If The Internet Is Treated Just Like The Offline World, We'd Never Have Ridiculous Laws Like SOPA/PIPA
from the just-saying dept
One of the key talking points from the SOPA/PIPA supporters was this ridiculous claim that the internet shouldn't be "lawless." That was a laughable line, considering just how many laws have been passed already that directly impact the internet -- including many copyright laws specifically. For example the DMCA, the No Electronic Theft Act and the PRO-IP bills all directly were about regulating the internet concerning copyright laws. So to pretend that the internet is "lawless" is just ridiculous. A close second was to compare the internet to "the real world" (ignoring that the internet is pretty damn real), and to say that obviously we'd be fine with laws like SOPA in that "real world." Thankfully, the good folks over at Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal debunk that and other claims concerning online laws matching up with offline laws:
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...by entering the "internet" you are leaving the borders of the United States. Therefore, any actions you take while in the internet are the actions of a terrorist. When you leave the "internet" you are re-entering the borders of the United States, and therefore are subject to inspection, forfeiture, groping, probing, and mind flashing without right of redress. IF you don't like these terms you qualify for a free, extended stay at our luxurious Hotel Guantanamo... Have a nice day!
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First off, the "store next door thinks your stuff is similar" is pure bullshit at it's finest. Action like that would be the basis for a nasty counter lawsuit that would bankrupt the store next door. Sorry to disappoint you guys!
They aren't going to shut down questionable websites - they are going to shut down ones packed with pirated material. Sorry to disappoint you again!
As for child pr0n, all I can say is if you are downloading it online, don't be shocked if the feds are in knocking on your door soon enough. The net isn't THAT anonymous, sorry to disappoint you.
Are you guys suggesting that the internet shouldn't be subject to any laws?
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That part makes me cry.
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There is no personal attack on Mike, no insulting the TD community. It doesn't even bring in totally unrelated topics to prove a nonexistent point!
I'm afraid I'm only going to be able to give a 7/10.
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Re: Grade
Some of the finest trolling I've ever seen.
High points:
Opinion spoken as fact.
Addressed the topic at hand.
Good, subtle ad hom.
I expect to see a slew of responses. A gold star for you!
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Re: Re: Grade
Spelling and syntax are correct.
"child pr0n" indicates longtime familiarity with posting.
To get that authentic troll flavor, I would recommend a tighter tinfoil hat, or drinking a few more Dr Peppers before posting.
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In my experience, all trolls are not stupid, and not all stupid people are trolls.
Some people are too stupid to be trolls...and this AC is verging on that point. I just can't tell.....
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Tropid - That moment when an internet troll and a stupid person on the internet are indeed the same individual.
There are lots of tropids in r/circlejerk.
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Ever hear of Dajaz1.com? Record labels purposefully sent them music tracks for marketing purposes, then later complained about the site to the police. The site was closed for an entire year, and the site's lawyer was not given any information whatsoever to try and move it to trial.
"They aren't going to shut down questionable websites - they are going to shut down ones packed with pirated material. Sorry to disappoint you again!"
Again, Dajaz1.com A site that was not a pirate site, yet was branded as one and shut down.
"As for child pr0n, all I can say is if you are downloading it online, don't be shocked if the feds are in knocking on your door soon enough. The net isn't THAT anonymous, sorry to disappoint you."
Accusing someone of distributing child porn is a very serious charge. Do you have evidence to back it up? Are you actually accusing us Techdirtians of being child pornographers? We're not. But the fact remains that politicians are ramming through these internet laws by simply crying "Child porn! Child porn!" when the bills will do little to nothing to stop child porn.
And no, we're not suggested that the Internet shouldn't be subject to laws. We're suggesting that laws that do impact it be well researched, well written and narrow in focus. Not scorched earth nuclear missile laws, that shut down entire sites with just a single accusation.
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It's not hard. Walk into the court house, file the lawsuit. it's really not hard to do at all.
What is hard is that most online companies are NOT prepared to fight any sort of legal battle, nor are many of them really sure of their own rights.
DMCA has a false claim provision. How many lawsuits have been filed on this? Very few, yet there are huge amounts of "reported" false claims. Perhaps they aren't as false as all that, or perhaps too marginal to push the issue.
"Did you even read the article? The internet is already subject to all the laws that aply in the real world plus more draconian and invasive laws then would be considered acceptable in the real world."
The point is that when cars came along, the basic rules for walking or riding a horse were not enough, and as such, new laws were enacted. With the internet, the current laws are inadequate for dealing with all that the internet brings, especially when it comes to jurisdictional issues. New laws are being crafted to try to address the significant and large loopholes that the internet has opened in existing laws.
After all, you cannot take your hardware store and hide it offshore. You cannot move your radio station to Russia and still broadcast in the US legally. Yet you can do that with an online business in a flash - so the laws have to be changed to keep the level playing field, and to enforce the laws and values of the country involved.
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What is hard is that most online companies are NOT prepared to fight any sort of legal battle, nor are many of them really sure of their own rights.
DMCA has a false claim provision. How many lawsuits have been filed on this? Very few, yet there are huge amounts of "reported" false claims. Perhaps they aren't as false as all that, or perhaps too marginal to push the issue."
Dajaz1.com's lawyer found it impossible to move his case to trial. So no, its not as simple as walking into a court and filing for a counter-lawsuit.
And the point for the lack of counter-DMCA takedown lawsuits is that the DMCA has little to no punishments for those who issue DMCA takedowns in bad faith. So, economically, its not worth hiring a lawyer to fight it out.
Veoh tried and won in their court case, but were bankrupted because of it.
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What do you think LLC's are for?
But all of that is mute because the real problem is the legal fiction that copyright represents and the absurds that derive from that legal fiction that is complete nonsense.
John Locke was right, you own the fruits of your labor and nobody should take those fruits from you but if you expect that others will do all the work for you to rip the benefits of it you sure are mistaken, you don't deserve a monopoly.
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Oh, I'm so glad you chose that example. You see, those new laws included the Red Flag Acts, which required that a person on foot carry a red flag 60 yards ahead of the car to warn people that a car was coming, and limited the cars to 2 miles per hour in towns and 4 in the country because it was claimed that having cars travelling at the high speeds of ten miles per hour would be disastrous for road quality. As someone who probably grew up with cars as a fact of life you should be able to see how ridiculous those laws sound. Just because new laws might be needed does not mean the laws chosen are reasonable.
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- You are taking it at face value for what they say they are going to do. I think you are being naive to think that it will only be used on those sites, and what is one of those sites. Many bit torrents offer nothing but links to materials that they locate on the internet. They do not have copies of anything on their servers. How are the infringing? It would be like me linking to www.lowes.com and having my blog taken down for doing so. Look at the Patriot Act as a prime example. Warrant-less wiretaps with no probable cause, it was used to stop drug related crimes that had nothing to do with terrorism at about 1000 to 1. I am never worried about the intention of a new law. What I am worried about is how some lawyer is going to spin the phrasing of it in order to get what he wants. Giving the government and copyrights holders the tools needed to possible impinge on free speech is about as um-american as Communism was in the 1980s.
"As for child pr0n, all I can say is if you are downloading it online, don't be shocked if the feds are in knocking on your door soon enough. The net isn't THAT anonymous, sorry to disappoint you."
-That's actually where your wrong. It may seem cliche, but there are dark corners of the net where normal netizans like ourselves never travel. There are a number of services that can be used that allow for complete randomization of IPs and while they do require money its through a completely indirect means so that it cannot be directly traced back to someone. Not everything is as black and white as blocking super childpo rn.org. Going so hard against them is going to drive them further and further underground.
"Are you guys suggesting that the internet shouldn't be subject to any laws?"
- No one said that there cannot be laws, but the laws need to be a scalpel. Not a battle ax. These proposed laws SOPA/PIPA are all Battle Axes and are going to have far reaching (un)intended consequences that threaten what the internet has given people. A voice that can be seen and heard by millions of people in a matter of moments.
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The POINT, my intentionally obtuse friend, is that it shouldn't happen. This is not the same as "if it happens, you can sue". The attempt to shift the burden of establishing cause away from law enforcement is disingenuous and deceitful. Keep trying though.
"They aren't going to shut down questionable websites - they are going to shut down ones packed with pirated material. Sorry to disappoint you again!"
Just like Dajaz1.com? or Rojadireita? All packed with, um wait, not pirated materials, but links. Dreaded, evil, delicious links.
"As for child pr0n, all I can say is if you are downloading it online, don't be shocked if the feds are in knocking on your door soon enough. The net isn't THAT anonymous, sorry to disappoint you"
Obvious troll is obvious. If you'd care to comment on the comic go ahead, what you've spewed there was unrelated.
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So to point it out to you it's that there is one set of laws in "the real world" and another for "the virtual world". The latter ones trample over people's rights while the former, largely, protect them.
Clear?
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Re: An amusing cartoon...
- And how would you pay for this counter law suit with all your revenue streams cut off?
"They aren't going to shut down questionable websites - they are going to shut down ones packed with pirated material. Sorry to disappoint you again!"
- Suuuuurre they will. It says so right there in the legislatio... oh wait, no it doesn't.
Get real. The major industry players are already abusing the laws they have.
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No, just laws that allow due process, like in the real world, boy.
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Yes.
My turn to ask:
There is no law on the internet. U MAD BRO?
/trollface
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You really fail to grasp the concept of the whole cartoon in that it is showing how due process is not being given for so called "cyber" laws, whereas it is absolute for non-cyber laws.
No-one is suggesting the Internet should not be subject to laws, in fact everyone agrees that it ALREADY IS subject to laws. What people are absolutely against is that it is somehow subject to different and unequal laws.
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Have I been to hard on paywall bob all this time?
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Bull-CRAP.
Do you honestly think an organization that has no problem suing 11 year old kids is going to only use this against pirate sites?
Make a review on a site that the rights holder doesn't like? They can have you shut down by claiming any screenshots are copyrighted.
A band is making themselves a ton of money by distributing their content themselves? Not anymore. A record labels files a claim that, without even the possibility of an appeal process, gets shut down completely, and they send one of their slick talking managers to talk to them.
In the meantime, the material pirates continue to get material unscathed.
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Where are the Corporate Logos?
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Re: Where are the Corporate Logos?
SWAT teams with RIAA and MPAA stenciled on their uniforms.
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I remember him. He was in Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure. His name was pronounced [soh-kreyts] though.
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The fact that he had to make two more posts under alts to
support himself.
That's some funny shit.
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Examples--for the first one take a look at what happened to Veoh. And in the last one there has been at least one case of the feds breaking down someones door and hauling him off thinking he was downloading child pornography (it was a neighbor using his wi-fi).
So, misleading--hardly, I don't think it goes far enough showing how bad it could get (it's already bad enough).
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I personally will be overjoyed when this is finally declared worn out and is no longer used.
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Origin of "Drinking The Kool-Aid"
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You can find everything if you just look for it.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drinking_the_Kool-Aid
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"Kool-Aid - Free Diabetes with every Dose!"
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I like how you choose to belittle mike for being earnest. It's easy to be earnest when you know your cause is the one that benefits society. It's difficult when you know your message is a fine mesh of lies and half truths designed to promote the interests of a small handful.
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Wait...what?
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Re: Wait...what?
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Nor was it going to be something that happened. Someone who does not have at least an "on the face" valid claim would never get there.
Sorry to disappoint you... the cartoon is propaganda, nothing more.
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You, however, sound just like the Germans in their leaflets.
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Oh no! Not propaganda! The horror!
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TL:DR Can't tell if full of shit or just stupid.
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Oh wait there were none.
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Shills
Oh well, nice while it lasted.
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Hmmmmm...nasty response to Techdirt posting macro 1 or macros 2 through 6. Which one do I use?
/s (maybe)
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Hmm..
And Mark Zuckerberg would be bugging all our phone calls to sell ads on them.
Just saying.
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Interesting...
I would say, though, that it YouTube wouldn't need a license because it would be a cable channel, not broadcast, and the Zuckerberg would have an interactive system on your TV (monitoring your activity) to sell you more ads, and all your personally recorded information to ad companies and marketers.
Wait, both of those things happen. Public Access (more or less), and your information gets sold/resold via your phone companies, cellular providers, credit card companies, banks and grocery stores.
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Re: Hmm..
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Anonymous
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