking, but I don't believe that the new way of thinking is "yeah, take whatever you want."

It isn't a moot point. Just because there are some legal alternatives doesn't make the illegal stuff *more* acceptable. Am I the only one who feels that it just demonstrates how preposterous and just... low the theft actually is? You could pay the nuisance tax and borrow it from a friend, but then you'd be beholden…

So you're proposing that the existence of a relatively expedient and legal alternative to theft makes the theft *more* acceptable? There are business structures for rental games and so that part of you argument falls flat. In the case of a loan from a friend, eventually the owner is going to want their physical…

Are you seriously comparing torrenting to mimicking specs? Because you didn't make something identical to an Alienware system in your example, you made something functionally similar. All of those components are legally available for purchase, and presumably you paid for them.

I completely agree, but am engaging with the idea "for the purposes of discussion". If people have an issue with the penalties being applied, that's a discussion about severity and penalty, not a reason why the crime isn't a crime.

My pet theory is that "saving face" isn't just for Asia anymore. One or more very powerful people at Gawker pulled the trigger on spending all of the time and money to make this redesign, and probably had a ton of say in how it was done. If so, it will be an agonizing process to gradually walk it back to being…

Cool. So then the next step is to postulate how much of a problem this is. I suppose that if they can get a layout that is satisfying to use for the majority of visitors quickly enough, this will look like a bump. If it stays miserable like this for long, then people will get attached to some other source for news.

Yeah, that's what I do too, but a backdoor workaround for the sufficiently-motivated is not a solution that retains the audience.

@LoungeDinosaurian: I'm unsure what you're proposing. Are you proposing that the culpability of the thief is diminished if it was a crime of opportunity?

@diasdiem: "would they have bought a copy anyway" is a totally specious distraction. You don't get to defend yourself for stealing an apple from a cart or a used car from a car lot by trying to prove that the stolen object was crappy and never would have gotten sold anyway.

Hey Luke...

But it is definitely more important that you see the ad than that you be able to use the site.

Can anyone in the know here comment on whether this is factual? It probably accurately describes my new usage of Gawker sites.

From now on, whenever I envision Michael Bay talking about Transformers, I can only visualize one caption: "Needs more dangling robot balls."

I will never be able to see him and think anything else now.

The Guild is entertaining, and she's a big part of that. The "self-conscious nerd" character that she often portrays strikes a chord for a lot of other socially awkward people. She is real-world attractive, and her interest in various nerd things appears to be pretty genuine.