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Law Professors vs the PROTECT IP Act

Posted by Soulskill on from the clean-up-your-act dept.

Freddybear writes "Along with 90 (and still counting) other Internet law and IP law professors, David Post of the Volokh Conspiracy law blog has drafted and signed a letter in opposition to Senator Leahy's 'PROTECT IP Act.' Quoting: 'The Act would allow the government to break the Internet addressing system. It requires Internet service providers, and operators of Internet name servers, to refuse to recognize Internet domains that a court considers "dedicated to infringing activities." But rather than wait until a Web site is actually judged infringing before imposing the equivalent of an Internet death penalty, the Act would allow courts to order any Internet service provider to stop recognizing the site even on a temporary restraining order or preliminary injunction issued the same day the complaint is filed. Courts could issue such an order even if the owner of that domain name was never given notice that a case against it had been filed at all.'"

8 of 212 comments (clear)

  1. LOL! American Freedom! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    LOL, is this the "American Freedom" I heard so much about as a youth growing up in Hungary during the Cold War?

    1. Re:LOL! American Freedom! by shutdown+-p+now · · Score: 5, Insightful

      No, you're not as bad as China. You still have free political speech, which is the most basic thing - thanks to it, these professors can publish materials explaining just how bad this law is, and campaign for getting it repealed. Whereas in China, no matter what goes wrong, you can't really complain.

      This isn't to say that "PROTECT IP" act is not bad - it is - but limitations on political speech are infinitely worse in comparison.

    2. Re:LOL! American Freedom! by zblack_eagle · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I think the "Freedom of Speech" became freedom to make noise some time ago. There's a lot more noise going on than speech these days, or at least that's what gets the attention of people. Bread and Circuses and Two Minutes' Hate for everybody!

  2. I'm no longer conerced about it by countertrolling · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The law will provide great incentive to develop new technologies to work around it.

    --
    For justice, we must go to Don Corleone
  3. Copyright is Socialism... by paulsnx2 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The PROTECT IP act is a freebie given to Big Content because it is too expensive for them to police the use of their own content. Regardless of what anyone thinks about Copyright, this is a clear example of leveraging government to enforce artificial restrictions on the use of content in favor of the companies that seek to monetize said content.

    We have laws already in place for companies to lodge complaints with websites when their content is being used without license. But the content companies complain that it is too hard for them to find unlicensed use of their content. The solution via this act is to take down content on **possible** unlicensed use by the government and by other companies on a simple complaint.

    IF the PROTECT IP provided heavy penalties for false or inflated complaints, then okay. But it doesn't.

    IF the PROTECT IP provided for possible criminal charges should it be used to violate free speech as opposed to taking down infringing content, then okay. But it doesn't.

    IF the PROTECT IP provided fees and taxes on Big Content to cover the public expense of implementing the act, then okay. But it doesn't.

    ANY Government granted system of monopolies granted out to privileged parties, where such monopolies do not and in fact cannot exist without Government intervention, this is socialism. It is bad enough that we have copyrights that last over a hundred years, and that we cannot upload birthday videos because a song written in the 1800's is (most would say falsely) under copyright. That we have extend copyright terms without compensation to the public.

    But why should the public pick up the bill to enforce copyright?

    Make Big Content to pay for it, and make Big Content liable for misuse of it, and throw anyone in jail if they use it to inhibit free speech, then okay.

    But that won't fly. Because this is about making money, and Big Content can't make money if they are at risk, or have to pay for the enforcement of their own (supposed) rights.

  4. Re:"Internet death penalty" by Fjandr · · Score: 5, Informative

    Refusing to route traffic to a site is a death-knell to it no matter how you slice it. The term "death" has many different and perfectly reasonable contexts. Only one of those is biological death.

  5. Who likes/dislikes the PROTECT IP act? by paulsnx2 · · Score: 5, Informative

    ORGS ENDORSING
    Graphic Artists Guild
    Independent Film & Television Alliance
    Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA)

    ORGS OPPOSING
    American Association of Law Libraries
    American Library Association
    Association of Research Libraries
    Center for Democracy and Technology
    Demand Progress
    Don't Censor the Net!
    Fractured Atlas
    Public Knowledge
    Reporters Without Borders

    https://www.popvox.com/bills/us/112/s968/report#nation

  6. Re:anyone really surpriced? by superwiz · · Score: 5, Insightful

    No, not really. Their contributions to Democrats dwarf their contributions to Republicans. When was the last time LA traffic was stopped because GW Bush went to Hollywood for a fundraiser? Never. It already happened twice in the 2.5 years of Obama's administration.

    --
    Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.