The Blackout......

[JohnnyWalkerBlackLabel]

Today while browsing various sites I saw some of my favorite links blacked out. I have been working so much I've not paid attention to this Lamar guy and what he's trying to implement.
Can someone catch me up to speed please, because I REALLY don't wanna go in the political section. They are cutthroat....

-JWBL

[RallyCola]

just google sopa and pipa. there is a thread here but its long.

basically sopa and pipa are just another form of governmental control...that will aimed at insuring producers make money from the sale of their products and not lose money to illegal downloads, it can have very far reaching implications for the rest of the interweb.

[Quiet Reflections]

From Wikipedia(which you can still get on if you use Firefox and NO Script)

The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), also known as House Bill 3261 or H.R. 3261 (http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.uscongress/legislation.112hr3261), is a Bill (proposed law) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_%28proposed_law%29) that was introduced in the United States House of Representatives - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_House_of_Representatives)on October 26, 2011, by United States House Committee on the Judiciary - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_Judiciary_Committee) Chair Representative (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_House_of_Representatives#Membership. 2C_qualifications_and_apportionment) Lamar S. Smith (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lamar_S._Smith) and a bipartisan group of 12 initial co-sponsors. The bill, if made law, would expand the ability of U.S. law enforcement and Copyright - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright) holders to fight online trafficking in copyrighted Intellectual property - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectual_property)and Counterfeit consumer goods - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counterfeit_consumer_goods)Presented to the United States House Committee on the Judiciary - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_Judiciary_Committee), it builds on the similar PRO-IP Act (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRO-IP_Act) of 2008 and the corresponding Senate bill, the PROTECT IP Act - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PROTECT_IP_Act).

[kukm4]

PROTECT IP / SOPA Breaks The Internet
PROTECT IP / SOPA Breaks The Internet on Vimeo (http://vimeo.com/31100268)

[JohnnyWalkerBlackLabel]

Yo wtf!!!!!!!!!
Are they fucking nuts?!?!?!?!?!?

[BluegrassCat]

An interesting take by Matt Yglesias on the actual costs of internet piracy: http://www.slate.com/articles/business/small_business/2012/01/sopa_stopping_online_piracy_would_be_a_social_and_ economic_disaster_.html

Congressional bill names are a reliable indicator of the state of conventional wisdom in America. That Congress is weighing bills called the Stop Online Piracy Act - and the PROTECT IP Act tells us that, at a minimum, the idea of stopping online piracy is popular.

It shouldn’t be. There’s no evidence that the United States is currently suffering from an excessive amount of online piracy, and there is ample reason to believe that a non-zero level of copyright infringement is socially beneficial. Online piracy is like fouling in basketball. You want to penalize it to prevent it from getting out of control, but any effort to actually eliminate it would be a cure much worse than the disease.

Much of the debate about SOPA and PIPA has thus far centered around the entertainment industry’s absurdly inflated claims about the economic harm of copyright infringement. When making these calculations, intellectual property owners tend to assume that every unauthorized download represents a lost sale. This is clearly false. Often people copy a file illegally precisely because they’re unwilling to pay the market price. Were unauthorized copying not an option, they would simply not watch the movie or listen to the album.

Critics of industry estimates have repeatedly made this point and argued against the inflated figures used by SOPA and Protect IP boosters. But an equally large problem is the failure to consider the benefits to illegal downloading. These benefits can be a simple reduction of what economists call “deadweight loss.” Deadweight loss exists any time the profit-maximizing price of a unit of something exceeds the cost of producing an extra unit. In a highly competitive market in which many sellers are offering largely undifferentiated goods, profit margins are low and deadweight loss is tiny. But the whole point of copyright is that the owner of the rights to, say, Breaking Bad has a monopoly on sales of new episodes of the show. At the same time, producing an extra copy of a Breaking Bad episode is nearly free. So when the powers that be decide that the profit-maximizing strategy is to charge more than $100 to download all four seasons of Breaking Bad from iTunes, they’re creating a situation in which lots of people who’d gain $15 or $85 worth of enjoyment from watching the show can’t watch it. This is “deadweight loss,” and to the extent that copyright infringement reduces it, infringement is a boon to society.

After all, things like public libraries, used bookstores, and the widespread practice of lending books to friends all cost publishers money. But nobody (I hope) is going to introduce the Stop Used Bookstores Now Act purely on these grounds. The public policy question is not whether the libraries are bad for publishers, but whether libraries are beneficial on balance.

By the same token, even when copyright infringement does lead to real loss of revenue to copyright owners , it’s not as if the money vanishes into a black hole. Suppose Joe Downloader uses BitTorrent to get a free copy of Beggars Banquet rather than Amazon.com, and then goes out to eat some pizza. In this case, the Rolling Stones’ loss is the pizzeria’s gain and Joe gets to listen to a classic album. It’s at least not obvious that we should regard this, on balance, as harmful.

Meanwhile, the benefits of forcing copyright holders to compete with free-but-illegal downloads are considerable. I am not, personally, in the habit of infringing on copyrights (though I will cop to some book lending and the fact that my fiancée and I, like any sensible couple, share Netflix and Hulu subscriptions) but recently have found myself firing up btjunkie.org again. Why? Because the BBC in its infinite wisdom decided to start airing Season 2 of its excellent program Sherlock in the United Kingdom without making it available at any price to Americans. That’s dumb, but until relatively recently it was a universal problem. It used to be that studios and labels didn’t make their wares available to people willing to pay for them. That created an underground market for pirated TV shows and music. The pirated market, in turn, pressured the entertainment industry to create legal options such as iTunes and Hulu. The illegal competition is a valuable consumer pressure on the industry.

This is not to say that we should have no copyright law or that there should be no penalties for piracy. Used book stores may slightly depress sales of new books, but they don’t threaten to destroy the entire publishing industry. Large-scale, unimpeded, commercialized digital reproduction of other people’s works really could destroy America’s creative industries. But the question to ask about the state of intellectual property policy is whether there’s a problem from the consumer side. If infringement got out of hand, we might face a bleak scenario in which bands stop recording albums and no new TV shows are released.

But we’re clearly not living in that world. There are plenty of books to read, things to watch, and music to listen to. Indeed, the American consumer has never been better-entertained than she is today. The same digital frontier that’s created the piracy pseudo-problem has created whole new companies and made it infinitely easier for small operations to distribute their products. Digital technology has reduced the price we pay for new works and made them cheaper to create. I can watch a feature film on my telephone.

The American economy has plenty of problems, but lack of adequate entertainment options is not on the list. SOPA isn’t just an overly intrusive way to solve a problem, it’s a “solution” to a problem that’s not a problem.

[flabbybody]

Industries like real estate and auto sales support layers of expensive middle men who have essentially been put out of business by free sites like craigslist. Who needs car salesmen, real estate brokers, and expensive show rooms anymore?
I honestly believe big business is behind this legislation to restore the old way people purchased things and services we need. And of course congressmen and senators who are on board with this attack on the internet are owned by the special interest lobbyists

[trish]

First you have to realize that the internet is a series of tubes. If you clog them up, pirates can't suck up your product and sell it. But if the tubes are clogged it's difficult for anyone else to communicate through them. Worse if the junctures are carefully monitored for the passage of contraband, they can also be monitored to obstruct free speech. Does that help?

[onmyknees]

Well...while y'all are on this current indignation and outrage....( and rightfully so) you're concentrating on the left hand, while the right hand is picking your pocket. Let me toss this grenade into the mix.

> Currently Gov. Andrew Cuomo has proposed a bill that would essentially say if you're convicted ( which will be changed to arrested after the legislation passes...mark my words) of any misdemeanor you will be forced to provide your DNA to the States DNA criminal DNA bank. Speeding, Reckless Diving, popped with a few joints....open up and let the State swab you to gather your DNA.

>Currently Mayor Bloomburg is proposing a bill to go along with all the street cameras currently watching your every move, to adding a new type technology that randomly images you as you walk down the street and can detect metal on one's body similar to what the TSA uses at airports. They're selling this as a way to detect handguns, but if you believe that, the Mayor has a bridge in Brooklyn for you.
Let's see how many civil libertarians we have in our midst.

[trish]

First you have to realize that a gun is small penis compensation device. The surveillance is designed to detect and warn women as to which men are not worth the effort. :) :)

[onmyknees]

First you have to realize that a gun is small penis compensation device. The surveillance is designed to detect and warn women as to which men are not worth the effort. :) :)

LOL...I actually made the entire thing up Trish. I wanted to see if your filters alerted you to the word "gun" . Well done !! :dancing::dancing:

[trish]

I actually made the entire thing up...Like I said, "not worth the effort."

[onmyknees]

Like I said, "not worth the effort."


Does this cause you some anxiety ? Here you are walking down the street, and the NYPD is imaging you to screen for firearms. What's a civil libertarian anti gun person to do? lol

[trish]

Why should it cause me anxiety, you made the ENTIRE thing up? And now you're hijacking the thread.

[Ben]

Chris Dodd’s paid SOPA crusading:

http://www.salon.com/2012/01/18/chris_dodds_paid_sopa_crusading/singleton/

[onmyknees]

Why should it cause me anxiety, you made the ENTIRE thing up? And now you're hijacking the thread.


Forget it.....it went past you. It's not made up (google it) and I'm hardly hijacking the thread. My point was that while we lament SOPA, there's equally concerning issues that are taking our freedoms away right here under our noses. Got an opinion on that?

http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2012/01/17/nypd-testing-gun-scanning-technology/

[RallyCola]

here is the thing...the US population is stupid and thinks our government is actually ok. they can only handle one thing at a time. and today, millions of people saw the google doodle, the craigslist black page and couldn't look shit up on wikipedia...and it is the first time alot of the dumbfucks in the country have heard of it...so while things happen under the radar...i at least applaud these web companies for trying to protect their investments and alert the public

[BluegrassCat]

Since when is changing the subject of a thread not hijacking it? Both programs sound awful, why don't you start a thread about them?

[trish]

You didn't make it up, you made it up, you didn't make it up??? The concerns of this thread are SOPA and PIPA, not your own pet peeves. Start another thread.

[Ben]

Reddit Co-Founder: SOPA Blackout 'Resounding Success' - YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RuVx5l5rP68&feature=channel_video_title)

[onmyknees]

You didn't make it up, you made it up, you didn't make it up??? The concerns of this thread are SOPA and PIPA, not your own pet peeves. Start another thread.


Your concerns are not my concerns, and the concerns of this thread are whatever I want them to be in my response. Get it ? Pet Peeves? LMFAO. You're kidding right? The larger point ( now that SOPA is essentially dead) is a loss of personal freedom. Got any comment on the 2 examples I posted....or aren't they your concern?

[trish]

Since everything in the universe is composed of elementary particles and their associated fields, and since SOPA is essentially dead, the larger concern is whether string theory is the better route to a unified field theory, or loop quantum gravity. Got any comment on these 2 approaches...or aren't they your concern?

http://arxiv.org/abs/hep-th/9905111
http://arxiv.org/abs/gr-qc/0210094

(In other words: you aren't the OP and you're still hijacking the thread. Start another.)

[Jericho]

Trust America...It can fuck up the internet!
If you want a eurocentric viewpoint" :shrug

[MacShreach]

An interesting take by Matt Yglesias on the actual costs of internet piracy: http://www.slate.com/articles/business/small_business/2012/01/sopa_stopping_online_piracy_would_be_a_social_and_ economic_disaster_.html

Congressional bill names are a reliable indicator of the state of conventional wisdom in America. That Congress is weighing bills called the Stop Online Piracy Act - and the PROTECT IP Act tells us that, at a minimum, the idea of stopping online piracy is popular. <snip>



Thanks. That is a very cogently thought-out and well-argued piece. I disagree with his suggestion that unlimited piracy could destroy the creative industry anywhere, and the evidence suggests that what happens is that creative people change their business models to adapt to the new climate. Bands go out on the road, actors go back to theatre, so on. They know that what is important is the creation itself, not the copyright.

Creative people do that anyway; non-creative people, who value their copyright more than creativity, and who, unfortunately, all too often run media companies, resort to lawyers and political lobbying and then you get attempts to restrict internet freedom.

[BluegrassCat]

The substantial effectiveness of the blackout day. As Biden said, a big fucking deal.

[Silcc69]

The substantial effectiveness of the blackout day. As Biden said, a big fucking deal.

Damn I wish I could read who is who on that pic.

[Ben]

The Surefire Way to End Online Piracy: End Copyright:

http://www.truth-out.org/surefire-way-end-online-piracy-end-copyright/1327328997

[Nicole Dupre]

Ben, who's the girl in your av?

[Ben]

Ben, who's the girl in your av?

Nicole, it's Lindsay Lohan....

[Nicole Dupre]

Oh wow. She looks different in that one. But now I can see it.