A thought or two on SOPA/PIPA (updated)

Update: there’s much dancing in the streets at the apparent withdrawal of SOPA/PIPA, after a huge public outcry and day-long internet protest. Great news, right? Except the redoubtable Lamar Smith, who believes himself to be an expert on both technology and civil liberties, has proffered a new law that requires ISPs to retain data on their customers’ activities online.

This one is meant to “protect children” (like the last one was intended to “stop piracy”)–seeing a pattern? Talk about Bad Thing (child predators, piracy), whip up hysteria—because, you know, people are too lazy and stupid to learn anything about how the internet works and will respond instead to fear mongering—then slip in laws that subvert civil liberties, violate privacy, and bypass due process. Here’s information about the new law, “Protect Children From Internet Pornographers” (read: “All Your Base Are Belong to Lamar Smith”), and here’s some more.

I do not share Lamar Smith’s views on the stupidity of the American public or the world citizenry of the internet. You know what to do.

Original post:

In case you’ve been living under a rock and haven’t heard all the hullabaloo about SOPA/PIPA, they are two bills currently wending their way the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, respectively–have a look at the Wiki article about it if you’re not familiar with the issue.

These bills, by their names alone (Stop Online Piracy and Protect Intellectual Property), seem like good things. Even those who guiltily BitTorrent gigabytes of TV shows, music, and other material will acknowledge that hard-working creative professionals should be fairly paid for their work, and that piracy is theft. There’s no argument for it, only a free buffet for those willing to bend their morals a bit.

In fairness, I’ve resorted to torrenting things on occasion–I’m proud to say less than half a dozen times–but only when I absolutely could not locate the items in question through any of the usual channels, through which I’d happily have paid for them. But, as a content creator putting my work out there, I fully appreciate how piracy harms large and small alike, I’ve seen it from all perspectives, and I would not dream of ever pirating content today.

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