SOPA Is Dead, But The Issue Isn’t
On January 18 the online world took a stand in the form of one unifying voice. Throngs of Internet entrepreneurs, tech greats, social savants and casual users spoke loud and clear when they demanded Congress put a stop to the flawed anti-piracy bills (formerly known as) SOPA and PIPA.
To be more precise, an estimated 13 million people participated in the protest, 50,000 websites were blacked out and 3 million email messages were sent to Congress, according to PC World.
That makes the SOPA/PIPA protest the largest, politically-charged collaboration on the Internet in history.
So, What Happened?
Considering the steamrolling movement with which these two bills entered the scene, it seems shocking that they could already be gone. On the day of the protest, a number of co-sponsors in both the House and the Senate announced that they were dropping their support.
Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Tex) was emphatic about his desire to move forward with SOPA on Wednesday, however; just two days after the Blackout, he announced that further action on the bill had been postponed. This followed an earlier announcement that the Senate bill, PIPA, would delay a cloture vote.
And, just like that it seems all our problems were solved.
That, however, is an underestimation as grand as the one made by Congress when they threatened the online community with these bills.
The Future of Anti-Piracy
Though the statement made by the people of the digital age is one that will likely reverberate with Congress for a while, the pursuit to “end piracy” is in no way over. The mega-corporations that were fueling SOPA and PIPA are not done fighting.
The Motion Picture Association of America and the Recording Industry Association of America are convinced that billions of dollars and thousands of jobs are lost to copyright infringement and piracy each year. Regardless of whether the numbers they present are accurate or not, their conviction concerning the matter is bound to persist.
Like so many bills, original drafts may die and disappear, but the issue at the center remains and is reborn in the form of a “new” piece of legislature.
Have You Heard About ACTA?
In the wake of SOPA and PIPA, conversation regarding another anti-piracy (though it is tagged as an “anti-counterfeit agreement”) measure has emerged.
The anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement carries the same eerie consequences as SOPA and PIPA, but has the potential to impact Internet users on a global scale. According to Forbes, the U.S. has already signed off on this treaty and now only needs ratification from the Senate.
Watch this video to learn more about ACTA:
These are not the first unsavory Internet bills to be presented and rest assured they won’t be the last. Since it seems unlikely that the rule-makers, foreign and domestic, will gain a vast knowledge of the web any time soon, it will remain the users’ responsibility to stay informed.
Don’t let bills that could undermine your success, innovation and potential slip through the cracks and become a law. As members of the Internet community we all have the power and the obligation to spread the word when it comes to news that could compromise the tool that is shaping our future (and anything else for that matter).
If it does pass, wouldn’t the American internet and everyone who supports it just move to another country, or even become rebels if the protest doesn’t work out? US would become just another grey area to the internet. Well I just doubt the internet can ever be truly stopped.
Comment by Julie on January 27, 2012 at 10:27 am
I understand what you’re saying, but the problem with an Internet law that affects the U.S. is that we are a global leader and the problem would spread to other countries quickly.
We also have to worry about treaties like ACTA and TPP that are international agreements and could have a devastating impact on the whole world.
Comment by Christelle Hobby on January 30, 2012 at 3:24 pm