If you could write a sensible version of SOPA what would it be?

What would you ban and what would you allow? Would you ban all unauthorized uses of a song on Youtube if its a say a wedding video or school project? Would you allow a fan made film to use music and or sound effects to liven the spirit of fandom?

Would you ban any use of pirated materials?

 

I would leave the Internet alone, just let it be.

 

Leave it be.

 

There is no need for any version of SOPA. We have just as much, if not more music being produced today as we did 50 years ago. Vastly more T.V. shows than 20 or 30 years ago (with much higher quality).

If copyright infringement was such a problem, this would not be the case--we would expect to see fewer musical acts and fewer and poorer quality t.v. shows since they would not be as profitable.

 

This. You simply can not stop internet piracy. You can curb it and you can detract people from doing it. But the simple fact is that many of these people are in countries where there are either no laws against internet piracy or it's not illegal. And these people are smart. They know how to mask their IPs and hide behind proxies etc. A bill like SOPA hopes to burn down the forest to smoke out the pirates. Problem is the pirates just move to another forest.

In addition, piracy has forced companies to change their business models to attract customers to legally purchase content. For example, the appeal of being able to download comics has led to Marvel and DC and Dark Horse offering digital downloads on the day of release for many of their titles. Itunes and Netflix have certainly discouraged piracy because their vast library and reasonable prices make it convenient to use. Steam has done the same for many PC games as well and PSN and Xbox Live have started doing this more and more with new games. 3D movies for a time (good ones anyway) motivated theater goers to stop downloading and go back in to the theater to see what they were missing. By offering their product in a convenient and relatively cheaper manner, many customers are more motivated to buy the product legally.

Ironically, it's the attempts to stop piracy that cause it to rise. Games and software with rootkits (which can be seriously harmful as well as annoying to computers) cause customers who have legally purchased the item to seek an illegal copy because the uploader removed the rootkit. Studio greed and poor business choices (see the recent comments regarding Netflix) encourage users to 'stick it to them' and download illegally.

I would argue that stopping piracy is not unlike prohibition. The more you try to stop someone from doing something, the more likely you are to drive them to do it. The businesses that have done well in recent years are those who have made obtaining their product easy and convenient. When it stops being easy or convenient to get what they are looking for, internet users turn to piracy for that.

 

SOPA is dead...or at least, on indefinite hold:

SOPA shelved

 

The current law is good enough. The only real issue is how to enforce it.

 

Not quite yet. Representative Lamar Smith is apparently still trying to get it out of committee.

And the Senate version, the PROTECT IP Act, is still alive too. They're probably just waiting for people to turn their backs so they can rename it "Protect American Jobs and Property Act" or something equally inane.

 

FWIW, I don't think SOPA will make it in February, either. Or if it does it'll be so attenuated it won't bear much resemblance to the original bill; an ad campaign talking about China-style censorship (which is exactly what SOPA and Protect IP are) would be an even blacker mark against a Congress that the public already barely approves of, especially with the White House refusing to sign it. Don't think there's enough votes behind it to override the President vetoing it.

 

Can someone explain these bills in layman's terms to a moron such as myself?

I'm curious as to know why they are being proposed and what they intend to do.

 

Reddit has a good explanation of both SOPA and the PROTECT IP Act (PIPA). You can also read about how SOPA and PIPA would break the DNS system (upon which the Internet is based) at DYN.

From a technological standpoint, it's not just a bad idea, but an insane, idiotic, short-sighted disaster waiting to happen. It would potentially cripple the functionality of the Internet in order to protect one specific industry (the entertainment industry), and it wouldn't even be able to succeed at that! (Nothing requires you to use anyone else's DNS servers, so it would be relatively trivial to bypass if you wanted.)

Think of DNS like a phone book. The real value of a phone book is twofold: it is a complete listing of names and associated phone numbers, and the information in it is accurate. If ISPs are required to start blocking DNS requests, it will lead to the creation of alternate DNS systems in parallel. Without a centralized DNS that actually works, it will become almost impossible to reliably send emails, or locate websites. (The records might update in one system and not another, or someone might maliciously change entries in one system to redirect people.)

SOPA is a cure worse than the disease it is trying to fix.

Kimball Kinnison

 

I personally love how Pirate Bay point blank states that this bill will not even remotely stop piracy:

There are easy workarounds to SOPA/PIPA

So, even though anyone with true knowledge of the internet (not Congress) knew this, the bill's primary goal of stopping piracy will fail. Which begs the obvious question: What good is it?

 

KK

Thank you, and now I feel like a jerk for going after you in the election thread.

At least it does seem like there is finally an issue that unites people across the political spectrum against powerful interests across the political spectrum, my understanding that Hollywood Studios to Fox News/Rupert Murdoch support SOPA.

 

Basically, there is no law that cannot be abused. There's actually a 15-year-old who was charged with production, possession, and distribution of child pornography...of herself. A 12-year-old boy was forced to pay child support to the woman who molested him because she got pregnant.

And the hell of it is, these laws would be easy to fix.

In terms of commerce laws, it gets worse. Our tax code is so complicated so rich people can find exemptions. I remember when powder cocaine was a misdemeanor, but crack was a felony.

Welcome to America, Inc.

 

Agreeing with the earlier comments. The best version is the one that doesn't happen.

I just called my Congressman's local office, as well as the local offices of both of my senators. My Republican congressman is currently not taking a stance one way or the other and giving me some line about just that he'll represent his constituents, while both of my Democrat senators are cosponsors for PIPA.

 

Or as I put it in the emails I sent to my two Senators last night, it's like burning down a library to prevent a few people from photocopying books.

 

Dang it man, why didn't you post that before I started making phone calls? That line is good.

 

Well we do have a lot of poorer quality TV but that has more to do with bad writers then downloading. As for music that is really hit and miss. The people who really take a hit from online piracy are the bands on smaller labels and the bands just starting up. For them the internet is away for them to get there music out there and they have no problem with youtube. Also the smaller labels will deal with piracy. This bill has nothing to do with keeping the small bands and acts safe and has more to do with help the bigger acts.

Heaven forbid people stop buying Justin Bieber's music and the label loses money on him. If they spent more time signing bands and singers that were good they would not have there problems.

Same goes for Hollywood start writing better stuff and when you do come up with new shows don't cancel them at the drop of a hat. Heck the same could be said for movies.

Well yeah he owns FOX NEWS which is under 20th Century FOX and anything to do with FOX. NBC is not talking about it ABC is not talking about CBS is not talking about it. They all have a hand in Hollywood in some way or another so it's not shocking they would support it.

I bet you the NFL, NBA, and MLB support SOPA as well. Are they going to come out and say it? No but a lot of people in Hollywood and the music industry support the bill.

What's shocking is those in DC who will not support it. You have ever one from Obama to Ron Paul who are against the bill. Heck even Nancy Pelosi and Michele Bachmann are against it. So to the people in DC who are for this. Maybe the should stop and see that they will very soon be out numbered and just let the bill die. This is one issue were it does not matter if you are a Dem or a Rep the bill is just bad bad bad.

 

Thanks My bursts of creativity are kind of random and unpredictable, but when they're good, they're pretty good.

 

Urrf. I don't think I've signed this many round-robin petitions in a single evening in my life.

 

Screw the government leave this to the private sector.

 

I've signed google's petition, emailed my senators, and posted on facebook with info and contact info. One of my friends has absolutely spammed facebook with it all day.

One of my senators has come out against it, and so has my congressman. The other senator, and the other congressman from my state, support PIPA but not SOPA. A little progress.

Though I wonder why more Democrats seem to be supporting it than Republicans. And I'd like to know how many phone calls and emails Congress has received in the last 24 hours.

 

What would I ban, you ask? I would ban Porn (well, the hardcore ****, not so much the softcore).

Then again, this guy still might not be satisfied with my decision...

 

Instapundit got an email from someone in a congressperson's office saying they were getting like 100 emails an hour, and the congressman was already an established no.


Just to mention this... the support numbers going into today were, I believe, 42 Democrats and 37 Republicans supporting, and 17 Democrats and 14 Republicans opposing, for a total of 79 supporting and 31 opposing. As of now (based of ProPublica) there's 40 Democrats and 25 Republicans supporting, with 36 Democrats and 36 Republicans opposing, for total of 65 supporters and 72 opponents. So a huge number of opponents have come out of the day.

Intriguingly, this has gone from Democrats and Republicans having roughly the same split in terms of support and oppose, to now a slim majority of Democrats supporting it, while about 40% of Republicans are.

 

While SOPA is making headlines in the US, this happened over here this week:
a Dutch district court has ordered two ISPs to stop their customers from accessing BitTorrent site The Pirate Bay. Dutch ISPs Ziggo and XS4ALL will have ten working days to start blocking the site before being hit with fines of ?10,000 ($12,750) a day. The ruling is the latest news in an ongoing case between the ISPs and Dutch trade association BREIN. Neither party is satisfied with the result, however ? XS4ALL is planning to appeal, and BREIN will soon be going after more ISPs.