How Other Parts Of The World View SOPA

from the not-good dept

We keep pointing out just how disastrous SOPA and PIPA look from a diplomatic perspective. Just as the US is going around talking about the importance of internet freedom, to start pushing a bill that involves censorship (and yes, it is censorship) looks really bad. SOPA supporters like to point to Hillary Clinton's letter that said there's no conflict between internet freedom and copyright enforcement. But she did not comment specifically on the bills at issue -- and furthermore her statement is wrong. There doesn't have to be conflict between the two, but you can't say there's never conflict between the two, because you could easily design a rule that proves otherwise (e.g., "we shut down the entire internet to prevent infringement.") The State Department, frankly, is having a really tough time straddling both sides of this debate, because everything they say about the importance of internet freedom acts as the perfect arguments against SOPA.

But, really, the true test of the diplomatic impact of SOPA on the international community is not what the State Department says... it's what those other countries say. And they seem pretty shocked that this is the path the US is going down. Here are two examples. First up, we have the Voice of Russia, noting that the US is joining China in censoring the internet:

The US and the West have long criticized China for stifling dissent and for censorship but now they are not only joining China but they are taking censorship even further and attempting to censor the whole world.

The international implications of SOPA are worrying for as experts claim: it appears that the US is taking control of the entire world. The definitions written in the bill are so broad that any US user who uses a website overseas immediately gives the US the power to potentially take action against it and enable them to force ISPs to DNS-block any foreign site.

On a global scale it grants the U.S. Government far-reaching powers to go after Web sites which it claims are hosting copyrighted content.... Not long ago the U.S. admitted that it was in a state of information warfare and that it was losing the war. So what do you do if you are losing the information war? You muzzle the messenger.

Considering Russia has a bit of a history using copyright law to stifle political critics... folks there certainly know exactly how censorship via copyright can lead to much more than just protecting a few companies.

Now, let's jump over to the Middle East, where Al Jazeera is pointing out the State Department's rank hypocrisy on this subject, assuming that Clinton's letter was, in fact, in support of SOPA, and showing how that seems to undermine the rest of the State Department's arguments for internet freedom around the globe -- especially when it comes to circumvention tools:

In the year and a half since, the State Department has had limited success promoting online awareness and circumvention tools in foreign countries. But given SOPA's incredibly broad definitions of which sites are liable under its censorship provisions - merely claiming the site "engages in, enables or facilitates" infringement is enough - it won't be long until the bill destroys social networks that spread news of protests and the anonymity software that keep activists protected.

Many tech groups worry social networks such as Facebook - which were instrumental in organising protests in Egypt - would be at risk under SOPA. Brooklyn Law School professor Derek Bambauer also argues YouTube, which hosts countless human rights videos, would be "clearly unlawful", since it allows users to upload videos that may contain copyrighted content. While Google and Facebook may have enough money and lawyers to fend off lawsuits and court orders without being shut down completely, emerging social networks in foreign countries would not. Any site hosting videos, even if they are used to draw attention to human rights abuses, will be easily derailed if an overzealous copyright holder decides to use one alleged violation to strangle the whole site.

But circumvention tools - which allow activists to foil internet censors and evade government surveillance - would be the bill's greatest casualties. While many are developed explicitly for human rights advocates, they can also be used to download copyrighted content. Tor, the anonymising software that masks users' IP addresses that was instrumental during Egypt protests, would be a prime target of copyright holders, despite being funded by the US government.

In fact, most of internet freedom programmes currently funded by State Department are in danger. Hillary has pledged millions of dollars to various companies to create a "shadow" internet "that dissidents can use to undermine repressive governments", according to the New York Times. But by endorsing SOPA, Hillary is giving the green light to copyright holders to destroy it. Virtual Private Networks, proxies, privacy or anonymisation software could all potentially be deemed illegal if they can also help get around SOPA's censorship mechanisms.

Even if Clinton truly believes that SOPA doesn't harm the US's diplomatic position on internet freedom around the world, it sure looks like large parts of the rest of the world disagree. The site TorrentFreak recently had a caption contest about a photo showing MPAA boss Chris Dodd sharing a hearty laugh with Chinese Ambassador Zhang Yesui. Perhaps they were laughing about how the bill that Dodd is pushing is the perfect cover for the Chinese the next time the State Department asks them to stop censoring the internet.

Filed Under: censorship, copyright, free speech, hillary clinton, hypocrisy, internet freedom, middle east, protect ip, russia, sopa

SOPA Becoming An Election Issue: Challengers Highlighting Reps Who Want To Censor The Internet

from the mucking-with-the-internet-can-backfire dept

One of the reasons that our elected officials in Congress often have no problem pushing through the worst of the worst in copyright policies is that most people don't think or don't realize how much copyright impacts them every day. Copyright sounds boring. From a policy perspective, that's great for politicians who can pass awful legislation that favors large campaign contributors and hurts their constituents, and it never becomes an issue. But once that copyright policy starts mucking with the internet... perhaps it's a different story. Supporters of SOPA keep trying to push the myth that the bill is just about copyright and "rogue sites" and "bad actors." But anyone who's actually read the bill and understands it knows that it's really about massive new internet regulations. And one thing people do get up in arms about... is when the government tries to muck with the internet.

Who knows if it will actually become a big enough campaign issue, but it's already showing up in some places. Karen Kwiatkowski is running for Congress in Virginia's 6th District... a position currently held by Rep. Bob Goodlatte. And while Goodlatte was one of the more moderate voices in the recent SOPA hearings (admitting that the bill needs some changes to reflect the tech industry's interests), he's still a sponsor of the bill, and was very active in the crafting of the bill (though, it sounds like he may have been overruled on some of the points he wanted). Goodlatte might also be hearing complaints about the bill from his own family. As he likes to remind folks in the tech industry, his son works at Facebook... and Facebook has come out strongly against SOPA.

Either way, Kwiatkowski is using SOPA as a key issue against Goodlatte in her campaign against him... and it's already catching the attention of others. Ron Paul's active supporters have really taken to the fight against SOPA, since Rep. Paul came out against the bill, and they're urging the wider community to support Kwiatkowski against Goodlatte for next year's election. It would take a lot to beat a long term incumbent like Goodlatte, but it's still impressive to finally see bad copyright policy (and really a bad internet, innovation and jobs policy) becoming an election issue.

Perhaps it'll make politicians think a little harder next time before introducing legislation to prop up Hollywood.

Filed Under: bob goodlatte, censorship, copyright, elections, karen kwiatkowski, politics, protect ip, ron paul, sopa

Senators Rand Paul, Jerry Moran And Maria Cantwell All Warn That PROTECT IP Will Kill Jobs

from the good-for-them dept

Quite an interesting day. Having Rep. Nancy Pelosi come out against SOPA was quite something. But the Senate has still been pretty quiet. However, it appears that some Senators saw the public outcry against online censorship, against regulating internet companies, against changing the basic regulatory and technological framework that the internet has been built on... and realized that perhaps they shouldn't stay quiet any longer either. Senator Wyden, of course, has been vocal about his opposition to PROTECT IP (and has put a hold on the bill), but now Senators Rand Paul, Jerry Moran and Maria Cantwell have also come out with a statement against PROTECT IP, saying that they, too, will put a hold on PROTECT IP.

Our fear, which is shared by many, is that S. 968 as currently written will have the unintended consequences of undermining our nation's national security and our goals to encourage innovation, entrepreneurship, and job creation.

As currently written, the Protect IP Act and the companion Stop Online Piracy Act legislation in the House unnecessarily risk an overbroad application of the new and unprecedented tools they provide to the U.S. Department of Justice and the private sector. An excessively expansionary application of these tools would undermine our national security and economic interests.

We are particularly concerned that the proposal authorizes the use of remedies that will undermine the infrastructure of the Internet. The nation's leading technologists and security experts say these provisions will kill our best hope for actually making the Internet more secure against cyber attacks. We take seriously the alarm expressed by the nation's leading investors in new online startups who say the proposal will dampen interest in financing the new ideas and businesses of tomorrow, and to legal and human rights experts who caution that the proposal enables the silencing of speech.

With significant concerns from both parties in both Houses of Congress, will supporters of these bills still try to push them forward as is? Will they finally let the tech industry into the discussions? Or will they continue to make ridiculous claims about how this effort to regulate the internet is to "protect the troops"?

Unfortunately, the biggest lobbyists in favor of these bills -- the MPAA and the US Chamber of Commerce, mainly -- are working over time to get them to move forward. They're telling Senators and House members that yesterday's protests, which inundated Congress with calls and letters against SOPA/PIPA were "just a fluke." We know that's not the case, but it would be nice if Congress heard that as well.

Filed Under: copyright, jerry moran, jobs, maria cantwell, protect ip, rand paul, ron wyden, senate

EU Parliament Warns The US To Stop Censoring The Internet

from the don't-censor-the-internet dept

What a world we live in... when foreign countries are speaking out publicly against American censorship. For a country whose identity has been built around its strong support of the First Amendment and free speech rights, to reach the level where others are condemning our own failings on free speech is really sad. The EU Parliament has adopted, "by a large majority," a statement warning the US to refrain "from unilateral measures to revoke IP addresses or domain names" due to the "need to protect the integrity of the global internet and freedom of communications." This resolution highlights both the practices prescribed in SOPA/PIPA... but also the actions of Homeland Security and ICE in seizing domain names. At what point is the federal government going to realize that these practices are completely undermining any claim the US has to a moral high ground against internet censorship elsewhere?

Filed Under: censorship, domain seizures, eu, first amendment, free speech, protect ip, sopa, us

Does Congress Really Want To Give China & Other Oppressive Regimes A Blueprint For Internet Censorship?

from the one-hopes-not dept

Rebecca MacKinnon, from the New America Foundation, has an absolutely fantastic opinion piece in the NY Times today, explaining why SOPA/PROTECT IP represent the Great Firewall of America, and why it's the exact wrong approach. It notes that the bill doesn't just bring the "major features" of China's Great Firewall to America, but that it also strengthen's China's ability to censor. While she notes that the intentions are not the same, the "practical effect," would be:

Abuses under existing American law serve as troubling predictors for the kinds of abuse by private actors that the House bill would make possible. Take, for example, the cease-and-desist letters that Diebold, a maker of voting machines, sent in 2003, demanding that Internet service providers shut down Web sites that had published internal company e-mails about problems with the company’s voting machines. The letter cited copyright violations, and most of the service providers took down the content without question, despite the strong case to be made that the material was speech protected under the First Amendment.

The House bill would also emulate China’s system of corporate “self-discipline,” making companies liable for users’ actions. The burden would be on the Web site operator to prove that the site was not being used for copyright infringement. The effect on user-generated sites like YouTube would be chilling.

I'd argue it's even worse than that. We've already seen how countries like Russia have abused copyright law to stifle speech. Do we really want to justify that kind of activity? If SOPA/PROTECT IP is in place, any government around the world can put in place something similar, justify blocking access to just about any website by abusing copyright law to find some form of "infringement."

In the hearings today, the MPAA's Michael O'Leary somewhat stunningly suggested that repressive regimes that censor the internet are a model worth emulating in the US, since they didn't "break the internet." Perhaps he should speak to those who have had their speech blocked in countries like China and Iran to see how they really feel about that. And is he really comfortable setting up the same system here in the US? Is he convinced that it won't be abused, despite the long history of abuse we've seen by the members of the MPAA? Just last week alone we heard a story about how MPAA member Warner Bros., took down tons of content it had no right to, including some open source software it just didn't like.

Fact is: we've seen copyright law abused repeatedly, even by MPAA members, to stifle companies and speech they don't like. We've seen how repressive regimes use the same tools in their countries to stifle speech. Setting up such a system in the US would be an epic mistake.

Filed Under: blacklist, blocklist, censorship, china, copyright, free speech, protect ip, russia, sopa

New Study From Booz & Co. Shows That SOPA/PROTECT IP Will Chill Investment In Innovation

from the indeed dept

Booz & Co., which is one of the most respected consulting/research firms around, has come out with the results of a new study, looking into how venture capital and angel investors will respond to new laws like PROTECT IP and SOPA, and found that a large majority of them would avoid investing in user generated content sites over fear concerning the liability.

• A large majority of the angel investors and venture capitalists who took part in a Booz & Company study say they will not put their money in digital content intermediaries (DCIs) if governments pass tough new rules allowing websites to be sued or fined for pirated digital content posted by users.
• More than 70% of angel investors reported they would be deterred from investing if anti-piracy regulations against “user uploaded” websites were increased.

In fact, the survey found that investors actually would prefer to invest in a weaker economy than a stronger economy with SOPA/PROTECT IP in place. But if the definitions were actually narrowed to not impact so many legitimate startups, they'd invest again:

• More than 80 percent of the angel investors would prefer to invest in a risky, weak economy (with the current internet regulations) vs. a strong economy (but with the new, more stringent proposed regulations on copyright infringement).
• If the legal framework for digital content was clarified, and penalties on copyright infringement were limited for content providers acting in good faith, the pool of angels interested in investing would increase by nearly 115 percent.

Hollywood can continue to pretend that only its jobs are the ones that matter, but repeated studies have shown that job growth comes from new startups, and VCs and angels are what make new startups possible. Chilling investment is no way to help create jobs.

Filed Under: angel investors, copyright, investments, protect ip, sopa, studies, venture capital

Hackers, ACLU, Consumer Rights Groups, Human Rights Groups, Many More All Come Out Against SOPA

from the an-avalanche-of-no-to-sopa dept

All day yesterday, we just kept getting more and more notifications of groups coming out against SOPA. Considering that SOPA-supporters keep trying minimize the complaints about SOPA, or pretend that it's "just Google" who's against it, the outpouring of anti-SOPA feelings really paints quite a different picture. Here are just a few of the anti-SOPA statements we've seen. First up, perhaps the most interesting of all, the folks at Hacker News -- basically home base to tons of techies -- have been getting together to send physical letters arguing against SOPA. The idea here is that physical letters are more likely to get attention than email (and this is true for some, but certainly not all, Congressional offices). If you'd like to send a physical letter, the link above makes it easy. And, as we've seen with most anti-SOPA letter writing systems, it lets you customize -- unlike every single pro-SOPA letter writing system, that only lets you submit existing text.

Next up, we have that bastion of "piracy," the ACLU. Yeah, that's a joke. The ACLU is hardly a defender of infringement, but is absolutely in favor of free speech, and quite concerned about the censorship mechanisms in the bill:

By their very nature, laws protecting copyrights constrain free speech and access to information. Unlike other speech restrictions, however, copyright laws may also advance the generation of information and ideas. A robust copyright system encourages free speech by giving speakers incentives to create and disseminate works of authorship. Such laws add to the marketplace of ideas by encouraging the creation of more content through the assurance that content producers will receive the fruits of their labor. But access to information of all kinds -- even disfavored information -- is a fundamental right that must be protected. Even more to the point, the mere existence of infringing content online does not justify the removal of non-infringing content in the course of attempting to rid the internet of the former. These established principles should not change or be treated differently just because technology has changed.

[....]

SOPA, unfortunately, is substantially worse than PROTECT IP. By eliminating the concept of sites 'dedicated to infringing activity', SOPA enables law enforcement to target all sites that contain some infringing content -- no matter how trivial -- and those who 'facilitate' infringing content. The potential for impact on non-infringing content is exponentially greater under SOPA than under other versions of this bill. As such, despite our support for the protection of the legitimate copyright interests of online content producers, we cannot support SOPA, and in fact we oppose it in its current form, given its broad sweep and its heavy hand that will land largely upon innocent content producers. We urge Committee members to focus not just on the goal of protecting copyright owners, but also protecting the speech rights of consumers and providers who are reading and producing wholly non-infringing content and to eliminate the collateral damage to such protected content. Only in that way will the Committee truly achieve its goal of protecting authors and allow the legislation to survive constitutional challenge.

The letter goes on to highlight exactly how and where SOPA infringes on the First Amendment. It also notes that passing SOPA would be setting a terrible precedent for the rest of the world.

Next up, there's a letter from over 40 different human rights groups, noting their concerns with SOPA and how it will create significant problems for human rights around the globe:

Through SOPA, the United States is attempting to dominate a shared global resource. Building a nationwide firewall and creating barriers for international website and service operators makes a powerful statement that the United States is not interested in participating in a global information infrastructure. Instead, the United States would be creating the very barriers that restrict the free flow of information that it has vigorously challenged abroad. By imposing technical changes to the open internet while eroding due process, SOPA introduces a deeply concerning degree of legal uncertainty into the internet economy, particularly for businesses and users internationally. Business cannot be conducted online when international users and businesses do not have faith that their access to payments, domain names, and advertising will be available, raising challenges to economic development and innovation. This is as unacceptable to the international community as it would be if a foreign country were to impose similar measures on the United States.

The provisions in SOPA on DNS filtering in particular will have severe consequences worldwide. In China, DNS filtering contributes to the Great Firewall that prevents citizens from accessing websites or services that have been censored by the Chinese government. By instituting this practice in the United States, SOPA sends an unequivocal message to other nations that it is acceptable to censor speech on the global Internet.

It still amazes me that SOPA's supporters don't realize what a big deal this is. Giving foreign nations the "ok" to censor the internet is a ridiculously stupid policy.

Next up on the tour of folks coming out against SOPA, we've got a bunch of public interest groups, including the American Library Association, Association of Research Libraries, Human Rights Watch, New America Foundation's Open Technology Initiative, TechFreedom, FreedomHouse, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, EFF, Public Knowledge and others.

We do not dispute that there are hubs of online infringement. But the definitions of the sites that would be subject to SOPA's remedies are so broad that they would encompass far more than those bad actors profiting from infringement. By including all sites that may -- even inadvertently -- "facilitate" infringement, the bill raises serious concerns about overbreadth. Under section 102 of the bill, a nondomestic startup video-sharing site with thousands of innocent users sharing their own noninfringing videos, but a small minority who use the site to criminally infringe, could find its domain blocked by U.S. DNS operators. Countless non-infringing videos from the likes of aspiring artists, proud parents, citizen journalists, and human rights activists would be unduly swept up by such an actions. Furthermore, overreach resulting from the bill is more likely to impact the operators of smaller websites and services that do not have the legal capacity to fight false claims of infringement.

Relying on an even broader definition of "site dedicated to theft of US property," section 103 of SOPA creates a private right of action of breathtaking scope. Any rightsholder could cut off the financial lifeblood of services such as search engines, user-generated content platforms, social media, and cloud-based storage unless those services actively monitor and police user activity to the rightsholder's satisfaction. A mere accusation by any rightsholder would be sufficient to require payment systems and ad networks to terminate doing business with the service; the accused service's only recourse would be to send a counter-notice, at which point it would be at the networks' discretion whether to reinstate the service's access to payments and advertising. This would bypass and effectively overturn the basic framework of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), by pushing user-driven sites like Twitter, YouTube, and Facebook to implement ever-more elaborate monitoring systems to "confirm," to the satisfaction of the most aggressive and litigious rightsholder, whether individual users are exchanging infringing content.

Had enough yet? Okay, well how about various consumer interest groups? Consumers Union, Consumer Federation of America and US PIRG sent a letter as well.

The bill would allow rights holders to send notices to payment processors and advertising networks, ordering them to cut off funding to sites the rights holders believe are "dedicated to the theft of U.S. property." However, this definition is extremely broad. Section 103(a)(1)(B)(ii) defines a "site dedicated to the theft of U.S. property" as including any site whose owner "takes active steps to avoid confirming a high probability" that it is being used (even by others) for infringement. This means that an entirely legitimate site can be defunded, and even enjoined entirely, merely because a few of its users may have infringed. Consequently, overzealous rights holders could shut down lawful exchange sites like craigslist, eBay, swap.com, or BookCrossing, closing off valuable outlets for small-scale buying and selling. For instance, a legitimate student-to-student textbook exchange site could be hampered or shut down by a publisher for the actions of just a few infringing users, raising the costs of an already-expensive education.

Secure online communication and commerce is also of critical importance to consumers. Yet, the bill could undermine the security of consumers. Section 102(c)(2)(A) allows for court orders that would block domain name system (DNS) operators from providing access to the Internet Protocol (IP) addresses of targeted sites. In other words, a consumer attempting to access an allegedly infringing site would get an error message or be redirected to another page. However, redirecting DNS queries (to phishing sites and other fraudulent websites) is also a common tactic used by malicious hackers to steal millions of dollars from consumers....

Finally, the bill grants complete immunity to a very large class of actors, including Internet service providers, advertising networks, advertisers, search engines, and payment networks, for cutting off access to a targeted site as long as they can claim their actions were taken in the reasonable belief that the site was suspected of encouraging infringement. This blanket immunity from all federal and state laws and regulations could allow the above actors to act in ways that would harm consumers. For example, Internet service providers could block access to online services that compete with their own telephone or video offerings under a justification of curbing alleged infringement, depriving consumers of legitimate alternatives to high-priced services. The broad immunity of the statute would prevent consumers or consumer protection agencies from policing or addressing such anti-consumer or anticompetitive.

Next on the list, we have a surprise entrant: the Brookings Institution. Unlike plenty of "think tanks" who are nothing more than lobbying shops in disguise, Brookings has an incredibly strong reputation for both intellectual honesty and credibility -- and thus it's widely viewed as one of the most influential public policy think tanks around. Not surprisingly, it's take may be a bit more measured, but it raises significant concerns about the cybersecurity impact of the bill:

I highlight the very real threats to cybersecurity in a small section of both bills in their attempts to execute policy through the Internet architecture. While these bills will not "break the Internet," they further burden cyberspace with three new risks. First, the added complexity makes the goals of stability and security more difficult. Second, the expected reaction of Internet users will lead to demonstrably less secure behavior, exposing many American Internet users, their computers and even their employers to known risks. Finally, and most importantly, these bills will set back other efforts to secure cyberspace, both domestically and internationally. As such, policymakers are encouraged to analyze the net benefits of these bills in light of the increased cybersecurity risks.

Also worried about the security angle is the respected security firm ESET, who makes clear the damage the DNS provisions will do:

Based on my work, and that of my team of researchers, I have to say that this legislation, if passed as currently written, would have a chilling effect on the economy of the United States.

More than 100 million Internet users in over 180 countries rely on ESET products to protect their personal and enterprise data systems. This gives ESET a unique perspective on the DNS filtering proposed by SOPA and PIPA. There is hardly any part of the United States economy today that does not depend upon the smooth operation of the Internet, which in turn relies upon the integrity of the Domain Name system (DNS). The DNS filtering proposed in SOPA and PIPA would seriously undermine that integrity.

While ESET fully supports the goals of protecting IP and reducing piracy, our experiences combating cybercrime for more than 20 years suggest that SOPA and PIPA will do little to advance these goals. What we are sure they will do is undermine valuable efforts to improve the security of the Internet. Without those improvements, expansion of the global digital economy, of which the United States is clearly a leader, as well as a leading beneficiary, will falter.

And, finally, we have TechAmerica, one of the biggest and most respected tech trade associations, representing over 1,200 companies -- and one of the most important organizations when it comes to helping to fundraise for politicians. I'd been disappointed that TechAmerica had been relatively quiet on this issue, so it's great to see it come out strongly against SOPA. After spending over a page agreeing that rogue sites and infringement are big problems, TechAmerica's letter notes:

Sadly, neither chamber of Congress has produced thoroughly acceptable legislation, but SOPA in particular marks a clear retreat from a history of Congressional support of the digital revolution. That support has often come in the form of not imposing regulation on the industry, and certainly never before has such a wholesale shifting of costs and responsibilities of property owners onto technology companies been contemplated -- a shift away from a careful balance and toward legislation that favors one industry over another.

Put another way, the approach taken in SOPA leads one to wonder why the DMCA would even be used in the future. Using SOPA’s proposed broad new inducement provision, one could simply ignore the current DMCA safe harbors and use intermediaries to accomplish the end goal, and if damages were warranted, merely later sue for infringement. Moreover, important measures to make sure that the proposals keep pace with technology, such as the DMCA requires with the triennial rulemaking on exceptions to the prohibition on circumvention of access and use controls, are non-existent. Along those same lines we are also dismayed that the proposed legislation relies on "simple" technical measures to address complex international issues that are likely better handled through diplomacy, negotiation, constructive dialog and coordinated action. The proposed "solutions" carry risk, perhaps significant, and are likely to be easily circumvented....

SOPA merely shifts costs from content owners, the rightful protector of their content, to various other parties, rather than making sure that costs are appropriately placed.

This is a philosophical issue that runs to the heart of both proposals. Do we really want government forcing one industry to subsidize another, to be required by force of law to assist another industry in being successful? More typically we expect industries to operate within a market framework and with the freedom of contract to solve such challenges. In this case, Congress seems determined to step in and force one industry to provide subsistence to another.

I'm sure there are some others that I've missed, but it's great to see so many organizations coming out so strongly against SOPA. Can defenders of the bill continue to pretend that it's just a small opposition now? Or that it's just those who wish to infringe who are opposed to SOPA's broad language and vague definitions?

Filed Under: concerns, consumer rights, copyright, human rights, protect ip, sopa
Companies: aclu, brookings, techamerica

SOPA/PROTECT IP Would Be Hideously Bad For Video Gamers

from the our-rights-are-not-a-game dept

Jennifer Mercurio is the Vice President and General Counsel of the Entertainment Consumers Association (ECA), the nonprofit membership organization which represents gamers in the U.S. and Canada.

If a pair of bills on Capitol Hill, called the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and PROTECT IP, pass, you could be fined and thrown in jail for streaming (i.e., "performing") your video game speed runs or game play. Just as people post cute pictures and videos of themselves, their pets and their kids singing and dancing to copyrighted works, gamers of all ages routinely post pics and stream video of themselves during game play. All of these things have, for the most part, been considered "fair use" under the law. Tens of thousands of videos currently available online featuring game play from popular games like Call of Duty, Halo, Starcraft and others could be made illegal under these laws.

Since games also rely on the unique and fresh content that gamers create structurally and within game play, SOPA/PROTECT IP would freeze such innovation. Creative new works developed out of the technology of video games could be stifled by these new laws. Machinima, or videos created using in-game tools such as in Red vs. Blue, may never have come about if SOPA/PROTECT IP were in place.

There are also serious "due process" issues with SOPA/PROTECT IP.

Under constitutional due process, if the government prosecutes you, you must have the ability to defend yourself before being penalized; and the prosecution and governing board must be a government body, not a private company such as YouTube, or a ratings entity like the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB). The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) presently mandates that a take-down notice regarding potential infringement must first be sent to the Internet service provider or host, which then must comply, if it wants to retain its so-called "safe harbor" protection. However, the alleged infringer can then send a counter-notice stating basically, "no we're not infringing, here is why." Under the current safe harbor provisions, the service provider is then required to put the material in question back up in 10 days if there is no further action taken on the part of the content owner.

Here, SOPA/PROTECT IP forgo even this slight due process. These bills lack the provisions requiring the providers to put the material back up following a counter notice. Instead, the incentives are for service providers to keep the content down. Furthermore, a court order via a judge could require payment processors and ad networks to cut off service, before sites are convicted of any wrong-doing. The accused would then need to defend themselves. In other words, the impact of the bill is that they are found guilty before their day in court.

The legislation would also allow Internet companies hosting the content to arbitrarily set standards regarding various classes of works and amateur performers and demand removal of content or petition the government to outright block access to websites, creating an Internet government-sanctioned blacklist.

Internet service providers (ISPs) that are part of a corporation which creates content, such as Comcast, could also then use these laws for anti-competitive practices, arbitrarily enforcing/not enforcing potential infringements of their content or their competitors. Where NBC and G4 could be weaponized and empowered... the potential for abuse is staggering.

SOPA/PROTECT IP would also strip the limited defense websites enjoyed under DMCA, and sites could be considered liable for the worst of the worst user, which means that they'd need to penalize all users to protect themselves. Since the bills allow actions against suspected sites, as opposed to just convicted sites, all Internet sites would need to chill the speech placed on them in order to avoid potentially crippling legal responses. Thus companies and sites like Justin.tv, Twitch.tv, Ustream.tv, Tumblr.com, Facebook, YouTube, Google+, Blogger and Wordpress, which used to be immune from prosecution for the content posted on them, would now need to monitor every communication, if they wanted to avoid liability. This will result in a chilling effect across the web.

Further, several experts have warned that the domain name system (DNS) filtering requirements of PROTECT IP would weaken Internet security and stability. The filtering provisions would not serve their goal of lowering piracy, but threaten the security and stability of the global DNS. Further, they would undermine the universality of domain names, which has been a backbone of how the Internet is navigated. The experts warn that many of the tools and stated goals of both the government and business related to prevention of cyber attacks and Internet security would be undermined by these bills.

SOPA/PROTECT IP also relies on copyright holders setting arbitrary standards regarding economic impact and prosecution for various classes of works and amateur performers. Since items posted to the Internet can be accessed immediately and universally, copyright holders could claim every post would be extremely costly.

These bills could impede or block constitutionally protected speech. This point is especially troublesome in the shadow of the great video games speech victory earlier this year, Brown v EMA, where the Supreme Court finally held video games to be such protected speech in their own right.

Since we already have laws covering this area on the books, it defies logic to further burden American consumers in these arbitrary and capricious ways. The ECA stands in opposition to these bills. To lend your voice, check out our free online tools, read more about the subjects or help us fight for our rights, visit: http://theeca.com/video_gamers_rights

Filed Under: copyright, due process, protect ip, sopa, video games
Companies: eca

SOPA Gives Me Powers That I Don't Want

from the not-in-my-name dept

I've had the privilege of working in two completely different worlds. I worked in technology, employed by Google for six years where I started and led Google Apps for Businesses. Then, I shifted into the movie business by leaving Google and producing a full length movie, Dead Inside, in LA. Our movie hits the market this week -- at a very interesting time with the copyright bill SOPA being debated in Congress.

I was amazed when I learned about the details of SOPA. This bill gives powers to content owners to easily and freely hurt many tech companies and could even go so far as to shut them down completely. Reading this from an entrepreneur's standpoint I immediately go on the defensive and hate it. After reading through the full bill, I finally realized "Wait wait wait...I'm a content owner, I could use this law." This is when I got truly scared.

As a content owner I would have power to send a simple letter to a payment processor accusing a client of theirs of copyright infringement. If the payment processor doesn't cut off a business relationship with my target within five days, they could be dragged into a convoluted legal process. I don't need to consult with a lawyer to do this, which is great because I don't even have one. I certainly can send simple letters out in my free time between takes on the set though. This is too much power for a single movie producer to have and it's way too much for any one else to have. A large tech company could defend itself in court, but small startups don't stand a chance.

The fact that many tech companies are very small and overly susceptible to the impact a simple accusation could have under SOPA is lost on many folks. While I was in LA, people on our set asked me what I did in addition to working the movie. I told them that "some of my time is spent advising tech startups." While a typical response in the Valley would be "Oh wow, which startups?" I was surprised to hear back "Oh, what's a startup?" After discussing this, many people on our set did not understand that most large tech companies start as two guys in a garage with an idea. Their concept of tech companies only included large firms of the world like Google and Apple. Now I understood that when people look at these laws, the concerns of small companies might be ignored because in some minds its obvious that tech companies have large legal arms to defend themselves.

In reality though, most of the large tech companies that exist today were once very small and very fragile. If SOPA was in place, those companies would have never grown up, since the two guys in a garage would have required four lawyers to survive. Dropbox is a perfect example. Created by some college students, the company provides shared online storage space for a fee. Under SOPA, the company would have been cut off from its revenues as soon as a single accusation was made that it was hosting copyrighted material. As a small company this could have been crippling. Today though, I know that Dropbox is one of the most popular tools in the movie industry, since it allows easy sharing of new daily shots, music cues, draft movie posters and more. The innovative tech companies of the future will be extinguished before they have a chance to even get out the door.

With our movie finished and coming onto the market, I'm looking forward to using technology to get our movie out to the world. I want to work with startups that are coming up with new distribution methods. I want to see new abilities to connect with our future fanbase. I want to see more methods of movies getting crowdfunded so viewers get to have more of a say over which movies they want made. Any company that might start solving these problems though would be at risk under SOPA of getting squashed. While my movie could be the one which shows up on those new sites, I already have tools at my disposal (like the DMCA) to deal with it. SOPA allows me to have an easier time protecting my copyrighted material, but the cost is too great.

Filed Under: copyright, movies, power, protect ip, sopa

VP Joe Biden Explains Why SOPA & PROTECT IP Are Anti-American & A Bad Idea

from the good-for-him dept

A couple of weeks ago, Joe Biden gave a perfect, if unintended, explanation for why SOPA and PROTECT IP are such terrible ideas. Since his speech included a bunch of other things, we thought it would be good to highlight Biden's specific arguments that explain why SOPA and PROTECT IP are bad, and to give him kudos for making such statements, since they contradict the statements from Hollywood on this bill. Unfortunately, even with Biden's clear and incontestable statements that show the massive harm that SOPA and PROTECT IP would cause for innovation in the US, this bill still has tremendous momentum in DC, thanks to a strong lobbying push from the legacy entertainment industry. In fact, don't be surprised if Biden totally contradicts himself in a few weeks and pretends that he's all for censoring the internet, harming innovation, and "fixing" what isn't broken on the internet. That's why we're urging folks to support American Censorship Day tomorrow, as the House holds its first hearings ever on how best to censor the internet. Biden's clear explanation of why SOPA & PROTECT IP are so bad should give pause to anyone supporting it -- and will certainly raise serious eyebrows if/when Biden (and the White House) later change positions on these bills. Oh, and if Biden does change positions, let's hold him to it, and make it clear that the American public doesn't appreciate flip flopping politicians, who completely contradict themselves, based on who's supporting what legislation.

Filed Under: copyright, innovation, internet freedom, joe biden, protect ip, sopa