Congress is currently considering two bills that have serious implications for the way people and companies in this country conduct business and network online. The bills causing the commotion are the “Stop Online Piracy Act” (SOPA) and the “Protect-IP Act” (PIPA). The sponsors of these bills claim that the legislation is aimed at foreign companies that break U.S. copyright laws. However if Congress passes SOPA and PIPA it will set a precedent for censorship of the internet. It will affect everything from the way companies use Twitter for business to the sharing of material on sites like Google, Bing, and Wikipedia. Everyone from the small-time marketing firm to the multinational corporation will be under scrutiny.
SOPA and PIPA would impart new power to the U.S. Department of Justice. The department would be tasked with seeking court orders against websites accused of permitting or facilitating copyright infringement. The legislation is suspiciously vague and worrisome to a multiplicity of websites, businesses, and people. The initial lines of the SOPA bill read: “To promote prosperity, creativity, entrepreneurship, and innovation by combating the theft of U.S. property, and for other purposes.” It is these “other purposes” that are fueling apprehension in America.
The omission of specificity in the SOPA and PIPA legislation implicates many things for the U.S. Department of Justice and the online community in Amerca. It means that the department can prohibit online advertising networks from conducting business with allegedly infringing websites, block search engines from linking to certain websites, and can demand that internet service providers block access to such sites. The Department of Justice will practically become an online police officer, moderator, and judge. The department will get to decide what characterizes infringement and which websites to punish. The ambiguous character of the bills can lead to indiscriminate attacks and harassment against targeted companies, people, and websites.
The line separating innocent and guilty parties will be fuzzy. Someone who uses Twitter for business to post updates and information about their product or service could be hit with a lawsuit because someone else with similar products or services does not want competitors. Court battles over who is infringing upon who and what infringement means specifically will clog the judiciary and distract the Department of Justice from going after and prosecuting other criminals who pose physical dangers to people. A marketing firm contracted to publicize an infringing website can be penalized or shut down even if the firm is unaware that its client is violating any laws.
The SOPA and PIPA sponsors are most likely well intentioned. There is a problem regulating and protecting copyright and property law on the internet that should be looked at. But Congress would be ill-advised to pass this legislation because it creates more problems than it solves. SOPA and PIPA will change the online atmosphere in this country from open and informative to censored and anxious. Congress should not censor the Twitter for business people, the entrepreneurial marketing firm, local business leaders, media innovators, and the sharing of knowledge and information on the internet. To tackle online copyright infringement we need to have an open forum discussion like the one taking place online right now in opposition to SOPA and PIPA. The world wide web is a democratic institution that will be destroyed if left to the enmity of special interest groups and lobbyists on Capitol Hill.
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