Wednesday, January 18, 2012

Stop SOPA

Very important for all of you to click this link and fill in the form.  Only takes about 20 seconds:

Stop SOPA

Please fight censorship and keep the intertubes free, free, free.....

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

There's plenty about the bill that I don't know. I readily admit that. However, I do know that if I start a company or webpage called either "Wikipedia" or "Google," they will send me a quick cease and desist letter because of protecting their copyright. Why is SOPA any different as far as protecting copyright?

Jason Brad Berry said...

Oh boy...I don't even know where to start. Please research it but start with understanding that the bill is as much a trojan for government regulation over the internet as it is a tort scorched earth policy for Hollywood. The doors it opens for Hollywood litigation are dwarfed only by the doors it allows the government to close.

If SOPA were to pass in its present form...I would most likely shut this site down the next day and erase everything from the web. I could not take the chance of the legal threat or the censorship threat (possibly criminal charges) which arise from doing what I do.

I realize that would make some folks in this city happy as pigs in shit but I believe the internet is the greatest manifestation of the 1st amendment the world has ever seen. The truth, as I see it, is that we are in the midst of a revolution. It's not an American spring, it's an American resurrection and the "Holy Ghost" is the internet. If that flame is extinguished, this country descends into hell.

That's pretty dramatic metaphor, I realize, but I honestly believe it. The NDAA, SOPA, the proposed Enemy Expatriation Act....look at the pattern. If you can't see where this is headed I'm not sure I can help you see it.

Anonymous said...

After the disaster there, you wrote some strong pieces in support of the people of Haiti. One of the sad things about Haiti is that the Haitian people did an amazingly brave thing, pulling off one of the early, effective slave rebellions, and to many it seems as if they have spent the next 200 years paying for it.

The American Revolution was complex, and it appears to have meant different things to different people who were involved in it. Some of those deep differences in intent became undeniable when the Civil War broke out; they are still with us today.

But whatever you have to say about the country, or metaphysical "countries" plural, that came out of it (So often people talk about how American is going to Hell for one reason or another), that Revolution, and the DREAM of a nation, and of a concept of civic participation that respected individual liberty, and even the happiness of ordinary people, is fucking awesome.

It is totally fucking awesome.

Your decision that if the law passed, you would take down the site might be wise. I haven't read the whole bill, either. Your concern, and the concerns of those who are sounding the alarm seem well founded.

However, I doubt that any law or any other kind of force could kill the part of the American soul that these laws seem intended to try to kill.

Slavery could not kill it. Jim Crow could not kill it. Hunger hasn't killed it. Hardship hasn't killed it. Wealth and a glut of cheap plastic crap hasn't killed it.

No matter what happens, I am going to believe that the America I love will remain undead.

Anonymous said...

I didn't know anything about the Enemy Expatriation Act, and when I looked it up, it seemed to be a bunch of wingnuts commenting on it.

The wingnuts are frothing at the mouth about it, but I was sad not to see commentary on it that seemed to be written by normal people, whatever their opinions or perspectives on it.

Do you have sources for articles written by non-insane people who have questions to ask about this bill?

Google introduced me to a world I am glad don't live in full time.