SOPA/PIPA
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A Kickstarter project hopes to revive SOPA and PIPA in a form they deserve: toilet paper. Following the January 18 mass online blackout against the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the PROTECT IP Act (PIPA) , Congress flushed these contentious pieces of intellectual property legislation down the proverbial toilet thanks to a soiling of public outcry. And now a Kickstarter project wants to help you send these bills down the crapper again — literally.
SOPA and PIPA return… as toilet paper
SOPA’s father gets a not-so-subtle warning
Image from www.mashable.com With America’s largest Internet providers only weeks from their next attempt at curbing copyright crimes by way of a coast-to-coast anti-piracy campaign, opponents of online censorship are taking their own message to the streets — literally. At least 120 supporters have pledged a total of $15,111 by Thursday afternoon, more than enough to fund a billboard that will be erected above an avenue in the State of Texas district that is represented by Lamar Smith, the same lawmaker who introduced the failed Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA). Although Representative Smith’s SOPA was killed in Congress, advocates for an open Internet still have concerns over how a partnership between Washington and Hollywood could crush the World Wide Web through other attempts at censorship.
Posted by Michelle Paulson on March 9th, 2012 After months of deliberation and a complicated transfer, the Wikimedia Foundation domain portfolio has been successfully transferred from GoDaddy to MarkMonitor. The portfolio transfer was formally completed on Friday, March 9th, 2012. The transfers were done seamlessly and our sites did not experience any interruption of service or other issues during the procedure. As the provider of the 5th most visited web properties in the world, the Foundation cares deeply about who handles our domain names .
Transfer of Wikipedia sites from GoDaddy complete
And this message was signed off with your typical emoticon signature . Yes, the message does start "@Mister Spock", but that could easily because it is a reply to the original post about "dumping", which was indeed posted from the "Spock" account. (The previous comment software being rather poor, etc.) So, the question becomes "Why would 'William Farrel' refer to something said by 'Mr Spock" in the first person ?
Wikipedia is leaving Go Daddy because of SOPA
By Rob Beschizza at 11:38 am Friday, Feb 17 You'd think that the proponents of SOPA [ 1 ] would give up that legislative dead parrot's ghost. But they're still doing the rounds on radio and in print, claiming that millions of Americans were 'duped' into opposing their harmless little internet censorship law. The fresh (!) talking points go like this: Wikipedia, Reddit, Boing Boing and others 'lied' to the public about what SOPA was in the crucial final moments, 'abused our power' by going dark for a day, and thereby tricked legislators and the public into turning on a much-needed new law.
Oh my God, entertainment industry people are still pitching for SOPA
Internet pirates winning with war on copyright with new software "Tribler" The never-ending war between copyright holders and online pirates just entered a new phase. However, this time hackers are armed with the ultimate weapon that may grant them victory. The new software called “ Tribler ” is the new weapon in the battle for Internet liberty and does not need a website to track users sharing torrent files. According to The Raw Story, it is a “ peer-to-peer network protocol that enables computers to share files with thousands of others .” For many this could be the solution movie and music pirates have been waiting for.
Internet pirates winning the war on SOPA with "Tribler"
Last fall, while television news outlets were largely ignoring the Stop Online Piracy Act and Protect IP Act during their evening news and opinion programming, their parent companies were busy paying an army of lobbyists to influence Congress on the then-pending legislation. For months, the networks deemed subjects like Tim Tebow and the British Royal Family to be more worthy of evening coverage. Following criticism for ignoring the growing outrage over the bills, television media eventually devoted considerably more coverage to the widespread protests, website blackouts, and eventual shelving of both bills. In the fourth quarter of 2011, Comcast (which owns a controlling interest in NBC and MSNBC), News Corp.
How Much Did Media Companies Spend Lobbying On SOPA And PIPA?
We've had a lot of discussion about SOPA and PIPA recently, the bills that want to cripple the internet , but there are still plenty of people who aren't clear on the issues. And although the bills have been shelved for now , similar threats (e.g., ACTA ) loom and it's wise to stay informed of the issues at stake. This infographic lays SOPA's and PIPA's legal and technical technical details out pretty clearly. The graphic from Lumin Consulting covers the main issues and arguments against these bills, including mis-labeling of sites and potential for abuse, based on sources such as Reddit's technical examination of SOPA and Protect IP . The nice thing about infographics is when they're done well, they're easy to scan and read, and this one, as Search Engine Journal notes, is something even non-technical people may understand. So if you know someone who is still unclear about these bills, pass it along.
SOPA and PIPA Technical Issues Explained Simply in Infographic Form
from the promote-this-guy dept Over the years, I've definitely found that there are plenty of folks working inside the major record labels (and big studios) who really do get what's going on. The problem is often that their voices are drowned out by others (usually the older guard) who are pretty stubborn in their anti-innovation, anti-consumer ways.
EMI VP Comes Out Against SOPA/PIPA; Says The Answer To Piracy Is Providing A Better Service
To back up their demands for tougher anti-piracy laws, the music industry often promotes statistics that show how drastically sales improve when they have their way. This week the music industry did this again by claiming that the French three-strikes law has been highly effective and has boosted iTunes sales tremendously. But is this really the case? Or have the media and lawmakers been fooled again by the copyright lobby?
Anti-Piracy Warnings Have No Effect on iTunes Sales
Good job, Internet. You win. As the day of online activism opposing SOPA and PIPA continued, supporters quickly began to have second thoughts. Now, the final blows have been struck. Senator Harry Reid has decided to put the Protect IP Act on permanent hiatus, and Representative Lamar Smith pulled his support for the Stop Online Piracy Act. In doing so, the bills have been effectively killed.
SOPA And PIPA Abandoned After Day Of Internet Activism
Advocates of a free and open Internet are celebrating a major victory. Today was supposed to be the day the Senate was to hold a cloture vote on controversial legislation to curb online piracy, but last week’s massive Internet protests prompted lawmakers to rethink their plans. At least 75,000 websites, including online heavyweights such as Wikipedia, Reddit and MoveOn.org, went dark for 24 hours on Jan. 18 to call attention to the censorship threat posed by the Senate’s Protect IP Act PIPA and the House of Representatives’ own version of the bill, called the Stop Online Piracy Act. Google, the most popular search engine in the world, stayed active but covered its logo with a black box and added the message “Tell Congress: Please don’t censor the Web!” Clicking on the message link then took users to a page where they could read about the company’s concerns regarding the legislation — and where they could also sign an online petition, if they so chose.
Amy Gehrt: Protecting intellectual property doesn’t require SOPA, PIPA
Dustin Watson: SOPA and PIPA failed, but the fight is far from over
Last week, Congress faced a challenge the likes of which they had not dealt with in some time: an opponent who was not swayed by lobbyists or corporate monies. In a misguided effort to halt online piracy, Congress sought to push through the Stop Online Piracy Act and Protect IP Act. The issues that these bills faced were from the vocal online community, which banded together across race, gender and political party lines in ways that our lawmakers never could do, or imagine. So what was the issue with these two bills that had the Internet all ablaze?While the controversial Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and Protect IP Act (PIPA) were both put on hold on Friday, the Entertainment Software Association (ESA) became the first major industry association to drop its support for SOPA. The ESA is the main trade association for video game companies and was one of the main business associations pushing for the bills that critics say would result in internet censorship. The ESA spent $190,000 lobbying the Senate to pass PIPA in just six months in 2011. In a statement, the ESA said : "Although the need to address this pervasive threat to our industry's creative investment remains, concerns have been expressed about unintended consequences stemming from the current legislative proposals. Accordingly, we call upon Congress, the Obama Administration, and stakeholders to refocus their energies on producing a solution that effectively balances both creative and technology interests."
Victory! Video Game Industry Drops Support for SOPA
With SOPA Postponed, Attention Shifts to ACTA - As Activists Try to Keep Momentum Going
As we've discussed , the ACTA took all of this country's worst copyright ideas --many of them enshrined in the controversial DMCA -- made them considerably worse, then foisted them upon much of the globe with little to no real public discussion. With SOPA temporarily derailed due to public disgust , attention is now shifting to the entertainment-industry-written awfulness that is the ACTA. Combined with the Trans Pacific Partnership Agreement ( TPP ) these agreements do a number of things, but most notable for our readership is the effort to ensure ISPs must be held liable for the content shared on their networks. SOPA opponents are hoping some activism can rub off on attempts to stop the ACTA and TPP, and have started a new petition trying to erode ACTA support. Poland meanwhile is reviewing their decision to sign off on ACTA after the websites of the prime minister, parliament and other government offices were taken offline by Anonymous.SOPA / PIPA