STOP SOPA NOW!

[funrush]

By the way, when's the voting on this thing?

[Fox666]

Wow, that's... this is amazing. Imagine how things will be for the internet if this passes.

It won't affect "the Internet" that much, since USA is just a country. China or Iran use the same domain blacklisting technologies and it's not like the Internet as a whole is suffering just because of what the government of some countries are doing.

[Ringworm128]

For what it's worth, guys, the general consensus going around right now is that there's no way this bill will pass because of how many people it has royally pissed off. Still, the fact that someone would even suggest this become a law is disturbing in and of itself.

Well the scary thing is that all the big company's are pumping money into this so even with all of the net going against it there is still a chance of this getting through.

[Fox666]

Even if this pass, it won't last.

Just look at Youtube, copyright holders now can shut down videos as they wish, however they block a lot of stuff they simply don't like, rather than copyright infringing content.

Besides, eventually sites like Google and other search engineers will be blocked, making Internet nearby unusuable. That will make USA a laughingstock, as they will be the only first world country "without Internet access".

[Ringworm128]

Even if this pass, it won't last.

Just look at Youtube, copyright holders now can shut down videos as they wish, however they block a lot of stuff they simply don't like, rather than copyright infringing content.

Besides, eventually sites like Google and other search engineers will be blocked, making Internet nearby unusuable. That will make USA a laughingstock, as they will be the only first world country "without Internet access".

Well I still think we should sign the petition so this doesn't get put into power in the first place. As they say "prevention is better then cure."

[TripleRach]

Besides, eventually sites like Google and other search engineers will be blocked, making Internet nearby unusuable. That will make USA a laughingstock, as they will be the only first world country "without Internet access".

Don't underestimate how ridiculous the US can be. It's also one of the only first world countries without universal health care (something that came up in the thread about Chuck Huber's medical bills), and just this year the government almost went bankrupt just because of arguments about abortion.

[Fox666]

http://vimeo.com/31100268

"In short Protect IP won't stop piracy but it will introduce vast potential for censorship in abuse making the web less safe and less reliable (...) Our Government is tampering with it's basic structure so that maybe people will buy more Hollywood movies"

[jjgp1112]

Yeah, Fox, you're demonstrating more common sense and foresight than most of the US congressmen can be bothered to use.

[BlazingFiddlesticks]

Besides, eventually sites like Google and other search engineers will be blocked, making Internet nearby unusuable. That will make USA a laughingstock, as they will be the only first world country "without Internet access".

Don't underestimate how ridiculous the US can be. It's also one of the only first world countries without universal health care (something that came up in the thread about Chuck Huber's medical bills), and just this year the government almost went bankrupt just because of arguments about abortion.

As dangerous territory as this is going, abortion was NOT the only thing that held up budget talks. You're the first person I've heard say it was one of the serious point on contention. Our parties are just hella divided in general, and of course since we're irrevocably two-party system the parties are probably going to have to change more quickly than the voters.

[TripleRach]

As dangerous territory as this is going, abortion was NOT the only thing that held up budget talks. You're the first person I've heard say it was one of the serious point on contention. Our parties are just hella divided in general, and of course since we're irrevocably two-party system the parties are probably going to have to change more quickly than the voters.

I guess I was kind of mixing two different things, but I was primarily referring to the government shutdown issues in April where arguments about Planned Parenthood were definitely a major factor. I mostly wanted to touch on the idea of ridiculous in-fighting embarrassing the US, but I probably shouldn't have been so hyperbolic about it.

[BlazingFiddlesticks]

I guess I was kind of mixing two different things, but I was primarily referring to the government shutdown issues in April where arguments about Planned Parenthood were definitely a major factor. I mostly wanted to touch on the idea of ridiculous in-fighting embarrassing the US, but I probably shouldn't have been so hyperbolic about it.

For me it comes down to how much ammo I want to give non-Americans on the internet. We facepalm at our own government as much as any outside observer, but at the end of the day most of us are still invested in it.

Backtracking, I second funrush's question, when is the vote actually coming? I did hear about this months back.

[MCDaveG]

Personally I doesn't believe they really have power to put this on action, but the congress clearly doesn't have enough knowledge about how the Internet in general works either.

I heard about this bill a while back, and I recall hearing that it's geared more against Megaupload than Let's Plays or Team Four Star. Does anyone actually have a link to the manuscript of the bill from which this website made its points? Because there's virtually nothing stopping me from taking this as sensationalized to whatever degree otherwise.

That said, given that no one in Congress is of the internet generation, piled on the fact that this is probably as vague and bloated a bill as just about anything else Washington puts out, I'd think it would be safe to say it's the lobbyists here. Sad thing is, anti-piracy measures are, in theory, something lobbyists should be well in their rights to request (Lobbying isn't inherently evil, get rid of it and the private sector loses its key communication with Washington). They just have no idea what they're doing.

That pisses me off. I'm using megaupload for uploading big master files of my music around the world, because my labels are in Germany and Greece. I have even account here as it's most reliable server to upload on by my taste. It's pain in the ass sending master files of one track which have over 1 Gb via e-mail (impossible) or on DVD by post, which is fucking slow and I won't pay postal fees across the globe 10 times a month......
Well, it's working the same even in my country. Democracy = money......

PS. So it will affect only United States as a country? In that case I'm cool

[DBZGTKOSDH]

Democracy = money......

I don't know about the other countries, but for my country it's Democracy = corruption + money
And, dear God, I want to finish Naruto first!

[Pokewhiz7]

PS. So it will affect only United States as a country? In that case I'm cool

Probably not, the US has probably more influence than anywhere else in the world. I guarantee you that if this passes, at least a few other countries will follow suit.

[Adrian Malacoda]

A law like this would most definitely not affect "only the US." The makeup of the Internet is largely composed of US companies (Google, Microsoft, Amazon, eBay etc), payment processing companies (PayPal, Visa, MasterCard, etc), internet hosting providers, and even the most common domain names (.com., .net, .org etc). Even if you're not in the US, you're probably using a service provided by a US company (if you're posting here, you definitely are), and that company is subject to legislation like SOPA (as well as things like the Patriot Act, but that's a different story).

Homeland Security has seized domain names belonging to foreign websites due to piracy concerns (why piracy is a concern of Homeland Security is beyond me, though), and Visa, MasterCard, PayPal, and Bank of America refuse to provide money transfer service to WikiLeaks (a foreign organization headed by an Australian citizen) presumably due to US government pressure.

[TripleRach]

Backtracking, I second funrush's question, when is the vote actually coming? I did hear about this months back.

From what I can tell, there is no scheduled vote yet. I believe it depends on how the hearings go. If it passes through the committee hearings, then it will come to a full vote in the House, and if it passes there it will then need a Senate vote, I believe. And then Presidential approval if it passes the Senate (but Obama and Biden seem very pro-copyright, so I doubt he would veto it). So I think there's still plenty of time to contact your local Representative in the House about it (and your Senators), if it even comes to a vote at all.

[Bussani]

I was going to say the same thing as MCDaveG. Going against things like file lockers in this manner is ridiculous, even if it's for a good cause. It's not like they exist just for pirating content, but they could be punished for it anyway, as could anywhere else that lets users upload anything they want. What's next? Banning email attachments? File transfers over instant messengers?

PS. So it will affect only United States as a country? In that case I'm cool

So long as your country doesn't follow suit and you don't mind US based sites disappearing, yeah.

[Attitudefan]

HAHAHAhaaa.... Fascism.

Anyways, the trouble is that government is extreme right and the world is extreme capitalism. Extreme of any "ism" is bad and low and behold, we live in a global dictatorship. Maybe Westerners should be more like the Arabs, no?

[Fox666]

even if it's for a good cause.

Which probably is not. I bet it is just a case of the government being financiated by private parties.

Besides the Internet does a lot for the economy (more than Hollywood, recorders and others) so you cannot say this is for the sake of people jobs or anything else. And I feel tempted to say that the government is also approving it because it allow them to censor content, while saying they are doing it to prevent piracy.

HAHAHAhaaa.... Fascism.

Anyways, the trouble is that government is extreme right and the world is extreme capitalism. Extreme of any "ism" is bad and low and behold, we live in a global dictatorship. Maybe Westerners should be more like the Arabs, no?

I don't think it is something related to ideology. The copyright holders have plenty of money to induce some political figures.

[CaBrPi]

THIS is why we need a clean sweep of the Government.