Internet wunderkinds Google, Wikipedia, YouTube, and a host of others contend that these bills would effectivly kill the internet. In an open letter to Washington D.C. penned by multiple internet "players" the reason is rather simple and concise:
The heart of the matter relates to specific portions allowing the U.S. Department of Justice the authority to seek court orders to censor material that may or may not be in violation of private copyrights. These organizations fear that while they are not specifically responsible for the content that their users post, they would be liable and face financial and use repercussions before any definitive legal judgement. Some go as far to suggest site such as YouTube would cease to exist and artists such as Justin Bieber, would go to jail..
The authors of both SOPA and PIPA contend that Internet piracy is all too common. The contention is that websites, such as Google, should have an active role in limiting illegal access to pirated material. SOPA author Lamar Smith put it bluntly in a recent Fox News Opinion piece titled "The Truth about SOPA." Mr. Smith contends that "this is a constitutional bill that protects free speech and America’s intellectual property. It’s not censorship to enforce the law and stop criminal activity." He goes on to note "so if SOPA only applies to foreign illegal websites, then why are Google and Wikipedia opposed? Unfortunately, one of the reasons why you can’t believe everything you read about the Stop Online Piracy Act is because some critics of this bill have generated enormous profits from illegal websites that sell stolen intellectual property."
While Smith may be trying to court public opinion he goes on to note that Google has been fined in the past for copyright violations, and the loss of profit and employment that easy dissemination of pirated material causes to content developers. Industry giants on both sides of the issue are worried about the same general thing, money.
In my mind the real debate boils down to access. Traditionally, you had to pay the artist money to access the product. With instant communication, we now have a situation where the artist cannot control their customer's access to the product. Technically, while the artist may view their labor and capital as having monetary value, the market has spoken with a big: NOPE. While it's nice to theorize that we can delegitimize theft of intellectual property without disrupting communication mediums, reality says it isn't going to happen anytime soon or without major changes to the nature of content delivery.
Links in order of use:
http://www.rightthisminute.com/video/fight-over-stop-online-privacy
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c112:H.R.3261:
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c112:S.968:
http://venturebeat.com/2011/12/14/tech-execs-anti-sopa-letter/ http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c112:H.R.3261:
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c112:S.968:
Posted by John "Jack" Whitmore
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