Blackout to protest against the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and its counterpart PIPA
SOPA and PIPA are laws that would lead to a censored internet, in the name of copyright protection.
You may not have heard about them yet as the big medias are hardly covering the subject because they are all in favor of SOPA. This new set of laws was about to pass silently (less internet = more TV).
It would allow copyright holders to shut down any site with user generated content (even just a little as it could be seen facilitating infringements), without due process, and create an american internet blacklist.
The law is supposedly aimed at rogue foreign sites without describing them in detail. We are a Domestic US site that complies with US DMCA laws, and even goes beyond them. It is unclear if we would become a rogue site under the proposed law, as it would replace the DMCA.
ISP’s, search engines, ad networks would have to cut off such sites quickly, or face penalties, however they would be exempted from penalties if they cut non-infringing sites. That is not exaclty the definition of a fair law. If copyright holders were to gain such powerful censorship tools, they would certainly abuse it, as they have shown before.
Last December all amendments to make SOPA more reasonable were rejected.
It is important to realize that the United States would send a poor message to the rest of the world, as many foreign leaders tend to copy US laws, it must try not to censor internet or chill innovation.
Fortunately President Obama moved on this week-end to announce opposition to this bill.
The future? let’s hope that PIPA gets thrown down too. In any case, President Obama asked for a new law to be passed this year.
With the US elections approaching, we are pleased to hear that personal liberty is becoming more of a subject, and without taking side we are hoping that all the candidates will talk more about freedom and free speech, and having a government that doesn’t think for its citizen.
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Learn more:
Electronic Frontier Foundation
Sopa Blackout
