Wow, it's only being made worse. Bob Goodlatte (R-VA), from what I can tell, is adding the payment processing blockage suggestion from Google in the last hearing, without removing any of the terrible, terrible components already in it.
The entire speech, too, was full of equivocation and mass confusion: sawdust breaks have exactly NOTHING to do with SOPA. Equivocating on physical goods and digital goods, when it comes to safety, is asinine.
Edit: HOLY HELL. Melvin Watt (D-NC) just said almost exactly: "A free and open internet is not unduly compromised by these changes to stop theft and piracy online." . . . "Trusting private rights-holders against foreign infringing sites will allow us to stop the compromise of US citizens and the influx of compromised goods." . . . "We need to be just as aggressive on the internet as we are with brick-and-mortar stores." . . . "This bill allows us to get into the internet." . . . "My perspective, as an old country boy, we need parallels on the virtual world to what we have in the real world." YOU ALREADY HAVE THEM!!!
Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) is up: please save us. YAY! "The integrity of the Internet is very much at risk." . . . "Especially disturbing given that today is the anniversary of the First Amendment." "The internet is not lawless. Breaking the law can already be punished, just like the physical world. But we have shut down illegal conduct at the source. The government has never tried to use the network itself to prevent illegal conduct . . . This will be historic, and not in a good way. Once the government has a taste of this power...expanding it will be irresistible. The US Government has never tried to monitor mail to prevent some sort of illegal content from being sent." Support this congresswoman!
Jim Sensenbrenner (R-WI) reminding us all that NOBODY was qualified to comment on DNSSEC issues. Good scenarios, including phishing-style attacks mimicking SOPA-takedown-esque redirects.
Howard Berman (D-CA) argues that "we can't stop the foreigners from stealing" argument. But that's always been the case, whether physical or otherwise. We can't stop a foreign company from making, say, fake Nike clothes and selling them in South Africa. You can work with foreign governments to shut them down according to their own laws. And once again, Zoe Lofgren nails it in her response: "This is the beginning of the balkanization of the internet."
Chaffetz (R-UT) says, "Let's get some nerds in the room." "How can you support a bill that will dramatically change how the internet works without understanding what it does?"
Alright, back to work. But this doesn't seem like SOPA's being fixed in ways that are important.
Was that a direct quote? I'm Canadian, which means that I have no impact on this legislation whatsoever. I can't email my congress(wo)man, threaten to vote for the other guy, throw money behind a better candidate, etc. All I can do is sit back and hope that somehow you yanks'll take care of it, so therefore I try not to pay too close attention to this since it depresses the hell out of me. As such, I wasn't watching the proceedings today and don't know if that's a direct quote or not.
If it is, then I find that comment extremely disturbing. The reason being that Congress, being made up mostly of old people largely out of touch with technology (senate.gov lists the average age of members to be 56.7 years in the House and 62.2 years in the Senate[1]), they should be looking to the younger generation in general, and experts in technology specifically, to help them make informed decisions. Calling these people "nerds" seems incredibly derisive and shows a general lack of respect for the very people that can best help them.
Just to let you know, that is a quotation, but it wasn't meant in the derisive manner (as you decided to interpret it). On the contrary, the reasonable members of the House understand they need more technical people to weigh-in and are pushing for another hearing with such people present.
They used the word "nerd" frequently, but it wasn't really meant derisively, and a few people self-identified as nerds. (The tech-savviest man in the room used to run an ISP, I believe he was one such "nerd".)
Mr Chaffetz is my new hero. More politicians should raise the issue of people not having a clue what they're on about. Even better, raising it eloquently.
I want some questions answered by the proponents, lobbyists and Congresscritters backing this thing:
1. Why do you need to avoid due process? The lack of oversight (by the courts) is what makes this like censorship in China, Iran, etc. With SOPA, all anyone need do is claim copyright infringement against some web site and it gets shut down and blacklisted-- correct or not, the targeted site owner is censored off the internet and cut off from their income simply because someone pointed a finger. That's bullying, plain and simple, and it's unacceptable.
2. What punishment is included for abuse of this lack of process? Without punishment, corporations can censor competitors, politicians can censor opponents, governments can censor citizens simply by alleging infringement against them.
I've been sitting in a hotel lobby for literally 24 hours over the last two days. There have been two different news stations playing this entire time. I have heard news coverage of all sorts of topics, but nothing discussing SOPA.
In fact, the only thing I've seen was an ad (presumably by the MPAA or RIAA) saying that piracy costs jobs, concluding with the phrase "Stop Online Piracy." How is it possible that neither of these stations even mentioned SOPA? Is there really that little public interest in the topic? They're talking about apple cider recipes right now.
Wow, a guy admitted that he doesn't know if he wants to use modern technology, yet he's expected to make an informed decision about this. We're pretty fucked.
I rage-quit watching the video after about 2 minutes.
You can't expect every congressperson to be an expert on every bill they vote on. That is why they have assistants; to research the matter and brief the congressperson on it. Frequently their opinion will also be heavily influenced by lobbyists, rather than their own knowledge of the subject.
Mr. Chaffetz is kicking ass pointing out that they have not taken into account any of the technical issues. "It's like performing surgery without a doctor." "Bring in the nerds."
This saddens me. I just saw Polis attempt to grant an exemption for University run DNSs (something already in place for businesses). The amendment was rebutted with a meaningful argument. Then I watched 20 minutes of completely mislead arguments such as people thinking like this would mean universities could freely violate copyright, post copyrighted material without legal consequences, and anybody at a university is immune from prosecution when downloading copyrighted material. It was eventually voted down. Ugh, clueless people...
She's barely comprehensible and monotonous besides. Nobody in that room is listening to her anymore. All three people in the frame behind her are looking at a screen.
My understanding was that her reading could have been avoided if a member who opposed the bill removed their objection. Basically, this was a way to stall progress on the bill and nothing more. No one was meant to really listen, I think.
On an unrelated note, today I discovered I definitely do not have the patience for congress.
I have finally found a useful purpose "Decrease speed" option in VLC. It actually works, I can hear what she says (she sounds drunk, but that's another matter). It's not very interesting though. Is she just reading through the entire act?
Ye gods... Mr. Gooolatte speaking now. Basic gist? Illegal foreign sites steal intellectual property and it gets back to US consumers, removing all motivation for those content owners to create new material... and jobs.
The more likely case is that they had their legislative assistants read some or all of the bill, and have made a voting decision before this hearing even started.
Watching this makes me realize that we don't need new regulations... we need new leaders... leaders who can compete and are knowledgeable on a global scale.
No such thing can exist in a world of seven billion people. If your model of government requires that, it is doomed to absolute failure. The correct answer is to decentralize more and reduce our need for "leaders" in general.
Why should we obey physical boundaries? Internet should be for people across national borders. If anything, we should establish our own government for the Internet that actually knows and understands what they're talking about.
Something that pro-members of this panel seems to miss is that it requires the creation of a mechanism to enforce the provisions of this bill, and that mechanism can be abused far beyond the scope of this particular bill.
Quick, someone file a copyright complaint against the broadcast and get it shut down! We can't risk public knowledge of this hearing, er, I mean, IP infringement, getting out!
In watching the live stream there is some young-ish woman speaking so fast in order to get through the particular amendment she is (I'm assuming) required to read verbatim, and in such a monotonic tone, that I can't understand the reason for doing so. The people listening surely can't be retaining what it is that she is saying. It would be much more prudent if (gosh forbid) everybody involved had done their homework, read up on the appropriate amendments prior to this hearing, and came prepared to discuss and debate merits.
Ya know...kinda like what we all had to do growing up. Do your homework.
BTW, there's a woman furiously typing away on a blackberry with an iPad in her hand and a man on an iPad who are both on camera directly behind this woman speaking. I rest my case your honor.
Is this your first time watching congress? Yes, shes required to read it, all you've really said is that its silly for her to do so, which it is. But its a formality and they'll normally move to have her STFU. In this case its a procedural runarund. Like a quorum in the senate, nobody actually cares that everyones there, and if they did care so much about attendance they'd have a better way to take it.
They did their homework beforehand, otherwise the chamber would be empty, like always.
When I have watched hearings in the past it has been to listen to debates (most of which wind up being read verbatim from a piece of paper), but the language used is more natural than that of a proposed bill/amendment.
As for doing their homework, from the events surrounding SOPA which have taken place to date and in reading the list of amendments to be discussed, I don't believe these JC members - save for a few like Lofgren, Polis, Sensenbrenner, Chaffetz - have done their homework.
Two of the most important amendments over the next two days:
* performing a study on the impact of any bill prior to its enactment (why this isn't a part of judiciary procedure escapes me)
* an expiry on the provision of the bill after 5 years, which I think is a wonderful idea.
Holy F___ what a bunch of idiots. Chaffetz , Lofgren and Polis seem to be the only ones who gets this. We are totally screwed if this moves forward. DMCA made worse.
I am a n00b to politics but why is that girl speaking so furiously? No one is/can understand that. They should do some debate. That seems to be useless.
it's a matter of course to read the amended bill into record before they proceed. everyone sitting there is presumed to have already been familiarized with the textual revisions
If you're on a Mac, it seems that Chrome probably won't work. Open up Safari and click on the video stream link (http://mfile.akamai.com/65764/live/reflector:39480.asx?bkup=...) For me VLC opened the stream then. You could probably directly open it in VLC as well, but that isn't what I did.
Are there any sites out there keeping track of how Congressional reps will vote? I just got a letter from my Senator saying she supports SOPA (and turns out is a sponsor of the bill). Gillibrand-NY
We will need a medium to discover what sites cant be visited so we can reproduce the blocked sites over the black-market under-the-table internet. A place where we can read about opinions and objectives that have not been approved by the riaa and mpaa for public showing.
Our internet is turning into fox news, with talking points, narratives, brainwashing and censorship. Not on my watch!
Do a google search for fox news sopa. Guess how many articles reporting on some of the most important legislation on the Earth today? I saw zero. corruption meter reading 100.
I'm not up for rioting. I'm up for creating an back channel that the government doesn't know about, though.
(Think about all the other things that are illegal, like growing certain plants and crossing the street when the light is red. The laws are just there to oppress people that the government wants to oppress, and we'll never change that. One more thought crime on my rap sheet isn't going to make a difference.)
The entire speech, too, was full of equivocation and mass confusion: sawdust breaks have exactly NOTHING to do with SOPA. Equivocating on physical goods and digital goods, when it comes to safety, is asinine.
Edit: HOLY HELL. Melvin Watt (D-NC) just said almost exactly: "A free and open internet is not unduly compromised by these changes to stop theft and piracy online." . . . "Trusting private rights-holders against foreign infringing sites will allow us to stop the compromise of US citizens and the influx of compromised goods." . . . "We need to be just as aggressive on the internet as we are with brick-and-mortar stores." . . . "This bill allows us to get into the internet." . . . "My perspective, as an old country boy, we need parallels on the virtual world to what we have in the real world." YOU ALREADY HAVE THEM!!!
Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) is up: please save us. YAY! "The integrity of the Internet is very much at risk." . . . "Especially disturbing given that today is the anniversary of the First Amendment." "The internet is not lawless. Breaking the law can already be punished, just like the physical world. But we have shut down illegal conduct at the source. The government has never tried to use the network itself to prevent illegal conduct . . . This will be historic, and not in a good way. Once the government has a taste of this power...expanding it will be irresistible. The US Government has never tried to monitor mail to prevent some sort of illegal content from being sent." Support this congresswoman!
Jim Sensenbrenner (R-WI) reminding us all that NOBODY was qualified to comment on DNSSEC issues. Good scenarios, including phishing-style attacks mimicking SOPA-takedown-esque redirects.
Howard Berman (D-CA) argues that "we can't stop the foreigners from stealing" argument. But that's always been the case, whether physical or otherwise. We can't stop a foreign company from making, say, fake Nike clothes and selling them in South Africa. You can work with foreign governments to shut them down according to their own laws. And once again, Zoe Lofgren nails it in her response: "This is the beginning of the balkanization of the internet."
Chaffetz (R-UT) says, "Let's get some nerds in the room." "How can you support a bill that will dramatically change how the internet works without understanding what it does?"
Alright, back to work. But this doesn't seem like SOPA's being fixed in ways that are important.