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The possible future of the Internet under SOPA?

The future of the Internet if SOPA passes?
The future of the Internet if SOPA passes? 2.5 GiB cap!

Is this the future of the Internet after the Stop Online Piracy Act comes into force? Users having to purchase a set package that includes access to a selection of websites and a 500 Megabyte cap with 2 Gigabytes added with each recharge. That would not last long if you want to stream television shows with Hulu and use Youtube instead of watching television.This is ostensibly to fight piracy, but this goes a lot further than that, with the Internet Filter proposed by Steven Conroy the communications minister at the time, who does not even know how to unlock an Iphone, his child had locked on him, and he is in charge of the communications infrastructure! Downloading games from Steam these days with a 2000 megabyte cap would really suck, games are gigabytes in size these days and how are you supposed to manage with such a small cap. I know this image is only one persons idea of the future under a dictatorship that would decide what people are allowed to do on the Internet, that was formerly a free and open forum where anyone could air their views and beliefs for anyone to read whether you agree with them or not.

Sure there is a lot of pirated content on the web and a lot of illegal material like Child Pornography, which Senator Conroy was trying to stop, and which the copyright lobby was using as an excuse for blocking websites. but that content is on certain networks and protected by high-ranking officials in the Vatican and certain Government circles therefore you will not be ridding the world of that anytime soon, unless you nuke the Vatican and Washington DC. No, this is just to regulate the web and remove Internet freedom from everyone and I doubt that prices of DVDs and CDs will drop after they manage to stop file-sharing websites and shut down torrent websites that offer download torrent files to access Hollywood movies free of charge. This needs to be stopped, we can not afford to let this bill pass, if it comes into force then all of the music and movie clips on Youtube could disappear, and you would have to purchase music from Itunes to be able to listen to it. One of the main reasons people use that Video website is to listen to music and create playlists of their favorite tracks for others to enjoy.

There is a new version of the SOPA bill with a few changes. Quoting from the website:

First up among the “differences,” is that this version of the bill changes the language around DNS blocking. But it appears to be more of a chance of style, rather than substance. The old part (in Section 102 (c)2(a)(i)) read:

A service provider shall take technically feasible and reasonable measures designed to prevent access by its subscribers located within the United States to the foreign infringing site (or portion thereof) that is subject to the order, including measures designed to prevent the domain name of the foreign infringing site (or portion thereof) from resolving to that domain name’s Internet Protocol address. Such actions shall be taken as expeditiously as possible, but in any case within 5 days after being served with a copy of the order, or within such time as the court may order. That language has been marginally tempered such that it now reads:

A service provider shall take such measures as it determines to be the least burdensome, technically feasible, and reasonable means designed to prevent access by its subscribers located within the United States to the foreign infringing site that is subject to the order. Such actions shall be taken as expeditiously as possible. Making it clear that service providers get to pick the “least burdensome” means is better than what was there before (and not giving a hard five day deadline) is at least a tiny step in the right direction, but still leaves us with the simple fact that this is a censorship bill. While it may not name DNS directly, that’s the clear implication here. You have to figure out some way to block websites. The new version does also provide some “safe harbors,” saying that if service providers determine what is the least burdensome, technically feasible means, and go with that, then that “shall fully satisfy such service provider’s obligation.” But… that seems to only apply if that means prevents domains from resolving. In other words, you can use any means you want… as long as you censor.

That doesn’t actually fix the problems with censorship and DNS blocking. It just lets the Judiciary Committee try to wash its hands of the complaint and say: okay, service providers, you deal with it. That’s not helpful.

As the website says, there is still a Censorship Bill whether we like it or not and only positive action and making as many people aware of this threat to Internet freedom as possible, that is the only way we can try to defeat this bill. Youtube channels have been threatened with action before and this will only be worse under a Stop Online Piracy Act that will remove Youtube content like movie reviews and user videos that have copyrighted music as a soundtrack.

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