Alright, I've been long overdue for an update.
A thing that's majorly p-ing me off is a new (? it's been around a while with different names) bill in Congress called SOPA and PROTECT-IP.
The person that's behind these bills is this dude called Leahy. Apparently some sort of Democrat control freak from Vermont.
What is this "SOPA" and "PROTECT-IP"? It's a bill to attempt preventing piracy. "Wait!" you say, "isn't that what the DMCA is for?" Yes. It is. So why do we need more regulations with the Internet? I have no idea. The idea is to prevent people from ACCESSING copyrighted material.
Access: meaning by clicking on that link on YouTube with your favorite cover, you violated laws set forth in SOPA and P-IP. Yes, even covers are under copyrighted materials.
Oh, and guess what? Google can be sued too just for showing you "infringing" results for whatever movie you just searched. Facebook, Twitter, and blogs can be shut down for posting one link. Think about it: one user out of the 800 million or so on Facebook posts a link, Facebook is sued out of existence (even though they have lots of cash so I doubt it).
SOPA and P-IP also have to potential to break the functionality of the internet.
Because the US is planning to have its own set of DNS list with "approved" sites, it'll break URLs as the list will not be the same as the rest of the world. Still, you can access "infringing" sites by just entering the IP address.
That, folks, is SOPA and P-IP. Totally pointless. It won't stop pirates. It's just a minor inconvenience that will be gotten used to after a couple weeks.
So, US citizens, here's what I want you to do:
First, watch this video;
PROTECT IP Act Breaks The Internet from Fight for the Future on Vimeo.
Then, fill out the form here: http://americancensorship.org/
Till next time.
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