I agree completely. Even Obama said today he thought Sony shouldn’t have capitulated to this threat. Freedom of speech is too important. We cannot allow any erosion of it.

Whether the threats were credible or not (I note they likely weren’t in the piece) is irrelevant. A dangerous precedent has been set. This is a freedom of expression issue. Just because it’s self-censorship in this case doesn’t mean it’s not an issue of free speech. Sony could have upheld their right to make movies about whatever they want (free speech) or pulled the film like they have (capitulation). This has larger ramifications for free speech in general. The message has been sent that we will capitulate to distant crackpot dictatorships at so much as a ‘silly’ threat of violence.

Amazing. Maybe hostages are not really victims of kidnapping, because the kidnapper never actually threatened their lives, or his threats were silly and not serious; maybe they had other reasons to not leave the building.

I don’t think the threats were serious – they were silly actually
Maybe they have other reasons to pull it (sony has been hacked before and they don’t want go through more trouble/costs)
There would be a freedom of expression issue if the government decided not to allow the movie, against the company’s will, but that’s not the case

A multimillion dollar U.S motion picture had a theatrical release date locked in, which was then pulled due to threats of violence relating to its content – and you don’t see the connection to freedom of expression? Have you looked?

This is allowing one of the worst regime’s on earth to succeed in the only way it can, and it sucks. (I use the phrase purposefully – today Charles Krauthammer called Cuba “the worst regime in earth”. I think there are plenty worse, including North Korea.)

Leaking of private e-mails is wrong. I can honestly say, as a matter of principle, I’ve never sought out private leaked e-mails or pics to read/look at, no matter what I think of the person concerned. Even Sarah Palin’s. Of course, I’ve been unable to avoid some of the reporting on them. If people weren’t so willing to read them and the media so willing to publish them, it wouldn’t happen so much, so I’m bit of a (insert rude word here) on the matter.