Today is a pretty apt day to write about this subject. On January 18th 2012, the internet is making a stand, a final stand, against a bill looking to get passed through the US congress, brought into existence with the express purpose of censoring everything people know, love and take for granted on the internet.
The Stop Online Piracy Act was introduced to the House of Representatives as a means of tackling the growing and leeching problem of piracy over the internet from sources outside of US jurisdiction.
If passed on January 24th, SOPA will essentially grant a dozen US corporations control over the internet so their profit margins take less of a hit. Under SOPA, US ISP’s will be forced to enact DNS (Domain Name System) blocking, the same tactic used by Iran and China to censor their people.
SOPA will also give up to five years jail time to those caught streaming copyrighted material more than ten times in six months, pull advertising sources from suspected rogue sites and most scarily of them all, make entire websites disappear from internet because of infringement.
Piracy has been a thorn in the side of the entertainment industry for as long as recording equipment has existed and our human instinct to avoid paying for things where ever possible. But this is not the way to solve the problem.
The entertainment industry has been allergic to change for decades. Ruled by outdated, dinosaur business models that see the exciting possibility of trying something new as a waste of money that could otherwise be earning some healthy interest in a bank account.
When Apple launched iTunes in 2003, reinventing how people listen and interact with music through digital means, the service found itself in the crosshairs of industry competitors trying to quash innovation as users found with increasingly faster broadband connections coupled with the groundbreaking iPod, digital music was the way forward. That and Apple, a computer manufacturer, invaded the sovereign territory of the music industry and made a profit.
And this is what SOPA boils down to, fear of change. The conjoined music and film industry lose billions every year to piracy but these wounds are as self inflicted as looking down the barrel of a loaded gun to see what a speeding bullet looks like.
One main reason for piracy, aside from greed, is a love for the American entertainment industry, in particularly the television industry.
Their industry produces some of the best quality (and mind numbingly stupid) TV in the English language that airs daily with a captivated US audience. Yet fans in foreign countries do not always want to wait the six to twelve months for catch up on what can be viewed after a ten minute download.
TV piracy on the most part is not about being malicious, its showing appreciation for a show from fans who eagerly want to keep up to date with goings on. With forums and fan sites, those waiting for a fresh series of How I Met Your Mother to air in the UK can have all the twists, turns and plots revealed to them by accident in the time it takes for the episodes to cross the Atlantic.
Sky and HBO have recently teamed up to give UK viewers the chance to follow American broadcasting times by 24 hours with the Sky Atlantic Channel. Such forward thinking is how other networks should follow suit to decrease the rate of piracy.
If viewers are given a significantly short delay between show air dates then piracy could be so easily cut. The TV and film streaming service Netflix has made a huge impact in the US, offering subscribers all the TV they can handle for a nominal fee every month. Its UK release last week saw home team competition instantly drop prices in competition for the behemoth that already boasts 20 million subscribers.
SOPA aims to solve a problem through legislation, law and a tight fisted, zero tolerance mandate when the solution is an Occam’s Razor, so much more passive, so much easier, so much cheaper, give the people what they want. There is the question of giving these companies a monopoly of the worldwide entertainment industry, but as
we’ve seen over the last few years, subscription services can limit that infringement.
Those who want their entertainment instantly can pay for it, those who aren’t fussed can wait. It’s a win win situation.
It’s because of such heavy handed solution to a problem that has plagued an ignorant and stubborn industry that I support today’s internet black out.
The internet cannot be allowed to be censored especially from a group of people who don’t understand with what they are meddling with. During the SOPA Judiciary hearings in December last year lobbyists support the bill had no problem preaching what they wanted the bill to accomplish but when asked as to how it would be implemented and its knock on effects to the internets infrastructure, they knew as much about internet protocol as I do about the goings on inside the mind of a hungry Honey Badger.
We have less than a week before the final vote for SOPA goes through yet the end doesn’t seem so bleak. Since the new year, a large number of SOPA supporters have dropped out, such as game publisher EA and domain name supplier Go Daddy due to opposition from fans and users alike. Monday saw Lamar Smith, the man behind SOPA drop DNS blocking from the bill, yet this news has flown under many radars.
There is still a chance for the internet may survive this attack on its integrity but make no mistake, if beaten down, these ideas will not disappear. They will return in smaller, less conspicuous forms and attempt to slither past the defenders of internet freedom. But they know their game and will they be waiting to do fight again. The internet community is stronger than threats and legislation.
You can’t stop the signal.
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For those of you who want to hear about the negative effect SOPA will have on the internet freedom through song, please watch the video below. You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll learn something.
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