In the last year, I have started to think that the internet was a mistake.

My theory was 'the death of the internet'. Once everyone has been scammed, once everyone has been hacked and stripped naked in public, when there are more lies than truths, when you are the tool and the computer uses you, when everything has been sold and you have nothing: then you would say, this was a mistake.

Actually, I don't know much about the history of the internet. The Sony stuff is before my time. Now you mention this, perhaps the idea that the internet was designed to be beneficial was actually a total lie.

The Internet was a project to build resilient military communications during the Cold War. It was designed so that in case Russia would nuke the USA, the USA would still be able to nuke Russia, and all its other targets. This was not going to help people.

keeping the ability to nuke Russia always available is very much helping people

That was 20 years ago

WP article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_rootk...

While it is indeed 20 years ago, it should not be forgiven, if they continue to pull off shitty things like this lawsuit.

Ok but Sony is not a time-contiguous person. Half the people there 20 years ago are dead or retired by now.

Heard this one about microsoft on HN as well. How did that turn out?

Companies culture tend to degrade over time, rarely improve.

It's perfectly faire therefore to requiere overwhelming demonstration of good faith to invalidate such a massive bad behavior.

They Never did So they deserve the PR hit.

Which honestly they didn't take nearly as much as they should have.

Stop defending the billion dollars corps. They have proved over and over they are not our friends.

At best our interests are temporarily aligned.

People working for them are not innocent either. They know the company past, they signed their contracts, and stayed despite the culture.

There is such thing as free will, they have their responsability too.

The "a few bad apples" argument is old and tired now. And the "not all People have a choice" have been repeated a nauseam.

You're right. The people working there now have had plenty of time to learn about these egregious crimes and implement better policy so that they don't repeat the crimes of their predecessors... Right?

Yes, they've been at it for that long.

Sony once was a great company. Excellent electronics, great service.

Then they became a media empire...

Japanese companies have always been heavy enforcers of IP, at least since the 1980s. For example, IIRC, they're one of the top filers of patents. Sanrio makes more money globally on their characters than Disney does. And Japan pushes for stronger international IP enforcement systems than even the US.

Japan is just quiet about it. Sony is no aberration.

So it proves that this behavior is not new.

It's my Roman Empire.

Would you consider 20 years "lately"?

Depends on how old you are :D