US Government is Dropping the SOPA

Stories have flown in from all over the Interwebz, and as you would expect with that particular medium, most of it universally positive about how the evil SOPA is no more, and the Internet triumphs over evil corporate agenda-driven Hollywood. That's all well and good, and I do believe that on the aggregate, this is a huge win for numerous reasons. Here are a couple links to stories about it:

Mashable: SOPA Is Dead: Smith Pulls Bill
Techcrunch: SOPA Scorecard: Internet 1, Lobbyists 0

However, (and there is always a however), one of the better articles I read in response to the whole ordeal came from one of the trade pubs I work with for my job, Digiday. Here are a few highlights from the article:

"In reality, the only thing worse than the potential damage that SOPA might inflict is the wave of misplaced earnestness and hypocrisy displayed by much of the tech industry of late."


"In fact, however misguided some of the safeguards built into SOPA and PIPA are, it’s fundamentally about catching bad guys, not destroying free speech. And you should care about that more than you do.


"It’s striking still to this day how naive some in Silicon Valley can be when it comes to the media industry. Many in the business still parrot the libertarian thinking from the Napster era — information yearns to be free, you can’t cut off ideas, the Internet is a utopia, etc.

"Aren’t those days over? Google and Facebook are billion-dollar companies. This is about business, not philosophy or sociology. It’s time for some folks to ditch the bottle and start drinking from a big-kid cup."



I would encourage you to read the whole article to get it all in context, but the point about the Internet being a huge business is spot on. Just because we use it and don't pay a monetary fee to Google doesn't mean that it's not a business that is looking at ways to make money. The difference is that we don't understand how it works, so it's not "real" to us. We understand the transactional nature of paying for a movie. That's our money. We grasp that concept.

Yes, the Internet is a whole new world that plays by different rules, and yes, SOPA and PIPA amounted to Hollywood lobbying Congress to swing at a piñata. But Hollywood wasn't wrong to want to protect its investment any more than Internet companies are wrong wanting to protect theirs.

The fact that the MPAA has the balls to come out and say that SOPA protests are "a gimmick" and that they turn people into "corporate pawns" is patently ridiculous. Do you know of any person or group of people more ridiculous and myopic than movie/entertainment fanboys? Oh wait, maybe tech Apple fanboys....nevermind...

The overriding point is this: whichever side of this debate you fall on, you need to have a good reason for it, and "not having Wikipedia for a day pissed me off" is not any more valid than any argument the MPAA, RIAA or whomever hell else has made. Read articles. Form your own opinion. Educate yourself, so you're not part of the faceless masses who bitched and squawked because you didn't have Wikipedia for a day.

SOPA and PIPA are dead for the time being, but that, in and of itself, is not cause for celebration. As great as the response was across the country and as inspiring as it is that people found a voice, the reality of the situation is that it's like the rest of life--not a black and white issue in which one side is right and one side is wrong. Read up kids. This is just the beginning.

Fighting Back by Going Black

So as anyone who hasn't lived under a rock the last month knows, there are a couple pieces of legislation circulating in Congress that are aimed at targeting pirates rogue sites that infringe on copyright. They are called the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the Protect IP Act (PIPA). Across the Internet publishers and companies protested this in various ways--the most extreme of which were blacking out their sites for the day. It has become so hotly contested between Silicon Valley and Hollywood that it is (rightfully) being framed as an incredibly divisive issue, but I have a different take on the entire situation. This SOPA madness is exactly what this country needs.

Let's start with where we all agree. Pirating is bad. For our own selfish reasons, at times we like pirated copies of things because it's a benefit to us, but we also recognize that this has a negative impact on those who produce and copyright the work that is pirated--namely movies and songs (which is why Hollywood is understandably pissed). Clearly, the fundamental problem with the whole SOPA deal is not the idea behind it. That's fairly sound, and there really isn't much debate around that.

The true root of the issue is that the rogues who are collectively wiping their ass with the whole concept of intellectual property are outside the US. How, then, is Congress going to change any of that by enforcing laws on US companies? Furthermore, how qualified is Congress to even discuss the Internet, let alone regulate it? Anyone who has paid attention to any portion of the Net Neutrality debate knows that the answer is "not a lot."

To their credit, though, some members of Congress seem to be treating this differently. Assuming motivations are pure (which they never are in politics) and not financially-driven (which they always are in politics), it's admirable that they want to do something to protect the copyrighted work of artists in this country. We want to foster that type of creativity and innovation within our own borders. It's part of what makes this country great.

But SOPA isn't just a shot into the dark. It's a firestorm, and the collateral damage could be catastrophic.

Remember the part about fostering innovation and promoting creativity? There's this thing called the Internet that has led to a lot of that, and it's the innocent bystander that gets slaughtered if this legislation passes. How is a search engine supposed to continue to drive innovation when the government is telling it to waste its time picking through its index for something that may link to something from a rogue? How is a blog supposed to purge all images/references to brands because it hasn't gotten the "expressed written consent" of the people in charge of it? Am I getting shut down and arrested for using this image? What about this one?

The Internet age has completely obliterated the old model and restructured way people receive information. That's a good thing. Since when are options for alternative viewpoints bad?  Yes, I realize print journalism is "dying," but aggregated media is a huge opportunity, and the pubs that are smart enough to innovate can capitalize on the new distribution--and monetization--models that are emerging.

There are plenty of phenomenal resources that discuss the bits and bytes and the legal arguments for why this whole thing is a complete mess. I won't rehash all that, and if you really want to talk about the viability of endpoint security solutions and packet flow evaluation, I would be happy to discuss (before informing you that you need serious help). But I would encourage all three five seven of my readers to read every last one of them. Here are a couple links to get you started: Ars Technica, Google, and the New York Times. (There's a reason Ars is first. If you read no others, read that one.)  

We all have that one "friend" who is just sure that he/she is always right and will argue and argue until everyone else gives up, which of course will only continue to feed that person's self delusion that he/she was, in fact, right. Everyone silently hates that guy/girl and just brushes the whole deal off, knowing that nothing will really change and, for the most part, arguing is futile. That's usually how Congress works. But this SOPA thing is a whole different animal, and the results have been astounding.

Creative: To further drive its point, Google locked this image. Had to take a screenshot of a screenshot to get this image.

Some members of Congress are realizing they're way out over their skis and  are backing off their stances, accordingly. The most vicious competitors in Silicon Valley and beyond are on the same side of an issue, are pissed and rallying supporters to let the government know about it. Household brand names all went dark for a day purely to protest. We got fun things like this. And this. And, of course, this.

Some of it was done in silly ways, but the fact of the matter is that it's all serious. The reaction from a generally complacent demographic in a generally complacent nation has been strong, unified and heard at the highest level. To me, that's the most impressive thing of all. I love this SOPA deal.

UPDATE: Looks like I'm not the only person who feels this way. PC World does too. Take a look.