Right, so It's International Internet Blackout day or whatever. Subversify joined in with a lot of other sites that either blacked out completely or sent up a message of some sort showing support. What I noticed was there were more sites that had promised to join that did not in fact do so. Like Huffington Post blah blah blah, did you think major American outlets were really going to go black?
Kudos to Wired for going to the trouble and Wikipedia for at least blacking out the main page as well as giving info on where to go and who to write to in your state about your disgust. Also a thank you to The Guardian who technically doesn't matter because they are not in America but thanks for the leg-up Guardian!
The question really is: does our mutual disgust and protest matter? Probably not much. I wrote an obligatory letter to my Congressman who usually does exactly nothing but check the box the other Republitards tell him to. I write him all the damn time about everything and every single time get the same letter back saying basically "I know better than you."
But I wrote him again anyway, it's kinda my monthly exercise in futility here it is:
Mr. Herger,
I am aware that you are set for retirement and as you have done nothing but vote the party line for the entirety of your career I have no doubt that this plea will be ignored. Just as all other letters I have written to you have been ignored. Over the years I have received letters from your office which sounded rather like form letters designed to tell me one thing. "I hear you dear constituent. Other constituents have told me the same thing, however I know better than you." Which has only served to separate me from you and Washington further. See, I was taught representatives were meant to represent their constituents no matter what. Not decide what is best for the constituents. Yet you on so many occasions have decided to vote against the majority of your constituents on so very many issues.
Here is another opportunity however to hear something your constituents have to say.
SOPA and PIPA are bad for everyone. They would put the burden on website owners to police user-contributed material and call for the unnecessary blocking of entire sites. Small sites won't have sufficient resources to defend themselves. Big media companies may seek to cut off funding sources for their foreign competitors, even if copyright isn't being infringed. Foreign sites will be blacklisted, which means they won't show up in major search engines. SOPA and PIPA would build a framework for future restrictions and suppression. I have no doubt that this will extend to American sites as well as the foreign ones. Besides which why are we consistently extending our laws to make it okay to infringe on the laws of other countries?
In a world where it is difficult to do buisiness anymore without a website this would slow down the small owners that we supposedly want to prop up. It would continue the dwindling of the middle class, you know...the class that pays all the bills already with their taxes as they have none of the tax breaks of higher earners.
Congress says it's trying to protect the rights of copyright owners, but the "cure" that SOPA and PIPA represent is worse than the disease. SOPA and PIPA are not the answer. They are entirely too broad in their definition and they do nothing to actually correct the problem. In effect they create an extra problem of a new sort of criminality. Both Bills would fatally damage the free and open Internet.
I urge you to think before you vote about how it would affect American media, business and tax payers.
-signed me.
Okay, I signed my really real name actually because I really do give a shit even if he clearly doesn't.
I don't know if people really give a shit about Piracy-that scary word that conjures up either Capt. Jack Sparrow or Somalian teenagers depending on your view of pirates...
It seems like we don't we put pictures of ourselves up all over the place and provide permission-even if we don't read the fine print, it's there, check your google+ acct.- for people we don't know to download them.
We take other people's pictures all the time like this one:
Because we agree with what it says and privacy means we can't always contact you to give you credit. (To whom it may concert, I really really like this picture and completely agree with it, we need to not let ourselves be oppressed. Please Please don't be mad that I used it. You Rock!)
What's really at stake here is money. Cash flow to those who hold the purse strings which is why you won't see National Geographic blacked out today. Nor will you see the New York Times. They simply do not give a shit about the whole issue.
They also aren't whistleblowers. When was the last time you saw National Geographic blow the lid off corruption with their awesome glossy photos, they report after the fact. They give no commentary or context. They just have really really great narration and pictures....and pullout maps with time lines and stuff.
This SOPA/PIPA thing is designed to make it legal to go after the people who work with entities like Wikileaks, Anonymous, and others whose names you may not know like Cuentame which is where I pirated the above picture. ( again, thanks so much cuentame you Kick Ass! and sorry for pirating your photo)
It's also about having the ability to extradite people and ignore the laws of other nations. Something which I find very bad and very rude of we, the American people. It seems we really do want to rule the world and this past year 2011-2012 has been all about making up new laws that make us feel better about breaking the laws of other countries. You know like that act Obama just signed into law making it okay to call anyone a terrorist or a trouble maker or a Bad Andy therefore making it okeeydokey to swipe them from other countries without their permission.
Anyway. Is our protest today going to make a difference. I highly doubt it. Does it therefore matter if we do it or not? Yes.
Yes because it always matters I think if you believe in something to stand for it. If you don't you are a gutless spineless shell of a human who already belongs entirely to The Machine.
But that's just my opinion.
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