Actually, a bill like this is proposed at least once every year since 1998. They change a few words around and cite a new growing trend or ancetode as evidence that they need this bill. Only reason it grew such a stink last year is because it actually had enough support in both the house and the senate.
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Click "open petitions" then "search" and type sopa to find it. This is the link I got, might not work for everyone.
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I have a feeling you are using a very loose translation of what the bill was. Seems to me it was largely to deal with things such as torrents and streaming of copyrighted materials. I seriously doubt that it would have affected anyone posting a personal drawing of spiderman. I think the biggest deal about it (at least from what I was hearing) is that all game recordings of copyrighted games were likely to be encompassed in it and many of the independant game companies used places such as youtube to advertise and bring awareness to their projects. This was before Kickstarter (or at least before it became popular, I believe) and Greenlight and what-not. So the concept was not nefarious. Not saying I agree with it, but any new versions should probably be read before completely flaming it.
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Was proposed-
Felony to stream copyrighted content in the US. Stream 3 times, 3 "strikes", in prison longer then a murderer or rapist for sharing content, that you may legal have purchased, with friends, (1 other person is grounds enough).
Combine that with the very loose interpretation that companies and courts are using to combat "piracy" and content theifs, it could be very interesting to see the number of new prisons pop up. I mean, if im doing something on webcam and my phone goes off and the ringtone is copyrighted, that counts...
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Actually, there's no need for additional laws to fight real piracy. The real piracy, I mean people making money on illegal copies, were almost entirelly eliminated in most developed countries many years ago. As for people downloading copies for their personal use, according to many studies it's still arguable if they make more harm, or more good in terms of promotion. Most top downloaders are, or become top buyers. I know for myself that if I hadn't downloaded some songs in the past, I would own a few cd's, not the dozens I have.
If there were steam-like services for music, films and tv-shows I would gladly spend money on them. Gigantic loses some companies claim to have due to piracy are just a nice way to explain lower profits to shareholders and to make them think they're going to earn few times more "when we finally beat piracy". More aware people know there's little to gain, because most of the downloaders are either already buying or are not likely to buy even if they can't download.
SOPA, ACTA, PIPA, they all lay on the same shelf as Patriot Act. It's just a tool to exercise more control over the population. It's also used to fight those who try to spread "wrong" ideas. Already DMCA claims are used to silence critical opinions in places like youtube on regular basis.
Look how the world has changed. In 1972 one tap was enough to cause president of USA to resign. In 2013 we have virtually unlimited (and most of the illegal) taps everywhere and we fell happy and safe, if not so free.
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i used to download alot of my games but now i use steam sales and some games i will use birthday and Christmas money for. i am always reluctant to buy music and if the creators of the music are so bothered about people uploading it to youtube so people can listen to it why not do it yourself with the ads to make money off people listening to music at school/college/university?
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I just read all of it SOPA this morning, and it is focused more on online pirates, which I know are still going strong (although I don't use them).
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It's the same loose translation companies will use when you call your youtube video "Always good year" and both Coca Cola and Good Year will sue you for money for breaking their copyrights...
Sounds kinda tin-foilish, I know, but I already hear about that kind of cases (like someone showing shitty product and its producer suing him for telling truth).
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I am not supporting the bill, but that is once again not how it was written. Streaming copy righted material, and it was fairly clear that it was focused on stopping people from sharing cracked game data, and streaming movies and TV shows, cutting out the producers who would make money off of it. Just because it mentions streaming and copyrighted material, does not mean that they can and will hunt down very lose infringements all over youtube, because that would cover half of youtube's videos, and any competent judge would throw it out of court quickly.
Although the way it was written, it was just broad enough that it would cause sites like youtube to drop any videos that it beleives to come to close to violating this bill. It is nice because it would prevent any stupid lawsuits, but it would be slightly broader than the bill too.
I wonder how many people that speak against it on sites like this actually read the bill to see what it really entails, not just assume that it is evil from what others say.
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There's little will to protect actual creators, both legislators and courts worldwide tend to protect corporations as a priority. Take Nissan Motors vs Nissan Computers case for example. The latter was named after its owner and he was first using his family name in company name back when Nissan Motors was Datsun. He also was first to register and use nissan.com domain, yet in court it didn't helped him. In fact, new acts for intelectual property protection was used against him. And there are many less known cases like that.
I've seen over a dozen videos on yt showing incompetence of certain mass media that have been removed in matter of hours on (fraud imho) DMCA notice claims basis.
Add to that medical corporations that almost succeded with patenting human genome, Microsoft attempt on patenting trade in video games (I don't remember if it succeeded) and other companies fighting legal battles to takeover inventions made by independent innovators. Where it is leading us? Does the law protect actual creators?
I think there's a need for a new approach and entirely new law to intelectual property protection, and therefore I don't support any new acts based on the old thinking.
BTW I'm not directly bound by american law, but USA has nasty policy of enforcing their law over other nations, in extreme cases even extraditing people from countries where they live and where they didn't broke local law, and there's also tendency to take example of american legislation in those matters so I'm concerned.
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I believe in the case of extradition, the people that broke the american laws on the areas of piracy and copyright law, that has SOME global reach, and it would be down to the country the person is in to determine if it is a viable case to extradite someone. If they didn't have that global reach, anyone can do whatever piracy and copyright infringement they want, screwing over the creators, without implications.
And I do believe that the human genome WAS patented for a while, but got reversed later on. The whole thing on that was that they had put money into the research into the portions of DNA that they had patents on, and their investment return would be from either selling allowances to use that research for others, or owning the research to patent the result. It was good to get the research done, but hindered everything else.
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1st, if all countries exercised their laws worldwide, there would be chaos. There's no clear rule to decide in which country infrigement was commited, and USA are trying to establish a precedence that whole Internet is within US juristiction. This is bad. I would rather see unified international law and courts ruling on that law, no matter where you reside.
And 2nd, IIRC US law says no american citizen can be extradited whatsoever, and I believe for the same reason USA will never allow its citizens to stand trial in some international court. Well, there's huge disproportion for USA and rest of the world, isn't it?
As for DNA-related patents, they patented both technological process and genes themselves. I think someone saw billions of profit in patent fees for any gene therapy ever created. Biotechnological patents stand, so company didn't really suffer a loss. Just gene patents were ruled invalid, in supreme court IIRC. But there are still US patents on various molecules and that's what hinders research worldwide. I'm curious if someone tried to patent a photon. After all, even sad emoticon was registered as trademark. And by the US law, when I use ":-(" emoticon, I commit trademark dilution infrigement (it is, or at least was, a registered trademark of despair.com).
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The United States has an extradtion treaty with 100+ countries, and copyright law may be accepted across borders. This all comes down to the agreement between the countries. Jurisdiction lies where the crime was committed, which means where the focus of the crime lies, so if someone is taking, let's say, game data from an American company illegally and sending it back to offer it to Americans for profit, which it would be easy for any income from it to become income, it is technically in America.
Yes, they patent both the tech and the gene, my point is that they use the patent on the genes to limit the research to people that pay for it, and people that reserve their resulting information/technology to that companies patent.
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So basically you're saying that it's a very good deal for American citizens and companies, and much worse deal for the rest of the world. To that I entirelly agree (why our governments agreed to such assymetrical deal with USA is a different matter).
Let's assume I'm at my home in Poland doing on the Internet something that is under fair use in my country but not in USA. Where would you place the jurisdiction line? If I upload some fair-use work to my website, will that be an infrigement? What if I am hosted by company that uses server cloud in many countries? What when google server caches my site content? What when someone shares my work on facebook? What when I email that work to someone who happens to be on US territory at that time?
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I don't know the specific lines of law in copyright law, I seriously doubt anyone here is well versed in them. My understanding of the law is a little more than basic. The copyright may be part of a system that is carried over from country to country, which protects the people who have the rights to their work. So if someone in America infringes on let's say your copyright, they would be just as liable as if it were in the same case, just localization reversed.
A quick look into United States Internation Extradition shows that MOST countries that the USA has a treaty with, that it works both ways. In this mindset, there likely have been instances where a country does not have their extradition agreement in their favor, just as the reverse is true. Instances in which the United States may have not turned someone over may be instanced based on what is specified in the extradition treaty in question, and the same issues can happen, reversed.
Not that anyone cares, but an extradition treaty list: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_extradition_treaties
And all those instances you've mentioned rely on the content, the intent, and the copyright.
EDIT: Just remembered an example for jurisdiction. Let's say I live in California, and I mail cookies to my buddy in Texas, and the cookies are loaded with arsenic. My buddy eats the cookies, and dies. I get caught, because my return address is with the cookies, which a quick inspection shows the chocolate chips are really arsenic chips, and because there has to be jurisdiction somewhere, it will be where "the body of the crime" occurred, in this case, Texas. I'd have sent him cookies from California, never leaving California for all this time, thinking I am not going to be tried in Texas. Texas gets jurisdiction, and Texas law is enforced. Sure, murder is a federal crime, but I am fairly certain that copyright is at least in part common law.
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I'm totally suprised. You got me on this one. Apparently you can't trust even what they tell you in college. I was told then US extradite only other countries citizens and only when proven guilty beforehand. I have to re-study that.
But there's still question of jurisdiction. In physical world it's simple, because it basically depends on lines drawn on the map. I happen to work as local administration clerk and I check those lines at least once a week. But how to draw those lines in the network? I'd say putting something on the FB or Google services is risky, because their EULA kinda puts them on US territory. I don't put anything of my fair-use work there, because it doesn't feel safe (current American fair use is very limited compared to Polish, judging from some rulings and policies of Internet companies) and I put very little of my photographic and graphic work, because it would be very hard to exercise my copyrights there. Still, they accept members from other countries, and EULA statements that are contrary to national common law are considered void. So it still comes to question, by which law I am bound when I use the Net.
I don't think it's possible to draw borders on the Internet in it's current shape, not it's sensible to require every internaut to know laws of all countries they "visit" (by means of performing some action on physical server). I believe we need to entirelly rethink jurisdiction instead of copying physical world concept into virtual one. Take it from person who did and does quite a lot of copyrighted work, we also need to rethink copyrights. It's a real concern for all people who want to do more on the web, than just consume.
Oh, by the way, here's a question I have been asked many times and I still don't know correct answer. In Polish law, it's not a crime to download copyrighted work, unless it's undoubtedly proven that you know you download from illegal source (publishing without author/right owner consent is of course illegal). From what I know, it is illegal in States. So if someone downloads from American server to Poland, does one commit a crime?
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Teachers are supposed to teach only information, and not input their biases, which they would in a perfect world. Since we live in an imperfect world, that is impossible. I can't say that is what happened wherever college you referenced, just look into what you can, and form your own opinion based on the facts you can find.
I will admit, I don't know everything about what I have said, but this is all based on what I know, and short bits of research. I am a supporter of informed decisions, and I think people need to look into things more in depth before making any major decisions one way or another. If you look into it more deeply and find yourself against something or for something, it doesn't matter what I think.
I am against SOPA, not because people who will sue for what, but I think the problem will lie with people attempting to avoid prosecution by dumping valid streams and downloads because they think it may lie in a grey area.
As for the download, I assume your being in Poland downloading from an illegal source from America, it is in jurisdiction lies in Poland, in the case of your actions. The person posting it would likely be in the jurisdiction of wherever they may have uploaded it from I believe, because, in the arsenic cookies theory, it would be like sending the cookies to a warehouse in Oregon, where the guy in Navada buys it and receives it from, consumes them, and dies.
On another note, I misspelled warehouse initially in that last post, and saw that one of the available correction options was were-house......idk, just weird.......
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Well, what can I say for academic teachers... I wasn't only time they gave me incorrect information, so I'm ashamed I never double-checked it. Unless of course USA changed their policy since I graduated.
Scaring people off doing legal things is also one of my concerns. I also feer false prosecution a bit. but I think it's time for me to stop ranting ;) Just the bottomline, in past two decades law gradually serves more to companies and less to common people. We also loose freedom in exchange for false sense of security bit by bit.
On the side note, were-house... My first thought was, is that where werewolves are stored? ;)
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That's the problem though, when you allow a broader law to be passed, you are relying on faith in the good-will of for-profit companies. While the majority of companies wouldn't be overzealous, it could open up a fast-track path for arbitrary and frivolous targeting of harmless individuals. I'm all for companies being able to protect their products and interests, but these laws should be very specific otherwise they run the risk of just opening new bullying / info control tactics where it isn't necessary.
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The law is the law, it doesn't matter what the companies think. If it is focused on illegal streams of copyrighted material for money, it cannot be applied to something that isn't for material gain. SOPA mainly just expands what is already out there to include some of the channels that the pirates use for the internet. I have read it.
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I get what you mean. But like I said, I already hear about companies suing for bad reviews. With this bill, they don't need to prove review was made in a wrong way or it lied, they would sue for infringementing their copyrights.
This bill requires lot of good will. That's something corporations doesn't have.
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The bad reviews may have libel issues in them, but from what I was reading from the bill (I admit, it may be an older version because I am having trouble finding a recent copy), focuses on reproduction for financial gain, and distribution.
http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-112hr3261ih/pdf/BILLS-112hr3261ih.pdf
I forgot how to do clicky, and the actual amendment starts on page 54.
If anyone finds a more recent copy and posts a link, I would appreciate it.
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Soon, we won't be able to copy-paste (because that's all it takes to crack a game) or double click (because that's all it takes to use those evil IP changers).
Long live the legal internet where the only thing you can do is watch sponsored adds online!
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I wish that people who thought of SOPA would just explode, or something.
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It is one of those times I think these people are lucky a lot of people like myself have no power to enforce a hit. lol
I hate these people with a passion since it is not only greed motivated, but it halts and destroys any real progress in any type of art form. This would stop people from doing what American Idol does "legally" on tv, stops karaoke, which is a huge culture of its own that almost the entire planet shares (I'm not part of it though), but it also stops people from making good remixes, montages, etc. for youtube which sucks in its own.
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I had feeling this would happen when we had it delayed last time. Each time SOPA is brought up, less and less people will care about it. Until eventually, it's passed with little resistance and we all wake up wondering where the Internet we knew went. It's depressing that this has become the state of politics, it only takes a modicum of patience to wait for the masses to become bored simply by the repetitive mentioning of a topic. Like racism or sexism, so many seem to have the attitude of, "haven't we talked about that already? I thought it was fixed?" Our own ADD is distracting ourselves to become willing lab rats, allowing any and all changes in the environment around us as long as we have our cheese to eat/tweet/diddle our time away on.
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Not even patience, but trying to give them the stamp of approval as stealthily as possible. It's easier to do these things if the people they affect most aren't aware of what is going on, and of course once they are passed it can be very difficult to amend without stark corporate resistance (and stature, money and lawyer teams speak quite loudly compared to the disorganised discontent of even a populace majority).
I get the feeling that an awful lot of people involved in the writing/judging of such legal twists aren't personally familiar with the various shades of the internet.
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Hilary pls, you are obviously scheming a petition to counter this one.
Source: I am watching you closely.
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Both Paysafecard and Payson have stopped processing payments for VPNs. Worrying trend since VPNs are perfectly legal.
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Many let you just send money straight to them even though, there will always be a way to pay for them.
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People with money are the one that put politicians into office.
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I'm not even gonna sign that petition, because....
Copying/torrenting/downloading is perfectly legal in Holland, and besides, there are no rules on the interwebs.
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Net neutrality is under fire from all directions, whether you would like to believe it or not.
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Now hold on a minute there mister, i'm still not done with KONY 2012
EDIT
well fug, kybaig beat me to it like yesterday
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You've almost proven the entire point. "Aren't we done with that?" "I heard about that last year, I don't care anymore"
They will keep trying to push the same legislation through over and over until no one pays a fraction of a mind.
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But there is only so much social justice i can do in 24 hours
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SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act A.K.A Operation: Kill the Internet)
I'm not sure how many people have actually heard about this as I haven't seen many people talk about it and I feel that it has kinda been swept under the rug.
Basically it's a bill that's attempting to be passed that will cause ANY Copyrighted material, such as a simple drawing of spiderman, to be taken down and the content creator to receive penalties such as fines or even jail. This will also affect Lets Players, People who do music covers and other things that involve copyrighted material.
And yes, this was attempted before, twice in fact, and it failed.
So anyways, if you want to know what you can do to help then you can sign a petition (link below) and spread awareness anywhere possible. That way more people sign the petition against this moronic, ignorant, Sack Of Poop Act the better and the lesser chance of it succeeding.
Clickable link from Raamah in the comments because I fail
Thank you for reading and/or signing the petition :D
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