Writers Guild Realizing That SOPA Goes Too Far; Union Support For Censoring The Internet Begins To Crack

from the well,-look-at-that dept

Supporters of SOPA have been trying really, really hard to pretend that this bill is a "jobs bill." They keep touting the "union support." They try to downplay that the bill is really designed mainly to protect the big Hollywood studios from having to innovate (while their execs take home record salaries and the industry itself brings in record box office revenues). But it appears that the unions -- even those representing content creators -- are realizing that supporting legislation that props up the giant gatekeepers isn't in their best interests either. The Writers Guild of America West recently made the rounds on Capitol Hill to talk about a number of issues. On the list? How SOPA will do more harm than good:

On the House side, Keyser and Barrios met with Reps. Henry Waxman, Howard Berman, and Janice Hahn. They thanked Waxman for his strong support of Guild issues and discussed concerns with the recently introduced Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA). Because Berman is a co-sponsor of SOPA, the pair discussed their concerns with the bill’s implications for competition and an open Internet. Although the WGAW strongly supports combating piracy, the competition, First Amendment, and due process concerns the bill creates must be addressed.

It seems that the folks who represent content creators are recognizing that SOPA goes against their own best interests as well. By setting up a system that props up the gatekeepers, rather than encouraging new tools and services that help content creators directly, laws like SOPA don't actually help the creative community at all. It's nice to see that WGAW recognizes this, and don't be surprised if other groups of content creators start realizing the same thing pretty quickly.

Filed Under: copyright, sopa, writers guild west