PROTECT IP Act Follows In COICA's Footsteps 162
Last fall, Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT) introduced the Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act (COICA), which was dubbed the "internet blacklist" by opponents worried about its broad provisions for allowing the removal of websites based on vague criteria. COICA stalled in Congress, but now Leahy has proposed a new, similar piece of legislation called the PROTECT IP Act (PDF).
"Like COICA, Protect IP expands the web of enforcement techniques by requiring advertising networks and financial transaction providers to cut ties to domains found to violate the law. But the new version now adds search engines and others to the list of providers who can be conscripted into complying with court orders. Protect IP would require 'information location tools' to 'take technically feasible and reasonable measures, as expeditiously as possible,' to remove or disable access to the site associated with a condemned domain, including blocking hypertext links to the site. ... Perhaps most worrisome of all, Protect IP adds a provision that allows copyright and trademark holders to sue the owner/operator of a domain directly. Again, the provision applies only to nondomestically-registered domains, but it allows the private party, like the government, to sue the domain name itself if the registrant does not have a US address. That's important because in all cases, once a suit is initiated, the plaintiff can ask the court to issue an injunction or restraining order effectively shutting the site down."
Re:Protect RIAA/MPAA profits act. (Score:5, Informative)
Leahy is beyond corrupt and firmly in the pockets [opensecrets.org] of the MafiAA - essentially he's the new RIAA hand-puppet in Congress.
He's actually worse than Fritz Hollings (D-Disney) [linux.com] was.
What we need is major campaign finance reform to get rid of all the backdoor contribution scams going on. But good luck getting that to happen - especially with the 5 senile delinquent conservatives on the Supreme Court having struck down the last few attempts at campaign finance reform!
Re:Damn Republicans! (Score:5, Informative)
What is more disturbing is the lack of public and news outlet reaction. Of course, most news outlets now being owned by extremely large corporate interests is in this case, no help at all...
Re:Protect RIAA/MPAA profits act. (Score:4, Informative)
They have to invent imaginary persons (corporations), and imaginary objects (intellectual property), both which defy the laws of physics
I know I'm being pedantic here, but the laws of physics say nothing about either of those concepts. The rest of your rant degenerates from there, but admittedly is perfectly aimed at the majority of the slashdot readership.
Re:Protect RIAA/MPAA profits act. (Score:5, Informative)
Campaign finance reform ran into the first amendment. It's normally right to have the first amendment prevail against other well intentioned laws.
We can get a lot of things done without messing with the first amendment:
1. Term limits to reduce the amassing of power and favors.
2. End of plurality voting so that we end the power sharing duopoloy that continues to favor corporatism.
3. Much stronger restrictions on the ability of government officials to do favors for corporations and then take jobs with them as lobbyists and executives.
4. Transparency transparency transparency! Government officials should be required to keep extensive records online declaring every source of income or benefit they receive. We should be able to know who is using commercial airlines, whether or not they're flying first class, where they're going, who's paying for their hotel rooms, dinners, trips, doing their home remodeling, etc.
5. Stronger ethical training and rules enforcement. The self-policing of congress is pathetic. Every congressman and staffer should have to take one of those ethical IQ tests, similar to the one they make you take to get a retail job; but much much more detailed. Any difficulties with the test should result in extensive ethics training. All test results should be posted online for every citizen to examine.
Re:The fine gentleman from Vermont (Score:5, Informative)
>It seemed to work just fine from 1789 to circa 1900
Not for people like you and me.
Not for miners, not for railroad workers, not for anyone who had to work for a living. I suggest you read up on the Banana wars. I suggest reading about how people died while putting in rails as the robber barons of the age built their cottages 20 miles from me in Newport RI. The Breakers (Cornelius Vanderbilt - Rails and shipping) alone, if rebuilt from scratch, would require half a billion dollars of modern money. Living the life on the literal blood of the people who worked for him.
That's what laissez-faire gets you.
Yeah, it was so magical back then. You're not romanticizing /at all/.
--
BMO
Re:Protect RIAA/MPAA profits act. (Score:3, Informative)
Where are all these powerful lobbyists going to come from if we get rid of the quid pro quo of having government officials become lobbyists with huge salaries?
They'll be former party officials who were never officially "government officials."
Or they'll be people who put together a firm simply for the purpose of being lobbyists from the industry themselves.
It's not the "who", it's the fact that they can make the threats and promises that in any other setting would amount to bribery.
Which political organizations will lobbyists target if we reduce the power of those organizations by allowing other parties to be voted in?
There will still be political parties.
There will still be individual representatives to target.
Which politicians will lobbyists target when term limits prevents them from buying a senator for 20 to 30 years? Fresh blood in congress means a reduction in strings.
Sons, daughters, neices, nephews... you forget how incestuous Congress really is.
For that matter, say (just pulling a name here) Boeing is in need of some new law to help them out. You don't think Boeing's staff can't come up with a list of "possibly sympathetic" and "Need to stop them from speaking against us" representatives within an hour?
Political attack and support ads are not the main problem crippling our government. Corruption and the amassing of power are.
You say that as if they are not one and the same.
Lobbyists only have real power because we've allowed them to be incestuously intertwined with government. Those ties should be broken, but not by curtailing free speech.
That was the whole point of campaign finance laws:
- Banning coordinated issue ads
- Banning coordinated "sneaky soft money" right next to an election
If you can't do those two things, even if some corrupt asstard in a black robe [washingtonpost.com] wrongly conflates them with "free speech", then you can NEVER break the incestuous ties of lobbyists and government representatives.
Re:Protect RIAA/MPAA profits act. (Score:4, Informative)
Abolishing imaginary property is exactly what we should be doing.
They're not advocating abolishing IP. They propose getting rid of Patents and Copyright and replacing it with private contracts between a buyer and seller. With added laws to enforce fair use saying things like a seller can't stop a buyer from loaning or renting.
One interesting quote in the book
If we did not have a patent system, it would be irresponsible, on the basis of our present knowledge of its economic consequences, to recommend instituting one. But since we have had a patent system for a long time, it would be irresponsible, on the basis of our present knowledge, to recommend abolishing it.
So whatever we do we should do it slowly and monitor the impact it is having.