Cyberpunk Review » MPAA looking to build a firewall around USA

Source: DemandProgress.org via Boing Boing.

[CENSORED]

If the MPAA has its way, bill S.3804 will be shoved through Congress so fast that they won’t notice that it mimics tactics used by China and Iran.

Congratulations, America! You have become the enemy you fight.

He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster. And when you gaze long into an abyss the abyss also gazes into you. (Neitzsche)

America always seems to cringe when other nations try some form of mass-censorship, but the MPAA wants it to happen. Bill S.3804, aka the “Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act” (COICA) is their latest scam to seize control of the Internet in the name of “stopping piracy.”

The “Bill” is currently “in committee,” meaning that some congressional members are reviewing the “Bill” to see if it is something that can easily pass, if some tweaking is necessary, or if it should be dumped altogether. If you want to see this “Bill” for yourself (you need some bathroom material or a cure for insomnia) you can find the full text on GovTrack.us where you can also track its progress.

Many bills do die in committee, so the odds are against this one surviving. But if it does survive and becomes law…

The Great Firewall of America. Demand Progress’ site has a fact sheet about what the bill purportedly does:

The bill creates two blacklists of Internet domain names. The first can be added to by a court, the second by the Attorney General. Internet service providers (everyone from Comcast to PayPal to Google AdSense) would be required to block any domains on the first list. They would also receive immunity (and presumably the government’s gratitude) for blocking domains on the second list.

Which sites would be tagets? Anyone “dedicated to infringing activity.” But read on…

Well, it means sites like YouTube could get censored in the US. Copyright holders like Viacom argue that copyrighted material is central to activity of YouTube. But under current US law, YouTube is perfectly legal as long as they take down copyrighted material when they’re informed about it — which is why Viacom lost their case in court. If this bill passes, Viacom doesn’t even need to prove YouTube is doing anything illegal — as long as they can persuade a court that enough other people are using it for copyright infringement, that’s enough to get the whole site censored.

And even without a court order, sites can get blacklisted just by order of the Attorney General — and the bill encourages ISPs to block those sites as well. ISPs have plenty of reason to obey a government blacklist even when they’re not legally required.

The US Constitution says that we’re supposed to have “due process” in the courts before a site gets its plug pulled, but in our post-9/11 security-surveillance state, due process can now be bypassed and a site can be shut down even though it never did anything wrong. If a person has a problem with a website, all they need to do is complain and … 404: Site not found. Imagine WikiLeaks, or even our own Cyberpunk Review site, being on someone’s shit-list. WikiLeaks can be considered a site “dedicated to infringing activity,” and Cyberpunk Review’s media and news about a genre that is inherently anarchistic and criminal in nature…

History Never Repeats… unless they didn’t study. I remember hearing something about Australia’s attempt at blacklist censorship failing. If someone down under can let us know what the status of that attempt. In the mean time, US citizens can sign an online petition to help stop S.3804.

Better still, let’s try this: Find out the congress-critters supporting this “bill” and the members of the MPAA and follow them around in speaker-packed cars or large boom-boxes set to continuously play FSR’s “Fuck the MPAA” to get our message across.

To be honest, I don’t think any of those corporate whores will ever get the message unless they’re raped in public.

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Comments

Oh, HELL no…

I think we need to make a counterpart to the “Doomsday clock” that, instead of counting down our march to a death by some form of weapon of mass destruction … it should count down the ticks of our evaporating freedoms.

We can call it the Dystopia Clock.

Not a good time to live in the USA, huh, people? But I guess if Uncle Sam has concidered the issue, the rest of the world is sure to follow. Still, I’m pretty sure that the common people will find their way around. I predict a high growth of interest in free software (RMS, rejoice!) and generally interesting times to live in.

Stupid fascists…

Whoa, “raped in public”? Internet censorship is an awful thing and this bill must. not. go through, but really? I think your abyss just gazed right back into you, Mr Roboto.

All kinds of weird and more bizarre bills get pushed into congress. Theres really only need for alarm if it reaches the floor. Also, even if it passed, they really don’t have the power to stop people from visiting sites like Youtube. Do you know how much money Youtube brings in?

@teflonsaintsally - he was speaking metaphorically being as he in the same sentance called them corporate whores.

@Icarus - Even if it did pass they wouldn’t have the power? Of course they would. It’s a law. The law is something companies like youtube have to bow to. Like they do currently taking down infringing things.

This is one of the better ideas I’ve heard all day.

Damn, forgot there’s no quote stacking. I need more sleep. I was replying to @Johnkzin.

uh-oh, looks like the cyber revolution may be sooner then we had anticipated.. crap, guess i gotta start building my new cyber-suit much sooner than expected

but in all seriousness this is just funny more then anything, because there will always be a way around the system, they can try all they want, but that isn’t gonna stop the really dedicated ones..

On the question of ways around the system, http://www.i2p2.de/ has got things covered. BTW, I know I would appreciate a mirror of this site there. You just never know…

And then there’s this: http://thepiratebay.org/blog/192

/\
||
Just what I meant. Don’t worry, even if we loose one Internet, we can make another.
BTW, does anyone else find it amusing that the very country that has created Internet in the first place now seeks to destroy it?

“dedicated ones..”
the problem is
the system..
the internet is currently ALREADY censored by government.
in some countries its censored hardly(china) in others not so.
but the fucking fact that bitches r doing that not for people.

if u wanna free internet - dont use IPS (internet provider service) cause its goverment-conTrolled.
juzt install wifi router at your home and connect it to others.

THATS FUCKING ALL.

u must do it even if your neighbourhood is seriall killer or evil hacker.
learn tech if u want to use computer safe - your life will turn suddenly interesting!

if u not a poor guy and have some money, buy powerfull wifi antenna so other less secured who can afford antenna to themselves can connect to u.
and the most funded folks can throw network over ocean.
Yes, u r downloading communizm! ^_^

and when those stupid fat whores will mess with YOUR wifi - u will say than GTFO BITCH!! (in mind: for this is my last frontier)
and if they will ignore u your and your neighbourhoods guns will talk then…

if u dont like this scenario than be more politically active, don’t be a FUCKING passive ANIMAL.
although animals dont visit this web site - the eat shit and do some other casual things.
sad(.

oh, forgot - or use i2p2 or kad network with anon proxy.

BUT this is temporarily:
in early times u could download content directly from filehoster, no w its controlled, torrents.
if a massive amount of folks will use i2p network - bitches will start to act and beleive me, they will shut it down.

How? It’s just an encrypted traffic. It might as well be a SSH session, an e-banking session, whatsofuckingever. There is and will be no legislation against encrypting digital data since it’s a fundamental means of commercial data security. Encrypting is not a crime, generating traffic is not a crime, that means generating encrypted traffic is just as legal as almost any traffic. And if someone ain’t down with that, you know who you are and what to do.
BTW, I2P has been gaining popularity in Russian-speaking segment of the Web in recent half-year or so. Since I first came there about a year and half ago, the speed has improved beyond comparison. It’s still far from perfection, but if you see what sort of information is posted there, you will agree that it is a price to be paid for THAT kind of info. I really cannot say more, you just have to take a look.

have used i2p a couple of times.

glad to agree with u, but
the thing is
there must be publicly available server(as far as i remember from wiki) - entry point for i2p users.
they can simply shut it down with no warning or explanation.
or DDOS it if fail to shutdown.
simply tell ISP to ceil access to head i2p server if it located not under their jurisdiction.

i am living in russia. there is no law in IT here(am not saying for real world-the hell).
beleive me.
read the story about torrents.ru, ifolder. they are give a huge gucking fuck upon all laws existed when they need to.

That server is not an ENTRY point, it’s an EXIT point for I2P-ists to (anonimously) browse the ordinary WWW. You install an i2prouter program that manages your connection to I2P peers and no-one else, quite like BitTorrent technology, except you connect to people that you will never know and who will never know you. I2P is completely decentralized, so even that gateway is not necessary for the network. As long as there are even just two computers connected to each other and running i2prouter, the network will survive, so if torrents.ru survived, then I2P is going to be immortal.

yes, Sniper, must be wrong memorized wiki i2p page.
now i see it.

you juzt killed anxiety within me, thank you dear ^_^
am feeling so good now… ^^

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