If you want to get Patrick Byrne's take on naked short selling and the alleged conspiracy (involving class-action lawyers, hedge funds, and journalists) against his company, Overstock.com (NASDAQ: OSTK), then Deep Capture, the Movie is a good place to get it.

In the 45th slide of the presentation, to provide evidence of the journalistic conspiracy, Mr. Byrne plays a clip of former New York Post business editor Dan Colarusso speaking to Herb Greenberg, Joe Nocera, and Dave Kansas: "When I think of Patrick Byrne ... We have barrels of ink and stacks of money and all the resources in the world at our disposal, legal and, indeed our media, to crush him."

Is this indicative of a conspiracy? Speaking on Mad Money with Jim Cramer about Mr. Byrne, Herb Greenberg said that "the real conspiracy, if there's a conspiracy, is a conspiracy by these people to silence the critics."

Exactly. And here's a tip for Mr. Byrne: Journalists tend to be big believers in free speech. When you attack their ethics, attempt to intimidate them into silence, and an employee of your company sets up a website to smear them -- that angers journalists, and they jump to each others' defense.

Was there a conspiracy of journalists against Patrick Byrne? I seriously doubt it. But Byrne's efforts to silence his critics have made him an enemy of journalists and lovers of the First Amendment everywhere. Maybe that's the conspiracy.

A media conspiracy against Patrick Byrne? originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Sat, 17 Nov 2007 15:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

The Chinese government is backing off of its efforts to crack down on blogging. The country currently has a real-name law in place, requiring bloggers to use their real names. As many bloggers know, the potential for a degree of anonymity is one of the great things about blogging, and a lot of people post stuff on the internet they wouldn't want up there with their own names attached to. The Chinese government is concerned about the Internet because of its potential for facilitating pornography and anti-government ideas.

It's exciting to see evidence of the huge power that bloggers have for changing the world and the way people look at things. Being seen as a threat by a repressive regime is one of the highest forms of flattery, and this news story made me prouder than ever to be a blogger.

I can only hope that corporate America will stand up for free speech in China. Yahoo, Microsoft, and Google have all, to varying degrees, aided the Chinese government in its efforts to crack down on free speech. While I can understand the difficulties that these companies face in dealing with these issues, as American companies, I believe they ought to support one of the most important rights we as Americans have: free speech.

China relaxes crackdown on blogs originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Thu, 17 May 2007 19:50:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Let me first make my stance completely clear. As a member of the proud, yet possibly coarse foundation of American society I wish to make an open declaration based on my First Amendment right of free speech: Don Imus has made himself a broadcast journalistic wimp of the highest order.

I DO NOT condone the words that Imus chose to spew in regard to a specific class of athlete, but I do support his right to open his mouth and forcefully insert his own foot. But somewhere along the line Imus must have missed the memo which clearly explained that it's one thing to denigrate a class of athletes with whom you do not associate and who are in no position to immediately refute you and it's a completely different thing to tell someone like Exxon Mobil Corp. (NYSE: XOM) CEO Rex Tillerson to sit down and shut up. (Umm, yeah I blogged that).

I could end this rant right here and consider myself fulfilled in chastising Mr. Imus but I really haven't brought this full circle yet. It's not enough that I simply rake him over the coals for his poor choice of wording. For me, there's yet a larger issue.

Continue reading My late opinion on the Don Imus mess: Imus is a wimp!

My late opinion on the Don Imus mess: Imus is a wimp! originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Fri, 13 Apr 2007 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

As corporations grow into multinationals, they have to learn to play in ball in international settings that may have their own set of rules. It's a tricky game and public opinion is the only referee.

Yahoo! learned how running afoul of those different rules could hurt it at home when stories surfaced about Yahoo! giving information to Chinese government officials that helped it jail dissidents.

On a server in the US someone can mock the president or the government all they want and only worry that they will upset their peers. But abroad, some governments seem to think humility and criticism aren't worthy qualities. Chinese officials sit in front of computers monitoring any movement on keyword searches on the terms 'freedom' and 'democracy.'

What's Yahoo! to do? Ignore international markets while others worm their way in, break the laws of the country, or resist and get possibly get kicked out?

Yahoo! chose to get into the second-biggest Internet market in the world and followed its laws. But back in the US people got ticked, and the Internet buzzed with outrage to see a company they use on a daily basis roll over and give up the data.

Now Yahoo! is going to the US government to ask for help to figure out how to dance this delicate dance without tripping.

Yahoo! Looks to US government to help with overseas censorship issues originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Fri, 12 May 2006 11:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.