SOPA / PIPA (Internet Censorship and Felony Copyright Violation)

Two bills currently in congress that will effectively censor the internet and lower the bar for felony conviction for copyright infringement.


Taken from: http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20...t-why-sopa-protect-ip-are-bad-bad-ideas.shtml

That main issue, we're told over and over again, is "piracy" and specifically "rogue" websites. And, let's be clear: infringement is a problem. But the question is what kind of problem is it? Much of the evidence suggests that it's not an enforcement problem and it's not a legal problem. Decades of evidence from around the globe all show the same thing: making copyright law or enforcement stricter does not work. It does not decrease infringement at all -- and, quite frequently, leads to more infringement. That's because the reason that there's infringement in the first place is that consumers are being under-served. Historically, infringement has never been about "free," but about indicating where the business models have not kept up with the technology.

Thus, the real issue is that this is a business model problem. As we've seen over and over and over again, those who embrace what the internet enables, have found themselves to be much better off than they were before. They're able to build up larger fanbases, and to rely on various new platforms and services to make more money.

And, as we've seen with near perfect consistency, the best way, by far, to decrease infringement is to offer awesome new services that are convenient and useful.

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This should NOT be a legal matter. Internet piracy, like petty larceny, is impossible to stamp out and is most easily decreased by offering a better SERVICE. Not by making another law.

Changing what counts as a felony for copyright, without understanding the implications or common usage of technology puts many at risk. This does not apply directly to PIPA, but its companion legislation in the Senate, S.978. Similar provisions are found in SOPA as well, making certain forms of "streaming" a felony. Supporters of these actions insist that they're merely harmonizing criminal and civil copyright laws, since the felony parts of the criminal copyright statute cover reproduction and distribution, but not performance. What they fail to recognize (or admit) is that there's a reason why performance rights were left out, and it's because it's pretty ridiculous to think of a felony performance in normal contexts.

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This means that YOU could be convicted of a felony and lose your firearm rights.

Example A: Posting a youtube video with a copyrighted song playing in the background. (You may not even have noticed your daughter's radio was so loud.)

Example B: Improperly snipping an article to post on THIS website or improperly citing your source.

Example C: Posting a picture with ANY copyrighted material in it.

Many of these examples could be done unintentionally and YOU could be convicted of a felony with one careless click or copy/paste.

Broadly expanding secondary liability is a dream for trial lawyers, but will be a disaster for business. There's been a move, associated with these bills to somehow demonize important concepts of safe harbors from secondary liability. The suggestion is that secondary liability somehow "allows" bad activity. Nothing is further from the truth. Illegal activity is still illegal. The point of safe harbors from secondary liability is blaming the party actually doing the action that breaks the law.

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Not only could YOU take the blame for the copyright infringement, but the ENTIRE website could be shut down and/or prosecuted. The website could even be shut down WITHOUT an issued warrant or due process of any kind.

You might want to write your congressman about this one.


An easy listen summary with good analogies: http://youtu.be/JhwuXNv8fJM

Well, there goes 90% of the websites I view every day *Shifty eyes*

I am really against those bills. There will be no freedom in the internet anymore.

Bump.

This is a very serious issue, one that effects us all including this website.

In fact, this thread should probably be in News & Political Alerts. Why? Because if these laws pass, this site could very easily get shut down. Gun rights have very few friends in the media and even more enemies. This is especially true for open carry. SOPA/PIPA would give an insane amount of power to the media to just about whatever it wants with almost no consequences.

But besides the dangers that could immediately befall everything on the internet with the passage of thes laws. There is also the issue of how they take a sledge hammer and 'chisel' away at the first, fourth, fifth, sixth and eighth amendments. The issues of increased number of felonies and the lowered bars on conviction, thus (in)directly threatening the 2a rights of everyone.

Like the war on drugs and the war on terrorism, this is nothing more than a front for the war on rights. And these two laws brings it closer to home than ever before.

Stop posting (copy/paste) stuff to support your posts. problem solved, opinion only. Unless of course opinions are on the list too?

That may protect you the individual, but the protection it offers would be limited, wont protect the site and without the ability to post citations your opinion wont amount to anything.

The SOPA Act is a lot more serious than most people think it is. It was even brought up on another forum that I'm part of that has nothing to do with citizen rights. If this Act is passed, even sites like YouTube and Facebook will be taken down or very very heavily censored. The government's even going to put pressure on ISP's to block their customers from accessing sites that don't fall under US jurisdiction. A lot of the effects of this Act are going to be a huge slap in the face to our 1st amendment rights.

Well, here's your chance to do something about it.

http://www.teapartycommand.com/node/2054

Link to a fax.

I've already sent two off to my reps.

Give it a whirl.

RIAA Declares Using Brain to Remember Songs is Criminal Copyright Infringement

This article is satire but this is where SOPA/PIPA could lead to.

http://www.naturalnews.com/022437_RIAA_copyrights.html

(NaturalNews Satire) On the heels of the RIAA's recent decision to criminalize consumers who rip songs from albums they've purchased to their computers (or iPods), the association has now gone one step further and declared that "remembering songs" using your brain is criminal copyright infringement. "The brain is a recording device," explained RIAA president Cary Sherman. "The act of listening is an unauthorized act of copying music to that recording device, and the act of recalling or remembering a song is unauthorized playback."

The RIAA also said it would begin sending letters to tens of millions of consumers thought to be illegally remembering songs, threatening them with lawsuits if they don't settle with the RIAA by paying monetary damages. "We will aggressively pursue all copyright infringement in order to protect our industry," said Sherman.

In order to avoid engaging in unauthorized copyright infringement, consumers will now be required to immediately forget everything they've just heard -- a skill already mastered by U.S. President George Bush. To aid in these memory wiping efforts, the RIAA is teaming up with Big Pharma to include free psychotropic prescription drugs with the purchase of new music albums. Consumers are advised to swallow the pills before listening to the music. The pills -- similar to the amphetamines now prescribed for ADHD -- block normal cognitive function, allowing consumers to enjoy the music in a more detached state without the risk of accidentally remembering any songs (and thereby violating copyright law).

Consumers caught humming their favorite songs will be charged with a more serious crime: The public performance of a copyrighted song, for which the fines can reach over $250,000 per incident. "Humming, singing and whistling songs will not be tolerated," said Sherman. "Only listening and forgetting songs is allowed."

Consumers attempting to circumvent the RIAA's new memory-wiping technology by actually remembering songs will be charged with felony crimes under provisions of the DMCA (Digital Millenium Copyright Act). The Act, passed in 1998, makes it a felony crime to circumvent copyright protection technologies. The RIAA's position is that consumers who actually use their brains while listening to music are violating the DMCA. "We would prefer that consumers stop using their brains altogether," said Sherman.

With this decision, the RIAA now considers approximately 72% of the adult U.S. population to be criminals. Putting them all in prison for copyright infringement would cost U.S. taxpayers an estimated $683 billion per year -- an amount that would have to be shouldered by the remaining 28% who are not imprisoned. The RIAA believes it could cover the $683 billion tab through royalties on music sales. The problem with that? The 28% remaining adults not in prison don't buy music albums. That means album sales would plummet to nearly zero, and the U.S. government (which is already deep in debt) would have to borrow money to pay for all the prisons. And where would the borrowed money come from? China, of course: The country where music albums are openly pirated and sold for monetary gain.

When asked whether he really wants 72% of the U.S. population to be imprisoned for ripping music CDs to their own brains, RIAA president Sherman shot back, "You don't support criminal behavior do you? Every person who illegally remembers a song is a criminal. We can't have criminal running free on the streets of America. It's an issue of national security."

NOTE: This is a satire report on the RIAA. That means it's written as fictional humor. It does not yet represent the actual position of the RIAA, although from the way things are going, the association may soon adopt it. Permission is granted to make copies of this story, redistribute it, post it and e-mail it (please provide proper credit and URL) as long as you do not actually remember it because copying to your brain is now strictly prohibited. Any attempts to circumvent the memory-based copyright restrictions on this article will result in your brain imploding, causing such an extreme loss of cognitive function that your only hope for any future career will be running for public office.

Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/022437_RIAA_copyrights.html#ixzz1jII02FUz

There's also a few petitions online out there that go directly against individual companies supporting the bill. One of them that I signed already had over 80,000 signatures. I'll try to find them if I can so I can post them on here. Usually when hundreds of thousands of your customers are threatening to boycott your products, it can make people atleast think about what they're doing.

Will charges apply to things posted before the passage of the law? It would be impossible to go back to every site, read everything you ever posted, and edit or delete copy/paste material. Some people get banned and cant even get on the site to perform the edit, and some had screen names and passwords long since forgotten. I have a Myspace I cant delete, because I cant recall the password, and dont have the email account anymore that the myspace account is assigned to. Cant login, cant delete, cant change anything, I cant even use the account.

From my understanding, and what I'm reading on most websites and forums talking about SOPA, their intent isn't to just have specific content removed, but to shut down the entire website. And if the website can't be shut down because it's outside of US jurisdiction, it appears that they're going to try to force the ISP's to block those sites from being accessed by their customers. I remember reading one quote where they stated that no action would be taken against the internet service providers that followed through with blocking those sites. While they didn't come out and say what they were going to do to the ISP's that refused to block the sites, it does make you wonder.. I imagine that with the ease of tacking on such huge felony charges due to copyright infringement penalties that are coming with these bills, that they'll be going after those ISP's pretty hard...

The whole damn situation is a disaster and it's hard to imagine it having so many supporters. But those big companies just want "their money" and a lot of people in the government are backing them...

I honestly don't think that some of the supporters of this bill have any idea just how much control this bill is going to give the government over the internet. Or how big of a door they're opening up for the government to come through and trample 1st amendment rights online.