China also knows that their censoring doesn't stop everyone, but it stops an awful lot of people. So saying it's not going to work and then criticizing China for censorship feels like talking out of both sides of our mouth.
The broader implications are that his has a chilling effect on any type of user generated content and free speech in general.
It turns international business entities into enforcement arms for the government. Particularly problematic is that it's an attempt to extend the reach of our laws into jurisdictions with different laws and to do so through a business. People get all fired up when someone violates one of our laws, but they don't like it when China or Muslims attempt to push their laws into our jurisdictions.
I think the argument here is that the Internet was invented, developed, and commercialized in the US and Western Europe (and not in China) precisely because our belief in freedom of communication provided the room for the explosion of communication technology (and all the jobs that enables). If it had been heavily regulated and litigated as SOPA/PIPA propose, it would have taken off somewhere else.
Attempts to regulate the flow of information always sound like a great idea to those who propose them. But (aside from it being contradictory to our fundamental values as a nation) what no one can predict is what future revolutionary innovations it will be killing off.
I disagree. Copyright, at least in the US, was created as a tool to encourage innovation. If innovation is at its maximum potential, there is no need for more enforcement.
People need to be shown, not told. Look at iTunes: it came after Napster, when everyone knew how to get MP3s for free. Or the O'Reilly Safari.
Part of the problem is that many businesses don't know how to adapt. Maybe some of them simply aren't capable of doing that for whatever reason. Thing is, I'm convinced that they have to, for their own survival, because I don't believe that piracy will be stopped any time soon, SOPA or no SOPA. So I think the best way to help them recover is to help or convince them move to new ways of doing business, but that's a pretty tall order.
* I say 'could'...whether they do or not is unknown to me.
Once everyone agrees DNS filtering is just wrong, _then_ we can talk about their problems. Otherwise we're just being held hostage.
And if that means fewer people care about copyright, well, it's their job to make people care about copyright for the right reasons. Not because they'll otherwise blow things up.
Your response is a perfect example of why we are failing the communication war. We simply want to get to the technical end: dns filtering is wrong.
Meanwhile, the opposition is saying: SOPA means more US jobs. You tell me which idea has a better chance of sticking in the average consumer's mind?
A better counter would be something like: SOPA means Americans going to jail for watching a YouTube video. Let them counter with "that's not true!". Well, it is as true as saying SOPA means more jobs.
When you're right, you want to move the argument to principles and facts. You don't want the debate muddled, b/c the more people know the likelier they are to agree with you.
(Unless you mean that Youtube really does mean jail? I haven't tracked the less bad parts of the bill so closely.)
I see this argument time and again and as much as I agree with it, it just doesn't sound very convincing to the mainstream argument against piracy. This is gonna be a huge-ass debate and HN, in some ways, is preparing ground for our folks. One of the things I hope we will do is be dicks and challenge the arguments laid out by folks we like and support, including Alexis, so that the next time they go on, they are better prepared.
I know personally when I prepared for debates in debate class, I'd purpose take a completely opposite position to my own and try to crush my own arguments. It helped me lots - better me crushing nuances in my arguments than my opponents.
To play devil's advocate, here's a counter:
Indeed, piracy may be a service problem. But that does not keep it from also being an enforcement problem. Even in the best case scenario where we have optimal innovation, piracy will require enforcement. We believe there isn't enough of enforcement right now. This has little to do with innovation.