House committee votes on SOPA today

[beer]

(CBS) - YouTube videos of your kids dancing to Katy Perry songs could land you in jail, or at the very least, cost you a hefty fine. Sounds like a Big Brother-inspired vision of the future? It's actually only a few steps way from a reality. If a House committee votes to support the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) today, you could be committing a felony.

The House of Representatives Judiciary Committee is meeting today to determine if a slightly, though still controversial, version of SOPA will move onto the House for a vote.

Resistance from Internet Giants

A wide range of opponents of the bill are speaking out. Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales threatened a temporary shutdown of Wikipedia pages to protest the bill.

"One possible view is that because the law would seriously impact the functioning of Wikipedia for everyone, a global strike of at least the English Wikipedia would put the maximum pressure on the US government," Wales said in a statement against SOPA.

In November, Major mtechnology companies, like Google and Facebook, have taken a full page ad out in the New York Times to state their opposition.

A letter signed by AOL, eBay, Facebook, Google, LinkedIn, Mozilla, Twitter, Yahoo! and Zynga stated:

"Unfortunately, the bills as drafted would expose law-abiding U.S. Internet and technology companies to new uncertain liabilities, private rights of action, and technology mandates that would require monitoring of web sites. We are concerned that these measures pose a serious risk to our industry's continued track record of innovation and job-creation, as well as to our Nation's cybersecurity. We cannot support these bills as written and ask that you consider more targeted ways to combat foreign 'rogue' websites dedicated to copyright infringement and trademark counterfeiting, while preserving the innovation and dynamism that has made the Internet such an important driver of economic growth and job creation."

CNN Money reported that Google executive chairman Eric Schmidt "called the bill 'draconian' during a speech in Boston." SOPA has obvious consequences for a site like Google, which indexes the entire web.

The House of Representatives Judiciary Committee held a Nov. 16 hearing on H.R. 3261 (SOPA). A statement released by Judiciary Committee chairman Lamar Smith defended the bill.

"Unfortunately, the theft of America's intellectual property costs the U.S. economy more than $100 billion annually and results in the loss of thousands of American jobs. Under current law, rogue sites that profit from selling pirated goods are often out of the reach of U.S. law enforcement agencies and operate without consequences. The Stop Online Piracy Act helps stop the flow of revenue to rogue websites and ensures that the profits from American innovations go to American innovators."

Google's copyright counsel Katherine Oyama testified before the panel. Oyama's written statement underline's the search engine giant's concerns.

"Unfortunately, we cannot support the bill as written, as it would expose law-abiding U.S. Internet and technology companies to new uncertain liabilities, private rights of action, and technology mandates that could require monitoring of web sites and social media. Moreover, we are concerned that the bill sets a precedent in favor of Internet censorship and could jeopardize our nation's cybersecurity. In short, we believe the bill, as introduced, poses a serious threat to our industry's continued track record of innovation and job-creation."

Other sites like Reddit, BoingBoing, Tumblr and Mozilla put the issue on the front page of their websites and encouraging users to sign a petition against SOPA. The social link-sharing site Reddit relies heavily on a community of users, who have the freedom to post whatever they want, regardless of copyright infringement.

Lawmakers and Professors Join the Opposition

CNET reports opponents of the bill include members of Congress, like Rep. Zoe Lofgren and Rep. Ron Paul (PDF). Senior House Republican Rep. Darrell Issa joined the chorus of opponents.

"I would expect this bill is not going to become law in this Congress unless these problems are resolved," Issa said in a statement given to CNET.

Professors from dozens of law schools, including Stanford, Berkeley and Harvard have also submitted letters of opposition (PDF). International organizations have also written in to state their concerns (PDF).

According to Forum for Growth & Innovation fellow James Allworth the bill "contains provisions that will chill innovation. It contains provisions that will tinker with the fundamental fabric of the internet. It gives private corporations the power to censor. And best of all, it bypasses due legal process to do much of it."

SOPA is intended to curb the illegal download of copyrighted materials from foreign "rogue" sites, like The Pirate Bay. There is already legislation that provides some protection for copyrighted material, like the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), which requires companies to remove copyrighted content "in good faith."

Worst-case scenarios are being debated. The Electronic Frontier Foundation speculates, "Instead of complying with the DMCA, a copyright owner may now be able to use these new provisions to effectively shut down a site by cutting off access to its domain name, its search engine hits, its ads, and its other financing even if the safe harbors would apply."

(

source)

This bill is pretty much the cyberspace version of the defense bill posted in earlier news that allows US government to detain indefinitely without questioning and due process. This is the perfect timing to push this legislation while much of the citizen's efforts are concentrated in wall street protests.

I didn't want to believe it, but I now recognize CNN as a government controlled news channel to limit what you see and hear. SOPA is the biggest legislation in American Internet history, threatens American liberties, and consitutional rights, yet I do not see ANY coverage of this since Nov.18 2011.

If this bill passes today, it will only be a matter of time before they censor/blacklist nsane for people in the USA. Thoughts?

:drunk:

12/15/2011 3:45pm PST Update:

(This post was updated at 3:45 p.m. PST. No vote to move the bill to the House floor has been taken. The hearing is ongoing.)

The House Judiciary Committee debated the controversial Stop Online Piracy Act for hours Thursday — and about five hours into the hearing voted 22-12 to reject an amendment that would do away with its most controversial provision that would force changes to core internet infrastructure in order to stop copyright infringement.

(Full Article @

source)

[beer]

While I was looking for the list of CEOs that were against SOPA I found this(I guess google is better than CNN's own search):

CNN MONEY: SOPA supporters don't want to compromise

Supporters of a bill that could change the very nature of the Internet refuse to consider an alternative that would address the piracy problem without trampling users' rights.

They are so full of themselves. I see how it is now.

[CODYQX4]

Anyone know how to access nsaneforums via IP? I get the IP but it goes to the FP not the forums. I'll just put crap in my hostfiles if they mess with the DNS.

[beer]

I would also like to know the answer to CODYQX4's question too if anyone knows!

[nitrus]

thanks for the updates on Sopa B)

[beer]

thanks for the updates on Sopa B)

You are welcome. Hopefully tomorrow brings better results.

[Avitar]

Wow, i didn't know nsane was based in germany...

And their server is in Washington...

And they have a fax number lol

[Lite]

Anyone know how to access nsaneforums via IP? I get the IP but it goes to the FP not the forums. I'll just put crap in my hostfiles if they mess with the DNS.

We change our IP sometimes.

At the moment, if you add these to your HOSTS file you can access nsanedown/ forums with no problem:

176.56.227.107 nsanedown.com
176.56.227.107 nsaneforums.com

The forums will be moving to another IP address soon.

[beer]

Thanks for the info ^_^

[avmad]

Holy moly. We did it -- at least for now. The House Judiciary Committee looked certain to vote for the Stop Online Piracy Act today. Instead, because of the work of so many rank-and-file Internet users, the bill's lead sponsor acknowledged that our concerns are legitimate, and adjourned the committee without holding a vote!

Here's Wired's take:

The House Judiciary Committee considering whether to send the Stop Online Piracy Act to the House floor abruptly adjourned Friday with no new vote date set – a surprise given that the bill looked certain to pass out of committee today.

It's amazing work: Politicians are, for the first time, having to contend with the Internet as a political force -- and we might actually win.

But now we need to focus attention back on the Senate, where Marjority Leader Harry Reid says the PROTECT IP Act will be the first bill he calls for a vote next year.

And you and your friends can ask to have your names read from the floor of the Senate during Ron Wyden's expected filibuster of PROTECT IP by visiting http://www.stopcensorship.org

Or direct link.

http://act.demandprogress.org/act/sopa_win/?referring_akid=a3652659.550105.6yzMmo&source=auto-e

[beer]

Thanks for the info avmad :cheers:

I am glad to see more and more people stand up for the free internet, but I think opponent team needs to come up with another strategy. If you have been following SOPA news, then you know the proponents side cares nothing about breaking the internet, cost of changing infrastructure, and security risks involved even after listening to warnings & testimonials from the experts.

What is even more absurd is the proponents of SOPA in the house is trying to condemn the tech experts and opponents of SOPA as what they call " the nerds" that do not understand how things work in the real world. I think these ignorant SOPA assholes should be kicked out of congress for discrediting the very men/women responsible for innovating and pushing the country forward(or even the world!).

[beer]

SOPA Committee Vote Scheduled for Next Wednesday (12/21/2011)

[avmad]

Damn that was quick. :angry: