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01.18.2012 - DCM IS ON STRIKE TODAY!

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John C:
I don't think that clause (the SOPA version, at any rate) is carries any real weight for a few reasons.

- Things happen so fast that a company cut off "accidentally" can lose a ton of business while the counter-notice goes through.
- While the counter-notice requires signatures and personal identification of the site's owner, the notice somehow doesn't mention any such thing, making it trivial to spoof.  If you can't find the person who sent the notice, sure, the censorship will be lifted, but the damage has been done.
- It ignores collateral damage.  Bans are demanded by domain or IP address, which can host dozens or hundreds of sites.  There isn't any recourse if you just happen to be "sitting next to" someone who is hosting a file and refuses to take it down because he believes it's Fair Use.
- It ignores third party "vigilantes," by granting them unilateral immunity for their actions.
- It ignores the anti-circumvention clause, which would require even American sites to self-police.
- Copyrights are no longer registered, meaning that many penalties will undoubtedly be ignored as unfortunate accidents--you can't prove I didn't THINK I owned a copyright on "Romeo and Juliet."

In other words, it only penalizes, say, a representative of John Carbonaro's estate demanding a takedown of a site hosting a THUNDER Agents book.  It doesn't penalize a web host for following an anonymous (or malicious) tip and suspending the account, or Visa for seizing the business account.  You're also out of luck if you're a whistleblower, since the copyright on documents is valid, and for them not to be would call into question the whistleblower's integrity, but the reason for making them available is (conveniently) inconsequential.  Ditto for Fair Use, which the MPAA is vocally against.

And yes, I absolutely believe that, if Disney had a competing social network, they wouldn't hesitate to drive people off of Facebook by any means necessary, because they're legally obligated to the bottom line on behalf of their investors, not Facebook's users or their personal preferences.  Today, they probably wouldn't, but the law would still be in effect tomorrow.  (It's like Obama signing the NDAA with the detention clause but issuing a statement that his administration probably won't use it.  Thanks, but you're President for no more than five more years, and that statement isn't even binding.)

And moreover, it's not just the direct, single takedown.  Just the threat of repeated takedowns (due to user contribution that there's no serious way to monitor--which is why the DMCA defines "safe harbors" like Facebook and YouTube) is enough to make a project too high a liability to pursue.

Every social network and every forum (including this one) would shut down immediately, because the cost to investigate and remove copyrighted material before there's a problem (and deal with crap from users claiming Fair Use) increases with the frequency of communication, which is usually proportional to the square of the users.

So yes, I did ignore it and I sincerely appreciate the oversight (and bringing what little balance can be provided in a discussion like this, where Chris Dodd says that censorship is working fine in China and Iran, so it should be good here, too), but didn't think that one clause was relevant to the overwhelming majority of affected sites.

Yoc:
Thanks for your replies guys.

I've made this entire News/Announcements section a READ ONLY one as it was originally only intended for staff updates to the membership.
Further comments on this Very Important topic is most welcome in the Discussion sections.

Take care,
-Yoc

Yoc:
Here's a link to disturbing news that SOPA and PIPA might also be in Canada someday.

http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/6257/125/

John C:
It's probably also worth everybody (no matter where you are) taking a couple of minutes to look at ACTA, the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement:

https://www.eff.org/issues/acta
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/01/we-have-every-right-be-furious-about-acta

Negotiated in private and claimed by the Obama administration to not impact trade (which is the exclusive domain of Congress, as is ratification of treaties, by the way), rather than the bills that allow for Hollywood to step on rights, this treaty overrides national sovereignty and requires each country to enforce Intellectual Property protection laws of other countries.  That would give bills in the vein of SOPA even more abusive teeth, since every website is foreign to someone.

In the US, the best bet is to convince Congress that the President is taking away their Constitutional authority and they should demand control.  At the bottom of the second EFF article, there's also a link to a White House petition, though I'm obviously suspicious as to how useful that'd be.

In Europe especially, I'd recommend making a big stink about it (and there are also links in that same article).  The EU Parliament signed, but the member nations are only beginning to do so.  If there was ever a time to gripe about American imperialism negating your sovereignty, this would pretty much be it, since this is (on the surface) all to prevent foreign factories from selling overrun merchandise at a discount back to the developed world...but it's not a huge leap to call "piracy" counterfeiting, so it'll be used to the same end as SOPA, but on your dime.

John C:
Wait, wait!  What's that I hear you cry?  SOPA, PIPA, ACTA, and C-11 weren't annoying enough?  Trans-Pacific Partnership to the rescue!

http://boingboing.net/?p=141947

"Licensing ephemeral copies," so you understand, means needing special permission to actually use (load into memory to watch, for example) the media you have permission to access.

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