PIPA and SOPA

              Remember two years ago that one day when at the top of your screen on Google it said, “Tell Congress: Please don’t censor the web.” Well that was because of the two bills PIPA and SOPA. What they are is the Stop Online Piracy Act and the Protect IP Act. When you here it there it doesn’t sound so bad, but it actually is. The Government wanted control over the Internet. They could look at something and if they didn’t like it they could censor it. Then Hollywood heard about this and they wanted it because they said that it would protect their “Intellectual Property”

            “Opponents claimed that the proposed legislation threatened free speech and innovation, and enabled law enforcement to block access to entire internet domains due to infringing content posted on a single blog or webpage. They expressed concerns that SOPA would bypass the "safe harbor" protections from liability presently afforded to websites by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Some library associations worried that the legislation's emphasis on stronger copyright enforcement would expose libraries to prosecution. Other opponents declared that requiring search engines to delete domain names violated the First Amendment and could begin a worldwide arms race of unprecedented Internet censorship.”- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop_Online_Piracy_Act

            Google and Wikipedia weren’t the only people mad about this Firefox turned dark and had raise awareness PIPA and SOPA across the fox many people were furious that they couldn’t use the web browsers or the internet so the law probably wasn’t goanna be passed.     

When they wanted to pass the law Google and Wikipedia were upset and they were shutting down their sites to raise awareness and vote against it.  If PIPA and SOPA were passed then the Government would get so many complaints they might even have to arrest some people. Many people say we need to pass this because it would stop piracy but that’s not what it was. What it was is they wanted complete control over the Internet so that if they felt it shouldn’t be on there it wouldn’t be anymore.

            CBS news says, “Content groups like the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), and business representatives like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, argue that innovation and jobs in content-creating industries are threatened by growing Internet piracy. Overseas websites, they argue, are a safe haven for Internet pirates profiting off their content. According to the Global Intellectual Property Center, which is part of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, intellectual property-intensive sectors employ more than 19 million people in the U.S. and create $7.7 trillion in gross output. Foreign website operators currently outside the bounds of U.S. law; SOPA and PIPA would help quell illegitimate Internet activity.” To read on-http://www.cbsnews.com/news/sopa-pipa-what-you-need-to-know/

            Stopping piracy isn’t always a bad thing because when you think about it no thoughts are really original. Everything is based off something else that someone else has thought of so next time you see the Google signs blacked out or Wikipedia dark think twice before you shut them down.