American Censorship Day

11/16/11 is American Censorship Day. The day is sponsored by organizations and web companies that support free speech and open Internet that opposes two new bills in the US congress. These organizations include Electronic Freedom Foundation, Demand Progress, Fight For the Future, Participatory Politics Foundation, and Creative Commons. On the corporate side Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, Facebook and Twiter also oppose theses proposed bills.

Two misleadingly named bills -- Protect IP Act (PIPA - S.968) and Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA – H.R.3261) have been currently introduced into Congress. If passed, the bills will do permanent damage to the Internet, commerce, and free speech in the US. If you don’t want to read these long bills, watch the four minute video that provides a quick summary of there impact.

The bills would require Internet service providers (ISPs) to deny access to users trying to access websites host copyrighted material -- movies, TV shows, software etc.  Most of the sites are internationally based, like the Swedish site ThePirateBay.org. So the bill would force the ISP to black hole a website from being accessed by users in the US.

The bill gives government the power to go to court and obtain an injunction against any foreign website on the grounds that they are hosting copyrighted material. The websites have a maximum of 5 days to “prevent access by its subscribers located within the United States to the foreign infringing site.”, before the government cuts-off the website in the US.

The bill goes farther, by enabling the government the right to go after anyone who builds a tool that "circumvention or bypassing" the Internet block. In the government's ongoing campaign to seize Internet domain names -- taking over the web addresses of sites they believe contain infringing content; when they asked Web browser makers like Mozilla to remove access to these sorts of tools Mozilla refused. The new bill will ban such tools completely.

Search engines, don't escape the consequences either, they will have the duty to prevent the web sites in question “from being served as a direct hypertext link.” This means the website won't show up in a Google, Yahoo, or Bing search engines. Payment processors and ad networks would also be legally obligated to cut off the website.

To top it all off ISPs and payment processors -- PayPal and Visa, can simply block access to sites they think could be in volition with no notification to the site owners. As long as they believe the website is “dedicated to the theft of US property,” they can't be sued.

Here is a quote from James Allworth -- Harvard Business School, on what the bill will do for America.

"It contains provisions that will chill innovation. It contains provisions that will tinker with the fundamental fabric of the internet. It gives private corporations the power to censor. And best of all, it bypasses due legal process to do much of it."

You may think those who back such a broad law with the potential to abuse it  –Hollywood– Time Warner, Viacom, and Disney, among other media companies. Nobody unaffiliated with media companies stands to benefit from these bills; they don't extend their new powers to stop spam, virus, adware, or internet crimes. The bills were created for one reason alone: to protect the film, music and TV industries, I guess that’s what $91 million per year on lobbying gets you.

If you feel like I do please contact your representative, especially the ones co-sponsoring the bills and tell them to not pass these bills. Here is a list:

Howard L. Berman (D-CA)

Karen Bass (D-CA)

Lamar Smith (R-TX)

John Conyers (D-MI)

Bob Goodlatte (R-VA)

Adam B. Schiff (D-CA)

Tim Griffin (R-AR)

Elton Gallegly (R-CA)

Theodore E. Deutch (D-FL)

Steve Chabot (R-OH)

Dennis Ross (R-FL)

Marsha Blackburn (R-TN)

Mary Bono Mack (R-CA)

Lee Terry (R-NE)

Mel Watt (D-NC)

John Carter (R-TX)

Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL)

Peter King (R-NY)

Mark E. Amodei (R-NV)

Tom Marino (R-PA)

Alan Nunnelee (R-MS)

John Barrow (D-GA)

Steve Scalise (R-LA)

Ben Ray Luján (D-NM)

William L. Owens (D-NY)

http://americancensorship.org/
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2011/10/sopa-hollywood-finally-gets-chance-break-internet
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/10/house-takes-senates-bad-internet-censorship-bill-makes-it-worse.ars