Oppose SOPA and PIPA

(T)he important task of protecting intellectual property online must not threaten an open and innovative internet.
Obama administration

This is easy. Do I want to support Google (motto: "don't be evil"} and the Obama administration or Rupert Murdoch (remember the phone hacking scandal)? Google, Wikipedia and other websites are campaigning today to protect their services.

Two bills before Congress, known as the Protect IP Act (PIPA) in the Senate and the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) in the House, would censor the Web and impose harmful regulations on American business. Millions of Internet users and entrepreneurs already oppose SOPA and PIPA.

Sign the petition telling the Congress you are with those who want a free internet and against those who are willing to limit access to protect profits.

I just heard a Brit spokesman for the content industry on BBC News urge Americans to support these bills, saying he didn't know anything about U.S. law. The bills would authorize the U.S. Government to block sites abroad. It would impose on services like Wikipedia and Google, not to mention Twitter and Facebook, the responsibility to police all the content that passes over them.

These laws, in spite of the advertising, are not intended to protect the rights of writers, musicians, and others who create content. They are part of the effort by big media companies to protect their profits. They are part of the same mindset that extended copyright to the life of the author plus 70 years. Do you think it really encourages creativity to know that people will not be able to copy your paper or cover your song for 70 years after you die without paying the publisher?