I just stumbled upon this bill to censor the Internet in America. My fellow simmers. Don't let this happen. It starts like this then they take away more and more basic freedoms.

American censorship.

Video
Vimeo clip about the bill.

is this the USA created internet so we can moderate it as well thing ? i heard it a few years ago,this will pass too many lobbyst behind....controling it though will be dificult, sure,remove a blog from the net,but soon enough you will have users advertising piracy and #%&*$# on legit sites like newspaper and the like,are you gonna cut them too ?

is this part of the net neutrality legislation, or something different?

To put it simply this bill passing would mean anyone here posting a video of their simulators or games on Youtube and them playing them would face felony charges for copyright infringement for posting that video.

Basically Youtube would have no say and the government would decide what is and is not copyright material whether Youtube or anyone says it is ok to post or not.

No, this is aimed at intellectual property protection. From what I've read this bill is a poorly constructed effort.

The primary security concerns appear to hinge on enforcing DNS filtering/blacklisting, which may lead many to use untrustworthy DNS servers geographically outside US jurisdiction. Or at bare minimum, users can just type in the direct IP address and bypass DNS filtering/blacklisting altogether. It's not an unlikely risk scenario. Consider a family where a child wanting to download some music or movies illegally gets some "bootleg" DNS addresses from IRC or other sources, and with minimal skill plugs them into the household router. The parents could easily be unaware of this change, and would unknowingly face some risks using these DNS servers while doing banking or or taxes through them.

As a solution to intellectual property theft in general, I'm not certain there's much that can be actively done to combat this today. It would seem an entire generation has come to believe that free access to any commercial media is somehow a human right. Pretty much anything aimed at protecting IP is going to be opposed.

With this bill, it's easy to see why companies like Google are opposed. By making website owners responsible for policing user uploads, sites like Youtube become essentially unmanageable as they currently operate.

I can fully understand what they are trying to do but the wording of the bill is a bit to broad of a brush.

It does not distinguish enough of what it is actually trying to combat and in turn effects more than it needs to.

The "music publishing industry" is behind much of this. I am trying hard to figure out just what it is they do that requires restricting freedom of information by the government, to protect.

In exchange for fronting the cash to record performers and distribute those recordings, they get the biggest slice of the income stream of the product forever. But now, digital recording is much cheaper and more accessible, artists make most of their income from touring, and the internet has eliminated the barriers to reaching the market. Which is what brings us right back here.

The business model for the music industry is obsolete. And instead of adapting or going away, they are trying to restrict technology and information flow.


Feature films, complex video games for instance the publisher adds a good deal of value to bring the finished product together. But, recorded music not so much.

the music publishing industry attempts to enact filtering for copyright protection purposes is going to result in the loss of US centralization of the internet

those of you in the US, if you value your country being at the center of internet technology you'll oppose this bill vehemently - otherwise you'll lose an invaluable technological asset soon.

While I do not claim this bill is anything good, I would like a solid argument on why the above statement is actually true.

In the USA, property rights are held in very high regard. Yet, if I allow other people to store stolen property in my home, I will be open to criminal proceedings. How does a website which allows users to store "stolen goods" facing the same reality threaten freedom?

Within the great civic freedom the USA, if I serve as a contact man directing others where to go to trade in stolen property I may face criminal proceedings. How does a search engine facing risks for directing users to websites where they can trade in "stolen property" threaten freedom?

If a friend lends you a record album has a theft occurred? Of course not.

If you record a copy of that album has a theft occurred? In the days of analog tape no one thought so. Now if you sold that tape to a third person -- YES certainly that is a crime.

If you play music or the Sunday game for a party of 10 at home is that a crime -- No.
If you play music or the Sunday game for a party of 100 at home is that a crime -- probably not but the NFL would likely say that it is.
What if at that party for 100 you charge $5 each to cover expenses, is that a crime -- yes.

The crime occurs when money is exchanged or when you try to pass someone elses work off as your own.
There are many ways content is exchanged without theft occurring.

well we are Censored on this board and we dont here any peeps from anyone?? Regardless what you say it is a Form of Censorship..

Does this apply to search engines who profit from advertising clicks returned during searches for this material? What about advertising placement on websites that allow upload and exchange of this material? A few years back a guy I knew used some file sharing client which had an ad banner on the GUI, so even this would appear to be an avenue for monetizing this kind of traffic.

A considerable part of the irritation with policing this kind of activity appears to be based on who is getting paid and who is losing money. Media publishers suing individuals for distribution infringements costs money for legal work and has public relations costs, completely ignoring any loses from the piracy. Meanwhile, the search engines and websites are getting paid out of all this traffic. Shifting the focus of enforcement back up the chain from individuals to facilitators serves a manifold purpose of working to eliminate profitability for the "middlemen" and making legal investments farther reaching by impacting thousands or millions of users, rather than a single individual. All this while avoiding negative publicity for suing old ladies and such.

Flip side is that the previously profitable "middlemen" are forced to pay the bills. Search engine companies will need new staff to ensure compliance with blacklists. Websites will need new staff to police user uploaded content for infringing material. For very active websites this could require a costly staff of hundreds. Slowing user upload activity would also work to ease volume pressures on review staff, at the expense of user complaint and losses in advertising click traffic.

The technical accounts of this bill are a boondoggle, working from the wrong angles on the technology side and resulting in an easily defeated or even dangerous user response. Not to mention apparently terrible structure on infringement claims and whatnot.

But I think the general ideas I mention above are the big picture thinking, looking toward the future.

I love how the general public outcry for this is against so instead they push it under the table and try to sneak it through.

That is your lobbyist dollars at work!

Yeah..

They are doing everything they can to censor and silence anyone who opposes it.

They are not allowing anyone who opposes the bill to speak at the hearings.They are actively trying to block all petitions sent by the people to their representatives asking them to vote against the bill from being allowed to be used or even given to the representative.

Democracy working at it's finest.

FYI...censorship is defined as gov't regulations. If a company, corporation, or person (oh I forgot, according to the Supreme Court those are all the same now) prevents you from saying or printing whatever you want, that's well within the law. You have the ability to just go somewhere else and do what you want there. The gov't won't stop you, but yadayadayada.com has no legal need to allow you to post what you want. You don't like it, find another website or start your own.

What's funny is that people increasingly see these corporations as mini-gov'ts, hence the calls of "censorship" or "violation of rights" or whatever. They're not a gov't...at least they shouldn't be and any TRUE gov't that allows it deserves what they get.


The Jedi Master

Best post I've read all day. Right on the money.