Writer's Block: Stop Online Piracy Act

[eowyn_315]

Today, Congress holds hearings on the first American Internet censorship system.
This bill can pass. If it does the Internet and free speech will never be the same. [Learn more here.]

Do you support this bill?

First, let me say that this question is absurdly biased.

Second, yes, I support the bill, and not just because I'm being paid to. :) I generally

Comments

[gabrielleabelle]

I've only just started reading up on the whole thing, but it appears that there are some potential unintended consequences that have people (and I mean companies, not just tumblr users) concerned. This site has a PDF link to a letter sent to the House by Google, Twitter, Facebook, Mozilla, and a bunch of other big-name companies. That concerns me more than various fan protests cause, you know, those guys have lawyers who can actually decode the bill and see where there might be some problems (I tried to read through the bill, but I just don't speak that language).

I'm still researching. I've yet to find an outline of where these potential unintended consequences are. I'd like to see that.

[eowyn_315]

Yeah, a lot of Silicon Valley is opposed to it. Frankly, for a lot of them, it's simply about the bottom line. Google doesn't want the bill to pass, because if it does, it means they would lose a lot of ad revenue from all these infringing sites that they're no longer allowed to do business with. Visa is opposed to it because they want the transaction fees from all the credit card payments on the infringing sites. You get the idea

[eowyn_315]

Hahahaha, I can totally count, I swear.

I didn't leave out a fourth argument - I combined the first two into #1 and forgot to change the "four" to a "three." Oops.

[gabrielleabelle]

Thanks for the info. I tried to look at a link to the fact sheet on the site you linked to, but I got a 404 error.

One of the things I've found, though, is that the opposition tends to deal in hypotheticals - "well, this MIGHT happen, or this COULD be used the wrong way" - without any evidence that it WILL hurt anyone.

Okay, but honestly? I can see the concern there. After all, my objection to that annoying personhood amendment in MS was over what COULD and MIGHT happen as a result. And even though the supporters of the amendment tried to assure everyone that it wouldn't, that doesn't exactly assuage my concerns. This is a similar thing, and that's why I'd really like to find something that breaks down the language in the bill so I can see exactly what it might be opening things up to. I'm not impressed with the random protest articles that just make wide claims that I'm supposed to take on faith, but I'm not impressed either with refutations that I'm also supposed to take on faith.

[eowyn_315]

Well, the key part of my comment is the without any evidence that it WILL hurt anyone. With the personhood amendment, you had examples of where what might happen was actually happening in some places. I'd say that's pretty good evidence.

U.S. law already provides the authority to shut down infringing domestic websites, so theoretically, these hypothetical misuses could already be taking place. If that were the case, you'd think Google and Facebook and the rest would be shouting it from the rooftops, saying, "Look at all these sites that are being censored!" They're not. In fact, they acknowledge that piracy is a problem. They just can't be bothered to fix it.

Not sure why you had trouble with the link - I just tried it and it worked fine for me, but I can email you the PDFs if it's still not working.

[gabrielleabelle]

It's the "Fact Sheet: Section by Section breakdown of SOPA" on this page that isn't working. Might be the space in the title, actually.

I've spent the morning doing some reading, and I'm sorry. I think I'm gonna disagree with you on this one. I think there are some things that concern me about how broadly the bill is written and the potential consequences thereof. I still would have spoken out against the personhood amendment without the evidence you require, so we have a difference in tolerance there. I'm not gonna join the protest against SOPA, though, cause, really, I'm busy and choose to focus my attention on other issues.

[eowyn_315]

Oh, I have that one. Emailed it to you.

NO NO NO WE HAVE TO AGREE ON EVERYTHING! Nah, it's cool. At least you took the time to educate yourself before making a decision. I can respect that. :)