Legislating the Internet
(Government,Law)

On January 18, 2012, Wikipedia and many other websites went dark to protest two proposed bills: the House's Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the Senate's Protect IP Act (PIPA). Other sites protested as well. Google blacked out their logo, and many long-time YouTubers posted videos protesting these laws. So what was all the fuss about?

These two bills came about thanks to the lobbying efforts of the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) and Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). Also supporting these bills were some big trademark-dependent companies like Nike. The bills were attempts to address very real problems -- infringements on intellectual property. We all know the world is filled with knock-off counterfeit products, ripped-off movies and music, etc. I understand the desire to stop these criminal activities. But as often happens with legislation, the bills were written in such a way that they could hurt many legitimate businesses and websites.

Had these bills become law, the unexpected consequences could have been very far reaching. Journalist Rebecca MacKinnon, in an op-ed piece, pointed out that making companies liable for users' actions could have a chilling effect on user-generated sites such as YouTube. The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) warned about the danger to other user sites like Etsy, Flickr, and Vimeo. The IT magazine eWeek reported, "The language of SOPA is so broad, the rules so unconnected to the reality of Internet technology and the penalties so disconnected from the alleged crimes that this bill could effectively kill e-commerce or even normal Internet use." Google, Facebook, Twitter, and other companies sent a joint letter to Congress, stating "We support the bills' stated goals -- providing additional enforcement tools to combat foreign 'rogue' Web sites that are dedicated to copyright infringement or counterfeiting. However, the bills as drafted would expose law-abiding U.S. Internet and technology companies to new uncertain liabilities, private rights of action and technology mandates that would require monitoring of Web sites." I could go on.

Thankfully, the protests from the online community got the attention of the legislators and the bills were tabled while they worked to re-write them.