Hey folks, James here. Today... Today is just... Wow, nothing short of amazing. The Internet really pulled together and made a difference (I hope) in regards to the SOPA/PIPA bills. This post is about the bills, the affect they could have on independent film makers like us, and what the blackout accomplished today.
First, the bill:
SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) introduced in the House of Representatives in October 2011 while PIPA (Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property or PROTECT IP Act) was introduced to the Senate in May 2011. Both are aimed at anit-piracy and copy right infringement action/litigation. However, both bills fall terribly short of their intended goals.
In a nutshell, the bills allow for court complaints to be filed against alleged offenders (entire online sites essentially). If found guilty of the offense, various content providers, promoters, payment processors and advertisers could/would be pressured/forced to sever their ties with offending sites. Most importantly, the bill could force DNS servers here in the US to stop resolving to those sites in the US and abroad.
Where the bills falls short is that it is very easy to circumvent this by using DNS servers or proxies outside of the US, which is fairly easy to setup even for the non-technical user (even if they don't understand how it all works). There's already been development for browser plugins to do just this. Your site get taken down in the US? Easy 'nough, switch your hosting provider to outside of the US (and yes, that would drive money out of the United States, bad ju ju in these economic times).
Here's an interesting article listing supporters and opposition of the bill. Supporters include the infamous RIAA and MPAA, large companies like Ford, Walt Disney, Nintendo, Sony, and the pharmaceutical industry. Opposing the bill is, well, the Internet apparently, numerous tech companies, various 'rights' defenders like EFF, ACLU and Demand Progress, online search companies, social media, and even a higher education institution called Educause. I'd like to point out that, in my experience, most individuals tasked with handling the handling and maintaining Internet architecture have also voiced their opinions against the bills.
Affect on Independent Film:
Ultimately, the bills would rely on court procedures. So let's say a The ZBBC makes a kickass zombie film and we post it to YouTube as well as our own site (as we do with our kick ass films). Now let's say another fictitious company called Wime Tarner releases a new movie or television show about zombies and somehow, the same line or plot idea gets used. Wime Tarner could then, in theory, open a case against The ZBBC for infringement (I suppose we could do it to them, but from what I learned of the world so far, a small fry vs a large behemoth rarely works out well for the underdog).
The way the bills are written, the burden of proof falls to the offender (The ZBBC) to prove themselves innocent... after allegations and court orders are made - basically presumed guilty until proven innocent. This means our site could be unreachable by potential visitors for however long it takes us to present our evidence. YouTube could be targeted in this endeavor, or we could be targeted directly, either way we are at the butt end.
Now you might be thinking, 'come on, how often is that gonna happen?'. Frequently enough if you think about how often DMCA notifications are served up. As it stands, government intervention into websites has been executed very poorly in the past. But my example is also limiting in that it relates to our direct posting of film, let's broaden the scope a bit.
The language of the bills themselves actually say that even facilitating the sharing of links to copyright infringing materials are fair game for complaints. So essentially every platform on the Internet that allows for comment systems could be at risk because anyone and post anything. Think about this; Wime Tarner could get on a small competitors site (the Internet is full of small competitors like us vying for your time and good graces), start posting links to some random torrent site hosting Tarner's material, and then file a complaint against their competitor for hosting links to infringing material. Though it may be true that a site could moderate all posts before hand, that is a very unrealistic expectation for community driven sites like Wikipedia, YouTube, news sites, the blogo-sphere and forums across the Internet.
Think that's all a bit far fetched? Please watch this entire video that really dissects the language of the bills and they do and don't allow for. If our current court and copy right system is any indication, make no mistake, this kind of law will be abused.
Today's Blackout:
So today, sites like Wikipedia, Reddit, TwitPic, and many more decided to go dark in order to draw attention to the fact that these bills could easily harm the open nature of the Internet. The sites then directed users to the contact forms of various senators, politicians, and petitions so users could express their concerns.
If my Facebook friends are any indication, there was minor irritation from a small minority on the issue but far more support. Then again, most of my friends are in the age group of a generation who understand that, while the fight against piracy is not without merit, it should not be at the expense of the Internet architecture which allows for active participation and production of creative works.
I'm of the opinion most major entertainment companies would prefer to make it to where the sharing and creation of entertainment was much harder, prompting more users to just sit back on their couches instead of doing something, but I also recognize that's an allegation I can't prove, just a hunch.
So has the blackout been a success? Yes, I'd say so. Since the blackout has happened, at least 13 senators have dropped support for PIPA (including co-sponsor Senator Marco Rubio) and at least 10 have dropped support for SOPA (including co-sponsor Representative Ben Quayle). That's pretty incredible considering organizations like Demand Progress and ACLU have been fighting this thing nearly since the bills' inceptions.
Hell, even Rupert Murdoch recognizes what the blackout accomplished. He apparently thinks the Internet 'terrorized' senators today into backing out on supporting the bills - heaven forbid the people get involved with their democracy. There's something comfortingly ironic about Murdoch complaining about abuse of powers...
Not out of the woods yet:
So readers, if you've come this far I hope you learned something useful. But the job isn't done yet, the bills still have another week to stew, even though today was a major blow to them.
If you haven't already, take the time to really educate yourself on the powers of the bills and the kind of impact they could have on the open Internet. I'm fairly confident that if you have a functioning brain, unlike our zombie counterparts, you can come to the conclusion that these bills, though possibly written with good intention, simply fall short of their intended goals and would hurt innovation via the Internet in the long haul.
You can use various contact forms to get in touch with your state senators or sign petitions from the likes of Demand Progress or Google. Now if only we had that kind of response for the NDAA, another bill I highly recommend you familiarize yourself with if you have any love for freedom or the US Constitution.
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