SOPA Vs The Internet

In a further step towards a regulated internet, the US Government is currently attempting to pass the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), a bill aiming to strengthen copyright laws. Though on the surface this may seem a logical turn of events, many internet heavy-weights are sensing troubled times ahead if this bill is passed and are beginning to voice their disdain.

The core principle of the bill will be to protect US-born media content that is subject to copyright infringement outside of US jurisdiction. Sitting alongside the PROTECT IP Act (PIPA), a proposed law with similar aims, many are claiming these will give law enforcement agencies too much power in shutting down websites they view as contravening the acts.

Though SOPA was proposed back in October 2011, it wasn’t until the domain registrar GoDaddy.com was outed as a supporter of the bill that a wider audience began to rally behind the anti-SOPA movement. When a further supporting statement backing SOPA was released by GoDaddy in response, a ‘Boycott GoDaddy Day’ was organised for December 29th seeing the likes of Wikipedia and image hosting site imgur give their support. Though GoDaddy were quick to change their tact, the damage was done and SOPA was now very much in the public domain.

Rumoured Protest Action

Now it seems the wider world of online businesses are becoming aware to the potential dangers of these proposed acts, with many of the internets’ largest sites rumoured to be considering protest actions within their own pages. This sentiment has also been mirrored by companies who’d previously backed the bill, such as Nintendo and Sony, who’ve now “Done a GoDaddy” and removed their support of SOPA.

Whilst it seems unlikely that this backlash will stop the bills, it’s almost certainly ensured that amends to current proposals will be required before they’re passed, and moreover that these amends will be in full view of those they will ultimately affect. If the intended changes do come to pass though, we may soon be looking back on the past decade as the internets’ halcyon days for the sake of newly imposed copyright restrictions.