The bill itself is, in my perspective, only in the favor of big time capitalists. Let's face it, people. Piracy online is, logically speaking, impossible to defeat. What the government has to do is to effectively implement the existing rules. There is no need to make laws such as these.

Are you getting the idea?

On the issue of free knowledge, there really is free knowledge that originated from when man began to ask questions; Wikipedia is only a means. But I got news for you! There is a distinction between free knowledge and trusted knowledge. Most researchers do not trust Wikipedia because it can be edited by anybody. That is why there are books that we can purchase at the nearest bookstore, and don't forget that these books (particularly textbooks) are usually updated yearly. In essence, a student would use both Wikipedia and purchased book because Wikipedia is a convenient knowledge source and purchased textbooks are TRUSTED books.

Are you still with me?

Hence, shutting down sites such as Wikipedia, Scribd, and the like would be more than troublesome to the whole world.

I'm not an American, but this bill will change the world. It's obvious that the proponents of this bill are missing the significance of the so-called internet liberty. And if this bill gets signed, the only thing I can say is this: "The mill of the gods grind slowly but exceedingly fine."

Any questions?

Stealing and piracy is wrong, but will SOPA and PIPA be really able to stop it? I don't really think so. It's the sad truth, nothing will stop the hackers, I think that they'll be even more thrilled to find another way to spread the piracy and prove the government that they can handle their laws.

I'm personally against SOPA and PIPA, not because they are against piracy..that's fine with me, but because I don't see how they'll handle the problem with the piracy and how the internet freedom will stay untouched. Personally I won't be needing any internet if someone follows every step of mine, if I can't post what I want or find info abut things.

What I think, though, is very wrong is how the law was formed, the definition and the sentence of it. It sounds very stupid, too.

Jokes aside, I'm against SOPA/PIPA because there's no process of law, vague wording that even a non-law person can see through, and it's just ripe for exploitation and abuse. This is what you get when you have very techy-ignorant people write up a law about something they obviously don't understand.

A company can claim so and so site has infringed on their copyrights and that site will no longer be available in US via 'legal' means. The site in question won't be able to do anything about it.

Site: "I didn't know that was there! You know how many users we get?"
Troll!Law: "Well you should have paid more attention. Dismissed."

That can happen to any site like deviantart (bye bye fanart), Amaranthia (links to bieber/gaga=BAM. Goodbye), Wikipedia (all those media), google(it's a search engine that goes through links, think about it), youtube (you doing a cover of gaga's Alejandro? byebye youtube), etc.

Also, it will NOT stop piracy. At most, it'll make it slightly harder to pirate but where there's a will there's a way. I mean, the US tried to just shut down so called 80 'pirate' sites (1 of which was just a search engine NOT a pirate site *facepalm*), and most just popped back within hours.

If you want to create an effective law, they should have spoken to internet tech-y experts, not those behind the times fools in Hollywood who don't know anything about how the internet truly works.

(Don't mind my generalizations. I think PIPA/SOPA is squeaky trash. [according to the 'net, that's what it means in swedish XD])

SOPA also suggests that one could spend up to 5 years in prison for pirated material.

Lolwhat.

You mean to tell me that I could end up sitting in prison next to robbers, murderers, and/or sexual offenders because of a couple of songs?

There's plenty more wrong with this, but I can't begin to tell it all. There was one video where a man talked about what was wrong with the big companies that support SOPA, but I'm feeling a tad lazy at the moment. Perhaps I'll post it here later.

PS: The biggest mistake the creators of these bills made was messing with the internet. Anon is gonna be very displeased, if not already.

Oh, Anon's pissed alright. And generally, I don't agree with Anon's antics but in this case? Heck yes. DDoS on Department of Justice, MPAA, and FBI. You go Anon.

In addition, the US Feds recently shutdown megaupload because they had illegal stuff, stuff that users uploaded, NOT megaupload.

What's next, photobucket, imageshack.us gonna get shut down cuz they hold copyright photos?!

I better make backup copies of my AP/siggies/artwork/etc. stuff since rapidsharre/photobucket/imageshack.us might be next...

IN ADDITION:
Megaupload already had a policy of getting rid of illegal content when it's reported. Just like rapidshare, youtube, and mediafire. Only now the US Feds say we're gonna shut you down anyway. *major facepalm*

So basically any online file storage website is in danger of being shut down for content users put up regardless of their existing policy concerning illegal content. I really hate how my country's actions makes no sense at all.

I'm gonna go backup my stuff now *fumes*

Surprisingly, it looks like Congress is listening to the protests. The bill has been halted by the senate leader.

Not halted, just delayed to February at least. Sides, we still got PIPA to worry about. I bet they think this internet protest will just blow over and be forgotten. Than they can pass both with little fuss.

I think that you'll find with the recent taking down of megaupload that there will be a lot more people fighting. Did megaupload have a lot of illegal content? Yes. But it was also used for perfectly legal things, and should not have been taken down. And if SOPA/PIPA passes, then there will be a lot more of it.

And it still wont stop piracy- people will find a way to get around it. And honestly, I think SOPA/PIPA will actually -increase- piracy. Because instead of streaming things on youtube, for example, people will download music/video instead.

I don't think it'll pass that easily, if it does pass. It's losing a lot of support in Congress. Nor do I think people will lose interest and stop protesting.

@ashen: What really gets me bout megaupload is that it's users uploaded content is what got it in trouble. The users. Contrary to what those FBI idiots think, there's no crime syndicate unless they are saying the internet is the crime syndicate.

If megaupload's people are convicted, it's gonna set up a dangerous precedent where any file hosting service like photobucket, rapidshare, youtube, hulu,etc. is in danger of immediate shutdown without any warning.

Also, maybe it's the conspiracy theorist in me talking, but I find it very suspicious that megaupload is taken down right after SOPA is delayed. It's like the US wants to demonstrates it has the muscles to take down sites and it's only because they are so 'benevolent' that they haven't done it already.

@mopiece: If it does pass, it's going to be a very sad day in US. Kiss Youtube and wikipedia goodbye.

@KTC

If you use firefox, then there is already an add-on to get around it. It's not that hard to get around it.

But yes, it'll be a sad day because then it's a step in the complete wrong direction.

@KTC: Exactly. It's the users that 'abused' the website- the website itself did nothing wrong.

Also, sadly, I kinda agree with your conspiracy theory.

:.:.:
Anyway, I'm not against anti-piracy. I am against censorship, which is all these bills will really do. And here's the thing: if anti-piracy measures worked, then the anti-piracy measures we have in place should work a lot better than they do. But that's just it- they -don't- really work, in part because they aren't enforced, and in part because if people can get something for free and/or 'stick it to the man', they will.

If it (illegal downloading) wasn't ok, then why do it in the first place? The fact that everyone's already doing it means that they already think it's ok - duh. -_-


What they're doing is useless anyways. They'll prolly enrage the users more.

Sometimes one has to trust the people to do the right thing. Here, in the piracy thing, the same has to be done.
Trust the people

Sorry for the upcoming joke, but: One does not simply mess around with the Internet.




I mean, seriously, do they REALLY think that people would stop piracy and hacking? Just now I am sure that many of the hackers try to hack onto Mister Lamar's PC to have some fun. What I hate most is that big companies joined the cause. Nintendo and SONY are like dead for me. Thank God Apple stays aside, so I don't have a reason to throw my phone off.

Sony and nintendo dropped their support actually:
http://www.slashgear.com/sony-and-nin ... onymous-threats-03205579/

What really bugs me is why were pharma companies supporting the bill? The only thing I see them gaining from that would be the ability to easily shut down alternative medicine sites or sites that provide info about their drugs. . .



Also, I'm inclined to disagree --on an intellectual level-- with the idea that stopping piracy is desirable for legitimate copyright holders.

For example, the owners of Megatokyo and Goblins, among many other web comics, have all their work on the web for free. They still make money off their IP by selling related merchandise and books. Goblins even has s minicomic attached to it where the fate of the main character is determined by the amount of money donated, with goals up in the thousands or even tens of thousands. so far he's survived 11 of these drives.

Microsoft practically made an art of exploiting piracy with Vista and Windows 7 as I hear it... they released Vista, hackers reverse-engineered it and made improvements for their own use and some allowed others to download those changed versions, then Microsoft took those changes and implemented them in Windows 7, and got to charge people another couple hundred bucks per copy for an OS that actually almost works, with almost no effort on their own part.

The maker of TeX(the most popular writing program among people who publish books or papers regularly) has had that out for free for decades and still makes all the money he could want from royalties from the people who sell his users manuals.



These recent so called "piracy" issues have been about the RIAA's and other companies'/groups' desire to charge people between 49 cents and hunrdeds of dollars; for a service that requires no expertise, no equipment that isn't readily available to anyone, and costs less than nothing to perform-- which is copying the file and uploading it to a consumer's computer.

The postponement of the bill is a clever tactic, in my opinion. If the public forgets, it gives a perfect way to introduce laws.

Also, there is no reason for pharmaceuticals to agree except one. That would be to shut down Alternate Sites.

If this bill is passed, I believe even AM can be shut down on the grounds of the Music thread.

@KTC- You could always use proxies if that happens xD

Quote:

It's worse than that. Mozilla could be shut down on a whim because they use the term "Internet" on their site, and as a non-profit don't have enough lawyers to fight Microsoft. Or Yahoo, sine they have an email thing.

Google and most other search engines would definitely be shut down since there is no possible way for them to find all the pirate sites that show up from obscure terms and filter those.

any wiki and forum(using this term loosely so it includes things like youtube) would get shut down that doesn't charge members for membership. the ones that do would make no money from it because they'd be busy paying moderators to scrutinize every post real-time.


any advertising or sales site would get shut down because someone is completely legally selling a third party product.
Sites that have ads on them would be shut down.


and not just at risk-- the owners would have to shut them down to avoid the choice between jail time or lawyer-induced bankruptcy.

and these are just the obvious examples, not to mention the less obvious ones.






Good thing it's not something we have to worry about anymore this year.