Imagine that. Saying goodbye to innovation, expression, and cutting off a vital part of communicating in today's society. As America is considered the "melting-pot" of different cultures, the internet serves as the melting pot of the world. All cultures combine, mix, and meld together unique ideas and concepts stirred together into one big constant global communication. It may seem like a dramatic approach, but we live in a churning society, where one technology, trend, or even theory is constantly advancing and replacing the next. The freedom of sharing of information that the internet allows has rocketed these advancements so far that the trends of ten years ago seem like the dark ages. The support bills like SOPA and PIPA gives that opportunity for advancement a heavy sedative.
Pirate (pi•rate) noun: A person who attacks and robs ships at sea.
See also: rob or plunder. If pirates are people who attack, rob and plunder, could major entertainment industry leaders in fact be the pirates of creativity, communication, and freedom of expression? To make an overall stand against piracy on the internet, these companies have taken legal action and had to proposed bills written up, SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) and PIPA (Protect IP Act). What will they have the power to do? According to the breakdown in this article on www.1stwebdesigner.com, SOPA and PIPA gives U.S. corporations and government the power to do the following:• If deemed as copyright infringement, U.S. internet providers to block overall access to the offending
sites
• Seek legal action against offending sites and have them blacklisted
• Private corporations will be able to create personal "hit lists" of websites that they feel are breaking
any copyright policies
The bottom line of both bills that has been causing the recent uproar of protests from the major Fortune 500 companies such as Google to the bloggers such as myself is this: the vague language of the SOPA and PIPA bills that allows a scary amount of wiggle room. The simplicity of the bills and allowance to self-monitor basically gives any person with internet access to black list a post, picture, or even an entire site. Yes, this has the potential to affect major sites such as Google, Twitter, Facebook, and Youtube, but it also stifles the communication, creativity, and inspiration that the internet allows to circulate around the world. From a different perspective, the allowance of wrongly-accused people and sites have the potential to be plundered by the buccaneers of communication.
Sharing information is what turns this society on.
From the person who sends a link to their favorite song on Youtube to their friend, to the aspiring photographer on Facebook, to the newbie blogger who simply wants to share their interests on a collage for others to see, each would be threatened with the potential to be "shut up" by these laws. Hillary Clinton was quoted on americancenceorship.org saying, "When ideas are blocked, information deleted, conversations stifled, and people constrained in their choices, the Internet is diminished for all of us." I could not have said it better, as I believe that a threat in that nature could potentially turn off a vast majority of people from using the internet at all, creating, in effect, a stalemate of creativity.
What is my point?
If SOPA and PIPA are passed as laws, it would be like setting back society by fifty or more years. The support these acts is the support the suffocation of creativity, opportunity for innovation, and an overall global communication that is vital for the advancement of our society. All in all, society is excelling to the future, how can we let our very civil liberties be halted and thrown into the past?
