As much as I don’t want to end the year’s writing on a note of doom and gloom, I feel I have procrastinated on this for long enough.
It’s been reported on all over the web for weeks now, from the lowliest tech site to the titans of gaming news. I first heard about it in the Jimquisition over at Escapist, at the time dismissing it as yet another attempt by big industry to harm the little guy that was doomed to failure.
But lately, this seems to be getting large amounts of support from the US congress, worryingly large amounts. While it may not immediately affect anyone outside the US, over time its effect will become noticeable and as history has shown in recent years, when the US does something, everyone else jumps on the bandwagon.
Now, you may be thinking: “What’s so bad about an act combating online piracy?” At face value, nothing. But dig a little deeper and you’ll see that SOPA is one nasty little bill. Now, I’m never terribly good at explaining these things, so I’ll let this video explain it for me. Note that this was not made by anyone at FutureSack, this is someone else’s video, a fellow by the name of “TotalBiscuit”. It’s about 20 minutes long so grab yourself a cup of your favourite beverage and get comfy. Oh yes, and make sure annotations are on, as the video author made a mistake and had to correct himself.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhwuXNv8fJM&w=450&h=259]
Watched it? Ok, now you begin to see why this is a potentially disastrous bill for the internet and pretty much everyone except the big guys. Unfortunately, as the video states, anyone outside the US is pretty much powerless to do anything other than spread the word, but if you happen to be in the States and reading this, then please do as he suggested at the end of the video and either write to your representative or sign a petition. Or both. If you’re outside then spread the word to as many people as you can.
Given this site is so small at the moment, I doubt this will reach many people, but it can’t hurt to add to the efforts already being made.
Anyway, Merry Christmas folks, or Happy Holidays, whatever floats your boat. We’ll see you next year. ; )
-Skillz
FutureSack is currently a small group of individuals who write articles about things that interest them in the subjects of gaming, technology and gadgets. You can find our various enthusings, ramblings and rants at our site, here. We are also in partnership with the guys here at Gaming-Edge.co.uk, so be sure to browse the rest of their site for news on similar topics.
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I have been planning on writing an article about SOPA, ACTA and Protect-IP for the past month or so but news has kept coming constantly (and it all was bad) but it is a very serious matter and I fear we are coming into a dark time internet wise.
Yeah, I have to admit I was surprised I hadn’t seen one from you Sec.
They still trying to push ACTA through? I thought that had been given up on. I had heard though, that Protect-IP was trying to piggy back on SOPA. I really, really hope this doesn’t make it through.
Protect-IP has already been approved and is in effect, together with the Patriot Act is has already been doing loads of damage.
As for ACTA, last week there was a talk about ACTA with politicians representing each European country (they even got delayed by a day because the Dutch government needed more time to talk about it) and all of them basically said yes.
Now the time has come that each country will once again be discussing ACTA and all it does to finally decide on a yes or no vote (after which ACTA will be signed for all of the EU), one of the main problems atm. is tho the secrecy, no politician party can even ask for expert advice/opinion/whatever on the matter because it’s still a complete secret and it cannot even be shared with an advisor (also the USA is the only party which is allowed to opt out of it at any time) so the politicians have a clue what there even talking about… Currently it all looks like a joke and my fear is that it’s reality within 6 months to a year and it will be very hard to get rid off again.