Ask Slashdot: How To Inform a Non-Techie About Proposed Copyright Laws

Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by eldavojohn · 2012-01-31 02:34 · Score: 2, Insightful

... SOPA/PIPA to protect the movie/music industries from offshore (non-US) piracy.

SOPA/PIPA were US legislation and would have had only been able to be used to prosecute inside the United States. I think what you and your friend are looking to debate in that respect is ACTA and even that's looking limited.

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My work here is dung.

Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by DragonWriter · 2012-01-31 02:46 · Score: 5, Informative

SOPA/PIPA were US legislation and would have had only been able to be used to prosecute inside the United States.
SOPA/PIPA were US legislation that were sold largely on their utility in fighting foreign-origin piracy by (among other things) requiring ISPs in the US to block access to foreign sites that were (accused of) providing pirated materials.
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by YrWrstNtmr · 2012-01-31 02:51 · Score: 5, Informative

SOPA/PIPA were US legislation and would have had only been able to be used to prosecute inside the United States.

Absolutely backwards.
SOPA, specifically -
" Rep. Goodlatte, "Intellectual property is one of America's chief job creators and competitive advantages in the global marketplace, yet American inventors, authors, and entrepreneurs have been forced to stand by and watch as their works are stolen by foreign infringers beyond the reach of current U.S. laws."
"They say it protects the intellectual-property market and corresponding industry, jobs and revenue, and is necessary to bolster enforcement of copyright laws, especially against foreign websites"
Claiming flaws in present laws that do not cover foreign owned and operated sites, and citing examples of "active promotion of rogue websites" by U.S. search engines, proponents say stronger enforcement tools are needed.

SOPA is designed to American citizens from accessing foreign sites that are deemed (implied) to be infringing.
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by Pieroxy · 2012-01-31 03:10 · Score: 5, Insightful

No need to get into that. Tell him/her that:
Facts:
1. Information flows freely between people. There is no way around that. It's been like that since humans were first able to communicate.
2. This didn't mean much back in the days since information was tied to physical media (books, tapes...), so it was essentially not free except what you could say/listen to, which was naturally limited by our brains.
3. Information is now infinite and fast and without borders (for all intents and purposes pertaining to copyrights)
4. You can encrypt and obfuscate communications with the help of computers, beyond the reach of anyone, including the law enforcement. Hence, with little overhead, nobody can tell what you transmit over the internet, except the guy at the other end with the key/password.
Conclusion:
0. Anyone can communicate freely with everyone else, MEANS:
1. Copyrights of information transferable by the internet are not enforceable anymore. Period. Unless you disconnect everyone from the internet.
2. Any law trying to prevent this will just harm lawful activities on the web by making it more and more cumbersome and risky to operate a legitimate website.
3. Piracy will not be reduced or stopped by anything else that global extinction of the internet. It is detectable for some part right now because people don't bother hiding themselves. This will change quickly and without pain from the pirates.
Ah... One last thing: It doesn't mean the end of music/films/books artists, but it surely means the end of movie/films/books distributors.

--
Write boring code, not shiny code!
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by PerfectionLost · 2012-01-31 03:39 · Score: 1

Copyrights of information transferable by the internet are not enforceable anymore. Period. Unless you disconnect everyone from the internet.
Interestingly enough, this is what SOPA/PIPA was trying to do by shutting down DNS.
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by alexhs · 2012-01-31 04:01 · Score: 0

4. You can encrypt and obfuscate communications with the help of computers, beyond the reach of anyone, including the law enforcement. Hence, with little overhead, nobody can tell what you transmit over the internet, except the guy at the other end with the key/password.
5. Encrypted content can be identified as such.
Conclusion:
1. As a prerequisite, control usage of encryption. Make it illegal without government authorization. You can get clearance if you can provide private keys, use weak keys that law enforcement can bruteforce, and/or keep a transcript of the deciphered stream for two years, to be handed to government officials on demand.
2. xkcd/538. I'm sure that you can guess which one it is.
3. Yes, there is steganography. This is probably not practical (if you send many times the same "visible" content, it will quickly become obvious that you're hiding something).

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Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 04:08 · Score: 3, Insightful

It's a good rule of thumb that any that uses the words 'job creators' is full of shit. That's enough reason for me to be against SOPA.
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by The+End+Of+Days · 2012-01-31 04:16 · Score: 1

Exactly. We all know jobs are made by the government using a confiscatory tax policy to drive the economy in the way they see fit. All hail the overlords.
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by mSparks43 · 2012-01-31 04:26 · Score: 1

I think SOPA/PIPA would be great.
All they would do is create a new, better "internet" that routes around them with even less central dependency.
We don't even need new hardware, just a willingness of users to embrace tech like freenet or i2p.
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by pixelpusher220 · 2012-01-31 04:34 · Score: 1

1. Copyrights of information transferable by the internet are not enforceable anymore. Period. Unless you disconnect everyone from the internet.
I would tend to disagree. Commercial use is always going to be enforceable since there's money being moved around.

Personal use is now not enforceable...or at least at a scale that makes it uneconomical to enforce. A million websites created on a million different servers...in under a day. You simply can't kill that type of scale with laws.

But a commercial entity using a copyrighted work won't have that type of scale, they are able to be targeted fairly easily.

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Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by w.hamra1987 · 2012-01-31 05:34 · Score: 0

1. Copyrights of information transferable by the internet are not enforceable anymore. Period. Unless you disconnect everyone from the internet. 2. Any law trying to prevent this will just harm lawful activities on the web by making it more and more cumbersome and risky to operate a legitimate website. 3. Piracy will not be reduced or stopped by anything else that global extinction of the internet. It is detectable for some part right now because people don't bother hiding themselves. This will change quickly and without pain from the pirates.
hear hear! you sir, are a true inspiration

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Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by Anthony+Mouse · 2012-01-31 05:50 · Score: 2

5. Encrypted content can be identified as such.
Really? And how is that, exactly? Please structure your reply as code that will take a bitstream as input and return a boolean value as to whether it is encrypted or not.

As a prerequisite, control usage of encryption. Make it illegal without government authorization.
Yes, sending all passwords to all websites in the clear is obviously on the Good Ideas list.
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by semi-extrinsic · 2012-01-31 07:00 · Score: 1

5. Encrypted content can be identified as such.
Researchers beg to differ on this point.
(To be fair, they don't go as far as saying "it is impossible to detect this communication", just that "without spending the equivalent of the entire annual US Defense budget it is impossible to detect this communication". But still.)

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Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by hairyfeet · 2012-01-31 07:20 · Score: 2

Actually jobs are made by competition, NOT buying your own laws. Funny how many have forgotten that, but businesses rise and fall constantly, somebody comes up with a better widget, hell somebody screw the competition by beating them to market or undercutting them, that's the way the game is played. SOPA/PIPA is the bribing of congress to try to turn the clock back to 1979, but you can't erase technology anymore than those buggy whip OEMs could erase the car. If this crap passes, which i have no doubt it'll be rammed through eventually, the darknet will simply replace the regular net and the MAFIAA can simply fucking die, simply because they didn't keep up with technology. Look at companies like Valve, they realized constantly fucking their customers trying to kill piracy was stupid so they offer a better product with autoupdates and matchmaking and chat and are rolling in pools of money.
Just because you made money in the past doesn't give you an eternal right to make money, you keep up or fucking die, welcome to the market.

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ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by Pieroxy · 2012-01-31 07:38 · Score: 1

Banning encryption is :
A) Useless because of steganography and other mechanisms encrypted content can be hidden,
B) Even if it could be done, it would kill the internet as surely as if you pulled the plug.

--
Write boring code, not shiny code!
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by spidercoz · 2012-01-31 07:39 · Score: 1

Nice logic, dipshit. Absurd proposition is false so its equally absurd opposite MUST be true.
Here's a bit of free advice: try actually THINKING about the shit you think.

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"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - Evelyn Beatrice Hall, re Voltaire
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by Pieroxy · 2012-01-31 07:41 · Score: 1

Exactly my point: Enforcing those copyright are going to hurt legal activities over the internet while the information flows freely underground.
That said, you make a point: You can still make money from "information" by selling it to public facing websites, that have to abide by the law. I mean, it's not like they can hide themselves, it would defy the point.

--
Write boring code, not shiny code!
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by spidercoz · 2012-01-31 07:49 · Score: 3, Funny

Yep. Goes beyond merely throwing the baby out with the bathwater; they want to set fire to the bathroom.

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"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - Evelyn Beatrice Hall, re Voltaire
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by alexhs · 2012-01-31 08:21 · Score: 1

As a prerequisite, control usage of encryption. Make it illegal without government authorization. You can get clearance if you can provide private keys, use weak keys that law enforcement can bruteforce, and/or keep a transcript of the deciphered stream for two years, to be handed to government officials on demand.
Yes, sending all passwords to all websites in the clear is obviously on the Good Ideas list.
This just in.
About your other "point", I will try to answer to the other guy that had the decency to contribute instead of flaming.

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I have discovered a truly marvelous proof of killer sig, which this margin is too narrow to contain.
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by pixelpusher220 · 2012-01-31 08:28 · Score: 1

The only grey area that comes into play is things like Facebook. It's a commercial site but the content placed on it is mostly user generated. So Facebook profits from people using it for both legal and illegal purposes.

Laws need to catch up with things like this..and the DMCA is a flawed but reasonable attempt at this. Safe Harbors provided you follow procedures when a copyright owner asks for take down. Could be done better but it's at least in the neighborhood of the direction we need to go.

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People in cars cause accidents....accidents in cars cause people :-D
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by Anthony+Mouse · 2012-01-31 08:52 · Score: 1

Key disclosure laws are pretty meaningless when the user doesn't have a key to disclose. SSL (among other things) uses session keys that change every few minutes. Once the session is over, the key no longer exists. You can't be forced to disclose it if it doesn't exist.

About your other "point", I will try to answer to the other guy that had the decency to contribute instead of flaming.
If you don't want an indignant response, don't suggest an inflammatory course of action. You have to consider the damage that would occur if someone who didn't know any better actually took you seriously and tried to impose what you're suggesting.
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by alexhs · 2012-01-31 09:18 · Score: 2

I don't see in which way they beg to differ. At a glance, I would call that out-of-band steganography. (I think that that paper was featured on Slashdot a few years ago ? Anyway, thanks for the link.)
Now, I agree that encrypted content can be undistinguishable from random noise. Usually there's an unencrypted hand-shake (allowing Wireshark to find SSL sessions for example), but Alice and Bob can do without if they shared their keys by another mean.
But there is no point in sending random noise, so detecting random noise implies encryption (from a law enforcement point of view).
Here is how I would conceptually differentiate unencrypted and encrypted data streams :
Basically, unencrypted means that the stream contains all of the bits necessary to reconstruct some data through some string of filters (like an AVI container filter, then an H264 codec and an AAC codec). Encrypted means that you don't have all the bits necessary (keys are missing) so you won't be able to reconstruct data through your filters. Although in theory anything can qualify as a filter, in practice, there is a finite number of filters that you can run in parallel. That's how forensics tools work. If something doesn't match any filter, it's most probably encrypted.
As of my point about steganography (and I forgot to mention deniable encryption), the weakness resides in the fact that you have to provide the "alternate" data stream: You need at least as much innocuous content as covert content. Now, thinking more about it, I found a way to get seemingly legitimate traffic (thus invalidating my previous 3rd point) : while the video of your last vacation wouldn't fit (finite length) simply a web-cam or a microphone would work. Want to send a movie to someone ? Just have a chat with the guy while the file is sent !

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I have discovered a truly marvelous proof of killer sig, which this margin is too narrow to contain.
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by wwphx · 2012-01-31 09:19 · Score: 3, Informative

I find this whole SOPA/PIPA/ACTA thing amusing in that the United States were major copyright violators in the 18th and 19th centuries, rampantly stealing European copyrighted works. Gilbert & Sullivan premiered Pirates of Penzance in New York City largely to establish American copyright to prevent piracy and were only partially successful. I believe Charles Dickens also had major issues with not getting royalties from American publishers, and in the 20th century French filmmaker Georges Mileas also had problems with American piracy.

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When you sympathize with stupidity, you start thinking like an idiot.
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by peragrin · 2012-01-31 09:30 · Score: 3, Insightful

It is simple really.
When your country is growing copyright, patents, etc are often ignored by governement because there is always new ideas.
However once you start going down you keep extending and expanding your "Intellectual property" rights because you don't want people to do you want you do to others.
Therefore if you want to grow you need to cut copyright and patents back to short terms. I suggest the life of the author for copyright, and 10 years for patents without products and 15 years for patents with shipping products.

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i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by alexhs · 2012-01-31 09:41 · Score: 1

SSL (among other things) uses session keys that change every few minutes. Once the session is over, the key no longer exists. You can't be forced to disclose it if it doesn't exist.
Unless I'm mistaken, session keys are symmetric keys sent from client to the server. If the government has the private key of the server and all of the session data, they can decrypt the session key when it is sent.

If you don't want an indignant response, don't suggest an inflammatory course of action.
I didn't felt that it was an inflammatory course of action as this is how laws are routinely written (sadly). Issues with liquid explosives ? Forbid all liquids on board ! That was kind of the point mentioning XKCD : government usually doesn't care to play by your rules.

You have to consider the damage that would occur if someone who didn't know any better actually took you seriously and tried to impose what you're suggesting.
As in "don't give them ideas" ? They're "smart" enough to figure that by themselves, as shown by the previous example.
Still, I supposed that I answered too fast, as I invalidated my third point by myself in my other response.

--
I have discovered a truly marvelous proof of killer sig, which this margin is too narrow to contain.
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by Szechuan+Vanilla · 2012-01-31 09:56 · Score: 1

> You can't be forced to disclose it if it doesn't exist.
I hope you like languishing in jail for as long as the judge holds you in contempt of court...which as long as the judge wants it to be until you comply with the court order.

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This space intentionally left blank.
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by Anthony+Mouse · 2012-01-31 10:09 · Score: 1

Unless I'm mistaken, session keys are symmetric keys sent from client to the server. If the government has the private key of the server and all of the session data, they can decrypt the session key when it is sent.
Nope.
All the private key does is authentication. You can conduct a man in the middle attack if you have the private key, but that is too computationally expensive to feasibly do it on every connection. On top of that, to do the man in the middle attack for everyone, the intermediary device would have to have every private key for everyone, and would thereby have access to the plaintext of all encrypted internet communications by everyone. The amount of espionage that could be conducted by hacking into that piece of equipment is totally unfathomable -- and you would need to have one at every NOC in the world.
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by Anthony+Mouse · 2012-01-31 10:27 · Score: 1

But there is no point in sending random noise, so detecting random noise implies encryption (from a law enforcement point of view).
How do you propose to distinguish "random noise" from "I have never seen one of these before"?
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by Anthony+Mouse · 2012-01-31 10:33 · Score: 1

Do you really think that you can legitimately be held in contempt for failing to do something that it is physically and mathematically impossible for you do to?
Obviously if the judge is willing to break the law then he can do that, but if he wants to break the law then he can do the same thing because he doesn't like your face, or because you're taller than he is and he's jealous. Encryption keys have nothing to do with it.
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 13:54 · Score: 0

Charge him with copyright infringement and 15 years imprisonment
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 15:39 · Score: 0

'Job creators' is a term intentionally used for propaganda. See Frank Luntz.
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by chrismcb · 2012-01-31 15:53 · Score: 1

No need to get into that. Tell him/her that:
Facts: 1. Information flows freely between people. There is no way around that. It's been like that since humans were first able to communicate.
I think you need to back up your "fact" I think it has been proven that information does not flow freely between people.
The rest of your arguments don't really tell the lay person what SOPA/PIPA was. And copyright is still enforceable. It is just harder to enforce.
Just because you don't want to pay for your music and your movies, doesn't mean they should be free.
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by T+Murphy · 2012-01-31 17:13 · Score: 1

(Bear with me)
Facts:
1. People have a tendency to kill other people.
2. This wasn't as much of an issue back when we had crude weapons.
3. Weapons today make it trivial to kill people.
4. You can easily kill people remotely, making the murderer hard to notice by anyone.

Conclusion:
1. Anyone can freely kill anyone else.
2. Laws against murder are not enforceable anymore.

The average person is against murder, so the painting the above (extreme) picture to them will bring them to the conlcusion "That's why we need (have) strong laws!". If your average person supports copyright in the belief that it protects our economy, your explanation of how the internet breaks copyright will bring them to the conclusion "That's why we need strong laws".

Avoiding the debate over the pros and cons of copyright, the question is to explain SOPA, ACTA in terms that would get the typical person on your side. Apparently your solution is to open a whole new can of worms discussing the effects of encryption/obfuscation and the very fun idea of laws being freely broken with no way to stop it. Yeah, you're going to scare the average person and make them convinced that whatever it is you want, it is scary and their senator better stop you from having it. As someone hoping to see ACTA and its ilk die a fiery death, I ask you never talk about them to any non-techie.

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Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by Pieroxy · 2012-01-31 18:31 · Score: 1

You are just a moron. I pay for my music and my movies. What the fuck led you to believe the opposite?
As far as facts are concerned, I think we're in the case of you needing to find a counter argument. Or let's put is another way:
FACT:
1. Anyone can tell anything to his/her neighbor provided the neighbor is willing to listen. It can be anything: The latest news (which is copyrighted by Reuters BTW), the name of my newborn, the weather (copyrighted by many people btw), etc.
There. Does that make it more clear? And during my weather description, I could obfuscate a hidden message trivially. That's for encryption.
Now, public speech is not a right everywhere. That's one-to-many communication. I was talking peer to peer. Apologies about the confusion.

--
Write boring code, not shiny code!
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by Pieroxy · 2012-01-31 18:49 · Score: 1

You need to check up your facts.

People have a tendency to kill other people.
Wrong. Whereas people talk to each other every day of every year since the invention of talk.

This wasn't as much of an issue back when we had crude weapons
It wasn't an issue because it is not true.

Weapons today make it trivial to kill people.
That one is not true either. Modern weapons make it easier, but certainly not trivial.

You can easily kill people remotely, making the murderer hard to notice by anyone.
But the murder is easy to notice. In copyright infringement, the "crime" is not even known by the offended party.
I guess there's no nee to explain why your conclusion is flawed since it is based on 4 facts that are wrong.
The point is that ACTA, SOPA, PIPA, are pointless. They can only harm people that do not engage on infringement and they'll do nothing against piracy. So really, there is no point.

--
Write boring code, not shiny code!
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 22:57 · Score: 0

I prefer thinking about what I think I'm thinking, I think.
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by nhat11 · 2012-02-01 05:16 · Score: 1

If EU wants to do something about it, they are free to do that too.
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by T+Murphy · 2012-02-01 11:03 · Score: 1

*whoosh*

I'll say it again: the original question was how to get the average person to side with you. My whole point is that you are relying on details and a good understanding of related topics in order for people to follow your argument. The idea with the over-the-top murder analogy is to picture making that argument to the average person, and picture their response.

I have no idea what you thought my post was about. At no point did I disagree with your argument.

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My webcomic
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by Pieroxy · 2012-02-01 11:40 · Score: 1

No, the original question was: How To Inform a Non-Techie About Proposed Copyright Laws
For me the only way to make your point of view understood is to explain it. This is my point of view, and I've already converted quite a few hard core pro-copyrights enforcement people with this.
The point is not to show and describe the devious side effects, because you then have to weight the side effects vs the "bonus by reducing piracy". Which is moot.
The point is to show that the goals of the laws will not be reached by the law. Therefore, the law if irrelevant because at best, it will do nothing.
And sorry about the confusion.

--
Write boring code, not shiny code!
Re:Wrong Legislation, You Want ACTA by Anonymous Coward · 2012-02-02 06:28 · Score: 0

I suggest the life of the author for copyright
This would be problematic in that it might create an incentive for someone to shorten the duration of the copyright by shortening the life of the author...

Find a Good Car Analogy by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 02:36 · Score: 4, Insightful

Find a Good Car Analogy

Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 02:44 · Score: 2, Informative

I find the basic concept of DNS pretty easy to explain using a phonebook analogy. You know a name and you need a number.
Although with all this fancy cell phone shit, that may be an out of date concept as well.
Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by jimbolauski · 2012-01-31 02:48 · Score: 5, Informative

Your car is a TCP packets, the DNS is your gps, when one person in the town breaks a law the whole town is removed from the gps. Now anyone driving buy looking for a gas/hotel/restaurants will not find one in that town, even though the owners did not break the law their business are hurt, all because one person broke the law in the town.

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Knowledge = Power
P= W/t
t=Money
Money = Work/Knowledge so the less you know the more you make
Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by masternerdguy · 2012-01-31 02:53 · Score: 2

A better analogy would be giving everyone in town a reprimand for one person breaking the law.

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Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 02:54 · Score: 0

And as it is much more likely to be used, everyone in that town will be hurt because one person in that town attempted to compete with one of the *AA groups by releasing their own music/movie without going through one of the *AA publication/taxation channels, or because one person in that town dared to criticize the product of one of the *AA groups, and is being silenced through further abuse of even more draconian laws than the ones they're already abusing to silence critics.
Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by jimbolauski · 2012-01-31 02:56 · Score: 2

Except outsiders would still be able to find the town, and with DNS removal only people that know the actual location (IP address) would be able to find it.

--
Knowledge = Power
P= W/t
t=Money
Money = Work/Knowledge so the less you know the more you make
Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 03:08 · Score: 1

take the analogy a little bit further. Let's assume the town is a US town or at least has some stores from US and foreign companies. One of the foreign company stores breaks the law by illegally selling US products. The store is not punished for this but rather all US citizens are now blocked from going into that town again to buy anything, even from the innocent US stores.
Foreigners on the other hand can still freely enter the town and do business with whomever they want, even with the foreign store illegally selling US products.
Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by AngryDeuce · 2012-01-31 03:12 · Score: 5, Informative

I read a good analogy on another thread concerning megaupload...
Imagine you own a storage unit in a large complex. Now, a few other people are storing illegal contraband in their storage unit, but that's just a few out of hundreds, and most people are perfectly law-abiding. The police get wind that there's contraband in one of the units. They react by putting police tape up across the front of the entire storage unit complex, confiscate everything, legal and illegal alike, and torch it all...just to be sure they got all the contraband.
Another good one I heard: Imagine a full parking garage. One of the cars in the parking garage was used in the commission of a bank robbery. The cops don't want to be bothered trying to figure out which car it was specifically, so instead they impound the entire garage full of cars permanently and tell all the owners they have no recourse. They get the car they were after, but in the process infringe upon the rights of everyone else.
Both of those do a good job of explaining how law abiding citizens will be totally screwed by shit like SOPA/PIPA. At Megaupload, there were millions of legitimate users doing nothing wrong, but all their shit is taken, too, no trial, no recourse, no chance to ever get their totally legal content back, just because other people broke the law. If it were a physical structure, like the storage unit or garage in the above analogies, nobody would argue that the public would go apeshit, but because it's a web site and a bunch of 1's and 0's people don't conceptualize it like that, but that's what it is.
Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by Ucklak · 2012-01-31 03:35 · Score: 2

If one person speeds on your street, they take the street away.

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if you steal from one source, that is plagiarism, if you steal from many, well, that's just research.
Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by next_ghost · 2012-01-31 03:35 · Score: 4, Interesting

Better yet - ACTA, SOPA and PIPA are the digital equivalent of trying to legislate water to flow uphill. You can try as hard as you want but it just won't happen.
Those laws will have no effect whatsoever on the actual copyright monopoly infringements. Pirates will simply abandon sharing technologies vulnerable to enforcement and take better care of covering their tracks. Technology and will of individuals to break stupid laws always beat the law. Communists in Central and Eastern Europe tried to crush rock music by force in 1960s and 1970 and they failed miserably despite much harsher penalties for live performance and distribution of records. They failed miserably.
What makes you think that the almighty US of A can win the very same war on culture? Because that's what it is. Sharing is what creates culture out of individual works of art.
Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by gnapster · 2012-01-31 03:55 · Score: 4, Insightful

SOPA would let the DHS remove entries from your phone's address book. Does that fix it?
Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 03:58 · Score: 0

Your car is a TCP packets, the DNS is your gps, when one person in the town breaks a law the whole town is removed from the gps. Now anyone driving buy looking for a gas/hotel/restaurants will not find one in that town, even though the owners did not break the law their business are hurt, all because one person broke the law in the town.
And any town who publishes maps with that town on it, can also be taken out of the GPS system.
Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 04:02 · Score: 0

I simply agree that copyright, in order to make sure artists are paid, seems like a good idea, but the various bills, as they are proposed, all seem to turn into surveillance bills. I point out that it's not the ability to ensure patronage that I dislike, but rather the method in which it would have to be enforced. If these bills had been introduced, and the wording had said "Industry will listen to & record every phone call you make, and open every piece of mail that comes or goes" then people would freak. But, somehow, internet/digital communications are being pitched as a different kind of communication, not "real", so somehow that's OK?
Generally, I finish up by asking them if, once they are no longer producing art/copyright material, and are mere consumers of art, would they still want the kind of electronic oversight that is being proposed? I usually find I just get a head shake and some muttering along the lines of "...well something has to be done...", I'd say people, who think that they may some day have that next great copyrightable idea, are willing to allow that kind of surveillance, so long as it keeps their dream alive.
Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by azalin · 2012-01-31 04:24 · Score: 3, Informative

when one person in the town breaks a law the whole town is removed from the gps.

Actually someone saying there is a guy breaking the law in this city can be enough for the whole town to be removed. The town will have to prove there is no illegal activity going on inside it's borders and making false claims would not be illegal or punishable.
Small towns would disappear first from the gps/maps then completely because no one could do business there anymore. Bigger towns would have to closely monitor their citizens seriously limit what people there could do. Otherwise they would risked being cleared from the map.
Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by azalin · 2012-01-31 04:28 · Score: 1

As for the effect on illegal activities, everyone knows where to turn from the interstate to the unnamed 10 lanes highway that leads to Anything-Goes-Town.
Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 04:37 · Score: 0

Yeah, so much for that whole "innocent until proven guilty" thing, they should have known better than to store legitimate files on a website that others were using for piracy, whether they knew or not!
How the fuck are they going to get their "white powders back" in this case when the servers are shut down and the data wiped? How are they going to get damages for a monetary loss when their is no evidence of the data existing in the first place?
No, they'll just get fucked in the ass, courtesy of your friendly neighborhood police force. Collateral damage in the retarded War on Piracy, this decade's War on Drugs. Who cares about them?
Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by sunderland56 · 2012-01-31 04:41 · Score: 1

Let's say you own a car dealership. You sell new and used cars, do service, and sell accessories. In the accessory department, some employee mistakenly purchases and stocks some knock-off Pioneer stereos. It is a very minor part of your business, and you actually never sold any.

The federal government can now come in, shut down your business, seize all of your stock, and seize your building.
Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 04:46 · Score: 0

How is innocent until proven guilty relevant? The government isn't destroying your data. The hosting company is destroying it.
The point is, if you had data on Megaupload, you have a remedy now: you can go to the hosting company and get them to give you your data back. Just like you would have to go to the strip mall owner to get your property back before they dispose of it.
Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by jpc1957 · 2012-01-31 05:34 · Score: 1

The analogies are ok, although just as plausible is the storage complex has only a few law-abiding units, and the large majority are illegal or maybe dangerous. Should action be taken, or laws revised? Not saying which case megaupload was more similar to, but it's useful to think through both extreme cases of the analogy.
Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by jimbolauski · 2012-01-31 06:05 · Score: 1

The problem with the laws is that they are vague when defining "a website dedicated to copyright infringement", an actual percentage of copyright material known to the owner vs legitimate material stored needs to be defined any site that has 90% infringing material would be reasonable to remove but where is the threshold. And what is to stop the threshold from being lowered in a rider attached to the kicking puppies is bad act.

--
Knowledge = Power
P= W/t
t=Money
Money = Work/Knowledge so the less you know the more you make
Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by Tokolosh · 2012-01-31 06:10 · Score: 1

If one person speeds on your street, they put up fuckin' speed bumps everywhere.

--
Prove anything by multiplying Huge Number times Tiny Number
Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by tsalaroth · 2012-01-31 07:12 · Score: 1

The federal government can now come in, shut down your business, seize all of your stock, and seize your building.
I think you mean, the federal government can now shut down your business, as well as all of your suppliers, because one of them must have supplied the knock-off parts.
Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 10:19 · Score: 0

This reminds me gun control laws
Re:Find a Good Car Analogy by Coren22 · 2012-02-01 07:47 · Score: 1

It would make 411.com(US DNS) not have the entry anymore, but you could still go to another site that may be able to bypass the block(foreign DNS), and you could have it hard coded on your phone's address book still(hosts).

--
APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?

Politician? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 02:36 · Score: 1

This person wouldn't happen to be a politician would they?

Re:Politician? by ciderbrew · 2012-01-31 02:44 · Score: 2

A judge.
Re:Politician? by CokoBWare · 2012-01-31 03:42 · Score: 2

oh god...
Re:Politician? by aztracker1 · 2012-01-31 04:48 · Score: 1

So, if someone is accused of speeding in a courthouse parking lot (not convicted, only accused), the correct reaction is to remove the courthouse from all U.S. maps?

--
Michael J. Ryan - tracker1.info
Re:Politician? by aztracker1 · 2012-01-31 04:51 · Score: 1

Oh yeah.. and the Phone Company ordered to remove said courthouse from their telephone directories, and 411 services.

--
Michael J. Ryan - tracker1.info
Re:Politician? by jellomizer · 2012-01-31 05:07 · Score: 1

Often when there is a disagreement, it isn't that the other side doesn't get the facts involved, but more to the point they just disagree with your conclusion.

I don't agree with SOPA myself and I see it as a bad idea... However I can see why people may disagree with my Point of view. So I am going to play Devils Advocate....

Digital Media Piracy is a big problem, why unlike other forms of media it can be copied over and over without quality loss and with inexpensive consumer level equipment. For the most part companies are taking a lax view of software piracy. Having a switch to turn off the offending site is a way to make sure companies keep a keen eye on piracy.

I don't really follow that logic, however if the person thinks piracy is a bigger problem then a chilling effect on some internet companies, then it may be good trade off.

But just because someone disagrees with you it doesn't mean they are wrong or ignorant to the facts.

--
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Re:Politician? by ciderbrew · 2012-01-31 06:04 · Score: 1

Digital Media Piracy is a big problem as it's being used as a political tool to make laws that fuck people over the world over.
Companies that make games really fucked their generation over. Blizzard you are the Skynet for freedom.
I give up copyright content - take it and fuckoff... stuff like that...

Give up by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 02:37 · Score: 4, Funny

"He has no grasp on how DNS works, much less the internet in general. What can I do to show him how destructive these bills actually are..."

Sounds like he's beyond hope, but probably has a bright future in politics.

Re:Give up by next_ghost · 2012-01-31 04:02 · Score: 4, Informative

Not really, Cory Doctorow had a brilliant talk on the subject recently. Even a non-techie should be able to understand the most important points.

Setup your own DNS server and point his PC at it.. by ikedasquid · 2012-01-31 02:39 · Score: 5, Interesting

..and randomly "blacklist" Google, FB, Yahoo, YouTube, etc. on it with some notice of copyright infringement.

A little unclear on the concept... by Dog-Cow · 2012-01-31 02:40 · Score: 5, Insightful

You don't need to explain copyright. You just need to use logic.

If existing laws are inadequate, the FBI would not have been able to take down MegaUpload. MegaUpload has been taken down, thus existing laws must be adequate. QED.

Re:A little unclear on the concept... by Xacid · 2012-01-31 02:51 · Score: 1

I was actually writing the same exact thing until I caught your post. I'm pretty sure if the OP's friend doesn't understand this logic then they might as well leave him glued to the tv on fox and go about their life elsewhere.
Re:A little unclear on the concept... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 02:57 · Score: 0

Yes, you need to explain copyright. Facts can make a person even more resolved to believe what they already believe. Especially when they contradict what they think is reality. Very few people can be swayed by logic, I would thing a nerd community would be one of those that thinks logically, and can't understand why someone else can't think logically.
http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2010/07/11/how_facts_backfire/
Re:A little unclear on the concept... by dkleinsc · 2012-01-31 03:16 · Score: 1

If existing laws are inadequate, the FBI would not have been able to take down MegaUpload.
You are making the unwarranted assumption that the FBI acts legally, when there is evidence that in many cases they do not. For instance, they bugged Martin Luther King's hotel room, and then tried to blackmail him with the sounds of him getting it on.

--
I am officially gone from /. Long live http://www.soylentnews.com/
Re:A little unclear on the concept... by Kjella · 2012-01-31 03:28 · Score: 1

That would imply that MegaUpload was the whole problem, and the problem was now resolved. Yes, they were able to take down MegaUpload using paragraphs designed for the Mafia and things like that (RICO) but that is usually just the tip of the iceberg. If you're talking to a person that argues that piracy must be stomped out, then I'm not going to argue that the existing laws still stop piracy because they won't. Neither would SOPA/PIPA/ACTA and all the king's horses and all the king's men, but it would put every site that allows user uploaded content at risk.
Only big corporations with lots of lawyers like Google will afford to operate a photo/music/video/file sharing site because it can be used for infringing files and that will get you shut down. You don't even get your day in court, boom and your DNS is gone which practically means your site has been banned from the Internet. No rule of law, no due process, it's basically going back a thousand years to before the Magna Carta, but instead of the King you have Hollywood making decisions at a whim. And if he thinks it doesn't apply to him, tell him that yes it will.. because when he's going to share his family photos or home videos those services won't be there because they've been shut down.
Perhaps he does not even fundamentally doesn't understand what he's asking for. They want to shut down your phone carrier because they're not listening to your calls, that's the essence of it. They only want to provide a communication service, but you don't think that's enough. Criminals could use the phone! It's like demanding voice recognition and text analysis to find possible criminal phone calls and forward them to the police, and if they don't well with proof that crimes have been planned on the phone they will get shut down. That's the model they want for the Internet.

--
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Re:A little unclear on the concept... by skywiseguy · 2012-01-31 03:45 · Score: 1

except his position is that if the laws were adequate, a site like MegaUpload would not have been able to flourish as well as it did.
Re:A little unclear on the concept... by Dog-Cow · 2012-01-31 04:11 · Score: 1

That's a ridiculous proposition. Laws don't stop criminals. If they did, they wouldn't be criminals! MegaUpload flourished for as long as it did because it takes time to make a case. It is not moral to preemptively punish via laws like SOPA before harm has been proven in court.
Re:A little unclear on the concept... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 04:18 · Score: 0

Then it will be tested in court.

I like those Farmers Insurance commercials... by TWX · 2012-01-31 02:40 · Score: 4, Insightful

...for their analogies.

Take his hard disk drive full of his downloaded music, movies, porn, etc, and say, "This is all of the stuff provided through the Internet". Take a hammer, say, "This is the new laws that they're planning on passing". Then say, "This is the result of those new laws" and smash the hard disk drive to bits.

Granted, you'll lose a friend, but you might gain an ally...

--
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.

Re:I like those Farmers Insurance commercials... by larys · 2012-01-31 03:22 · Score: 1

The first thing my mind went to is this old commercial: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qyXFN4ocN_o Now take that hard drive analogy a step further and change that hammer into a frying pan... Then: This is your hard drive *holds up hard drive*...this is your hard drive on SOPA...*smash* ...this is what your wallet goes through *smash*...and your freedom for personal expression *smashes stereo*...your privacy and freedom from not being monitored *smashes windows*...your desire to surf the internet *smashes monitor*...and your ability to watch movies online rather than spending five hours cleaning your garage to find the dvd *smashes television*...any questions?

Easily done by msobkow · 2012-01-31 02:41 · Score: 5, Insightful

Easy.

Take their lunch.

Then steal their wallet.

And tell them it's because you THINK they pirated a movie or music CD and they "owe" you.

Smashing their laptop or other portable computing device is optional.

That's SOPA, ACTA, and a host of others in action: no due process.

--
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.

Re:Easily done by TheDarkMaster · 2012-01-31 02:47 · Score: 1

Good one

--
Religion: The greatest weapon of mass destruction of all time
Re:Easily done by ciderbrew · 2012-01-31 02:53 · Score: 1

+1mod of that's a good way of putting it.
This is the good side of it. Please go one step more.
If they don't like it. Tell them it for protection against terrorist or paedophiles. They must want protection against those.
If they have a relative outside the USA. Get cousin Julian extradited. He didn't break the law in his own land - It doesn't matter.
Re:Easily done by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 03:44 · Score: 0

If you use terror words like "pirated", the content mafia has already won. It's like saying "nigger" to a black person.
It's not only creating very nasty false connotations, but is also highly offensive.
Don't do it.
Re:Easily done by uigrad_2000 · 2012-01-31 03:45 · Score: 4, Interesting

If you are trying to convince a conservative that SOPA/PIPA is bad, it's very easy:
Explain to a conservative that SOPA == "Fairness Doctrine - part 2"
The Fairness Doctrine was an attempt to use the government to stop Rush Limbaugh's radio show. Like the show or not, it was too successful, and Congress felt like it was their duty to stop it. Because of 1st amendment, they couldn't just make the show illegal, so instead, they tried to give the FCC the ability to withdraw licenses from stations whose programming was too biased.
Now, the government sees the internet as another huge industry that cannot be controlled. The least-controlled part of the internet is forums (like Slashdot). People can, and do, say anything.
Once again, the first amendment gets in the way. But, Congress is creative. Is it possible for them to get the power to shutdown entire sites based only on the content posted to the site?
The answer is obvious ... copyrighted material. Find a site that you don't like, submit copyrighted material (as a plant), and then if they don't clean it up completely, have them shut down at the DNS level.
The only obstacles were technical (no current method to force DNS servers to drop records), and political (DMCA guarantees safe harbor privileges to ISPs and websites from the actions of users). SOPA/PIPA are designed to clear both obstacles.
~~~~~
Liberals are a little different.
Usually liberals respond well to stories of corporate greed. Explain to them that the MPAA and Disney are big business, and that they are the only ones pushing for this legislation. I'd like to see a liberal respond with the best methods of persuading other liberals.

--
Free unix account: freeshell.org
Re:Easily done by SuricouRaven · 2012-01-31 04:58 · Score: 1

Liberal responding, and... no, you got it about right. Exploit the anti-big-business angle, that should work. Make sure to include mention of the obscene wealth of the sponsor organisations, and how they continue to rake in money even with rampant piracy, so it is quite clear that the various major copyright holders would happily trample over the rights of all in order to earn a few more percent.
Re:Easily done by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 08:08 · Score: 0

Liberal response
It's the usual right wing conservative propoganda relying on the fear and ignorance of most right wing voters. They are trying to convice us they need to more power to stop the big evil terrorists. People who download a pop song or a sappy movie like Love Eat Puke.
They believe these things are more important than things like the sovereignty of a nation, or feeding the planet. As there are only so many stories out there and all of them had been told by the ancient greeks, it is quite hilarious that these people feel they have created something original.
Of course they had never read a book or seen another movie before they made their movie, and there is no way they could have been influenced by it if they did.
It's simple, most ARTISTS are resigned to the fact that they will not make money selling their art. Most of them make their money performing their art. Because of publishing houses like these who create nothing and stifle creativity.

Ask them WHY exactly we would need those by bickerdyke · 2012-01-31 02:41 · Score: 1

They've been perfectly able to take down Megaupload without SOPA/PIPA.

So how could a sane person logically argue we'd need them to bring down similar criminal sites. (Considering megaupload criminal for the sake of the argument only. Everything else: Innocent until proven guilty)

--
bickerdyke

Re:Ask them WHY exactly we would need those by OakDragon · 2012-01-31 03:03 · Score: 1

Also a good argument against 99% of new legislation.

--
Dark Reflection
Re:Ask them WHY exactly we would need those by SuricouRaven · 2012-01-31 03:07 · Score: 2

Taking down megaupload took a lot of work, international cooperation, the use of political capital and no doubt all sorts of slow playing of games. For what? Taking down a single site, when there are about twenty more still running. With SOPA/PIPA, copyright organisations could kill ten of them with a single letter - the only way to whack the moles quickly enough.
Re:Ask them WHY exactly we would need those by bickerdyke · 2012-01-31 03:43 · Score: 1

I doubt that US local laws can take down sites in other countries without the same

lot of work, international cooperation, the use of political capital and no doubt all sorts of slow playing of games

--
bickerdyke
Re:Ask them WHY exactly we would need those by MacGyver2210 · 2012-01-31 03:44 · Score: 1

Sorry, "We the police want to do less, if possible zero, actual work" is not an acceptable reason for passing national and international copyright legislation.

--
If the only way you can accept an assertion is by faith, then you are conceding that it can't be taken on its own merits
Re:Ask them WHY exactly we would need those by next_ghost · 2012-01-31 03:59 · Score: 1

With SOPA/PIPA, copyright organisations could kill ten of them with a single letter - the only way to whack the moles quickly enough.
Justice is not a game of Whac-A-Mole.
Re:Ask them WHY exactly we would need those by SuricouRaven · 2012-01-31 04:45 · Score: 1

Depends whose side you are on. There are plenty of situations where something is illegal yet still commonplace: Piracy, littering, the less-harmful narcotics. When you reach a point where something is illegal yet common, there really are only two options: Either give up enforcing the law, or get out the giant mallet and start whacking.
Re:Ask them WHY exactly we would need those by next_ghost · 2012-01-31 04:53 · Score: 1

My point is that option two won't work no matter how hard you keep whacking. When so many people break a law, the law cannot be just.
Re:Ask them WHY exactly we would need those by Coren22 · 2012-02-01 09:07 · Score: 1

Which also shows the problems with the existing legislation. How many videos have you seen on Youtube that infringe copyright in one way or another? But yet Youtube survives even though Megaupload didn't do anything different, except maybe ignore DCMA notices (which I believe I read somewhere they had and used a takedown procedure, but were smacked down anyways).
Here is a good example:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fmEFN0VxwVg&feature=fvsr
Copyrighted music, copyrighted game, no consent from all parties for recording. This is the stuff that these industries hate, but I would be willing to bet, that if the person who put that up fought the DCMA notice, they would win, on fair use grounds alone.

--
APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?

Re:Setup your own DNS server and point his PC at i by lexa1979 · 2012-01-31 02:42 · Score: 1

mod parent up :)

Wait a minute... by SJHillman · 2012-01-31 02:42 · Score: 3, Insightful

Wouldn't the takedown of MegaUpload show that existing laws are already adequate? After all, the site was taken down...

Re:Wait a minute... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 03:15 · Score: 0

Presumably the fact that the site was able to operate for so long without action being taken against it.
"Look, these pirates cost Real Americans $200 trillion and it took 2 years to build a case to take them down. If we had SOPA/PIPA/ACTA/The 'Puppies are great and I don't want children abused by paedophiles anti-piracy act of 2012' then we'd have been able to stop them straight away, thus preserving all those jobs that they stole from us"
Or thereabouts.

Preferably as unbiased as possible by LordCrank · 2012-01-31 02:42 · Score: 1

You ask for a source giving a specific viewpoint on SOPA/PIPA that is also as unbiased as possible?

What does being a non-techie have to do with this? by DragonWriter · 2012-01-31 02:42 · Score: 2

I know someone who continues to argue that the takedown of MegaUpload shows that the existing laws are not adequate and that we *need* SOPA/PIPA to protect the movie/music industries from offshore (non-US) piracy.

I don't think you need to appeal to any particular technical expertise to explain that the takedown of MegaUpload shows that existing laws are more than adequate, since MegaUpload was offshore (non-US) piracy and it was taken down under existing laws.

Simply tell them.... by 3seas · 2012-01-31 02:43 · Score: 2

They are gonna start putting to death any copyright violators. That the copyright industry doesn't need buyers, they can have it all for themselves.

Pointg is, when someone has made up their mind, right or wrong, telling them they are wrong will not work, So you have to use the same sort of irrational logic to get them to tell you that you are wrong... so that they will see for themselves their own errors.

Re:Simply tell them.... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 03:19 · Score: 1

in other words:
you can't reason someone out of what they weren't reasoned into ;)
Re:Simply tell them.... by Belial6 · 2012-01-31 05:22 · Score: 1

The sad thing is that while you use the death penalty as an example of a ridiculous outcome, the things that are happening NOW were considered ridiculous just a few years ago. If you tell people that they are going to put copyright violators to death, they will dismiss you for being ridiculous. If you tell them that their 5 year old daughter is a felon because of that Happy Birthday incident last week at Chuck E Cheese, they will also dismiss you as ridiculous.

"Unbiased as possible"? by sohmc · 2012-01-31 02:43 · Score: 1

If you are against PIPA/SOPA, then you are not unbiased. Do you mean as "truthfully as possible"?

Both side of this argument have used puffery to describe the law. But the clearest argument against it I've seen is the one that Wordpress linked to.

--
We don't live in Shouldland.

Re:"Unbiased as possible"? by Nemyst · 2012-01-31 03:07 · Score: 1

Obviously only the bad guys (ie those who disagree with me) are biased.

Wil Wheaton passed this on... by twitcher101 · 2012-01-31 02:46 · Score: 4, Informative

A good infographic that explains dollars and sense! http://matadornetwork.com/change/infographic-why-the-movie-industry-is-so-wrong-about-sopa/

--
Time is an illusion, lunchtime doubly so- Zaphod beeblebrox

Give up while you can by Prod_Deity · 2012-01-31 02:46 · Score: 3, Insightful

As in other articles, people have pointed out that the general public doesn't care.
I know I've done what I can to let people know about the issues, but they seem to just shrug it off like it is no big deal to them. Some people are too blind to see the tree they're driving into, until it's too late to swerve out of the way.

Re:Give up while you can by anyaristow · 2012-01-31 04:30 · Score: 1

As in other articles, people have pointed out that the general public doesn't care.
The general public doesn't feel the need to own all the movies and all the music. Most of them have modest collections. So, when you use something like megaupload as your end-of-civilization-of-the-week appeal, they just think you're a dork. And when you get indignant and condescending because they aren't agreeing with you, they think you're a dork and a jerk. And when so much of what comes out of your mouth is hyperbole they get desensitized to anything you say.
If you're going to explain something to someone who doesn't live in the internet, choose as your example something more important than megaupload to the lives of normal people. And pass the task to someone who can talk to normal people without being a dork.
Re:Give up while you can by Prod_Deity · 2012-01-31 06:03 · Score: 1

I'm not specifically talking about megaupload. The general populace don't pay any mind to SOPA/PIPA/ACTA because they don't think it'll effect them or their iDevices

Re:Setup your own DNS server and point his PC at i by JAlexoi · 2012-01-31 02:46 · Score: 4, Interesting

Or better yet, find where he stores his private photos and videos and send a DMCA takedown notice. Make it look legit and have something like - in your picture you have X that is there without permission.
Or just block that site completely.... In essence just demonstrate how his life would be affected by the laws.

Copyright or avoid the cost of copyright. by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 02:46 · Score: 4, Insightful

Don't forget to point out that SOPA andACTA are not about combatting piracy.

They are about decreasing the cost and risk for the copyright holders. Using this legislation they can issue orders without any oversight or liability, and without any costs to them.

Find an analogy to that (you peddle X, but want to put the cost of peddling X on the general public via a 3rd party (ISP))

Re:Copyright or avoid the cost of copyright. by HappyHead · 2012-01-31 03:23 · Score: 5, Informative

Don't forget to point out that SOPA andACTA are not about combatting piracy.
They are about decreasing the cost and risk for the copyright holders. Using this legislation they can issue orders without any oversight or liability, and without any costs to them.
Find an analogy to that (you peddle X, but want to put the cost of peddling X on the general public via a 3rd party (ISP))
THIS! This exactly!
The whole point of SOPA, PIPA, and ACTA, is that the corporations want to escape the last few shreds of oversight and responsibility they currently have to deal with under existing laws. These laws were NEVER about combatting piracy - they are entirely about making sure that the copyright industry companies don't have to worry about little things like actually telling the truth when they say they own the copyright for something and are shutting you down.
Under current laws, if you post a video of yourself doing something, like say, a college professor posting videos online of his lectures so that his students can view them, and the MPAA files a takedown notice claiming they own that video and the prof is a dirty stinking pirate for stealing it from them (even though it's a false accusation), the prof has (supposedly) the recourse that he can file a counter-notice, and have the videos restored, (note: this is an actual example from the real world - they really did this.) and then the MPAA would to take him to actual court to sue for damages (which they didn't, because they didn't have any evidence, and it was obvious that they didn't actually own the material) instead of just having him thrown in jail and his property seized without having to show any evidence that he actually did what they claim. Under the combination of SOPA, PIPA, and ACTA, the MPAA would not have had to go through any legal procedures, or have any evidence that the prof's lectures belonged to them (which they didn't), but instead would be allowed to just say "BAD! YOU ARE THIEF!", and automatically be correct under the law, because they said so, and thus be allowed to take his domain, and shut him down with no recourse, no right to a trial, and no way to do anything about it.
Considering how little responsibility the MPAA and RIAA have demonstrated when applying the current copyright laws, is it any wonder that people who are paying attention don't trust them to behave with laws that take away what little responsibility and oversight they currently have?
Even worse, these laws are so poorly put together that any nutjob with a grudge can do the same thing to anyone they don't like, and have anything that person has put online shut down (the whole website), with little to no proof that their claims are true. Did you accidentally mention that you like eating bacon on your website? Look out - when the crazy person who has decided that all bacon-loving people are actually aliens trying to hypnotize the human race into complacency, they can fulfill their personal mission of silencing your bacon-promoting alien agenda by falsely using SOPA/PIPA/ACTA to shut down your website. Before you even know it has happened, you're gone, and if you are very lucky, you might even find out why, some day.

Start at the beginning by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 02:46 · Score: 0

Point them to the start of the MegaUpload saga when UMG first took down MegaUpload's paid-for music video on the justification that they "had contracts with some of the singers involved" and anyway it was all YouTube's fault for letting them have tools that automatically take down songs without having to confirm whether they really do hold the copyright. Basically, that automatic take-down is what they currently abuse on YouTube to take down other completely legitimate videos, and it is a system that they would absolutely abuse to outright destroy YouTube and other similar sites (Game Trailers is one to bring up with gamers) like any movie trailer site that isn't "authorized" to show commercials for Hollywood movies, if they can get SOPA/PIPA/ACTA legislation.

If you want to scare them out of copyright laws entirely, just ask them if they've ever had a birthday party with friends over and someone sang "Happy Birthday" to them, or if they have kids whether they've sang Happy Birthday themselves to their kids and their friends. That song is still held under copyright and earns the current owners $25 MILLION every year. Even the Girl Guides were sued for singing "Happy Birthday".

Re:Start at the beginning by countertrolling · 2012-01-31 03:47 · Score: 1

Start at the beginning...
First, the earth cooled.. Then the dinosaurs came...

--
For justice, we must go to Don Corleone
Re:Start at the beginning by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 07:24 · Score: 0

First, the earth cooled.. Then the dinosaurs came...
First there was nothing... Then there was everything....
Re:Start at the beginning by Travelsonic · 2012-01-31 09:56 · Score: 1

Butt hey were too big and fat, so they all died and turned into oil. And then the Arabs came, and they all bought Mercedes Benzs.

Shit, now I want to watch Airplane!

--
If you believe in privacy, and believe you have "nothing to hide" at the same time, you're a goddammed idiot

Highways by SniperJoe · 2012-01-31 02:47 · Score: 1

I know it's quite simplistic, but I would simply equate it to highways and car travel. Basically, the government would have the right to shut down certain exits on the highway or even whole highways themselves because someone at one point sped on that stretch of road, regardless of what is at that exit.

Re:Highways by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 04:36 · Score: 0

It's not the government that would gain that right, it's the industry.
How about this: the major car manufacturers want drivers of "lesser" car manufacturers off the highway, so that their cars (however crap they are) get more exposure. Moreover, they don't want to go through the courts to achieve that because judges cost too much to bribe (on a case-by-case basis), it's easier to just bribe a few politicians and buy them a law that allows them to sidestep the courts.

Don't give up... by skids · 2012-01-31 02:48 · Score: 2

Find out his personal domain names. Then file a frivolous DMCA takedown complaint on something he's linked. Or just send him a trumped up takedown notice.

(All in jest of course, but one wonders whether a campaign of emails claiming "your domain will be revoked in 3 days" then letting them off the hook by explaining how that was just to get their attention about legislative wranglings... might be effective.)

--
Someone had to do it.

Re:Don't give up... by Coren22 · 2012-02-01 08:48 · Score: 1

Perhaps we should all file frivolous DCMA notices against political web sites that support SOPA. Maybe if their IT person feels some of the pain, they might bring it up the chain and maybe the politician will hear about it.

--
APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?

DNS is like a phone book by mepperpint · 2012-01-31 02:49 · Score: 5, Insightful

DNS is a lot like a phone book, which is something many people understand. If we blacklist someone from DNS it's like removing them from the phone book. Their phone number still works and anyone can call them. Removing an illicit phone number from the phone book will not prevent people from dialing the number. A phone number would still be passed around in forums, between friends, etc.

Regularly removing phone numbers from the phone book may create many alternative phone books which is likely to create a big headache for all users in figuring out which phone book they need to use to find a particular website and in figuring out which phone books contain legitimate information and which ones will give you the real phone number for your bank and which ones will give you fake books. This is particularly concerning because the legislation proposed doesn't apply due process to removing a phone number from the phone book, but instead allows for arbitrary removals.

Re:DNS is like a phone book by heypete · 2012-01-31 03:37 · Score: 1

That is an excellent analogy. If you don't mind, I'm going to use that description to explain things to others.
Re:DNS is like a phone book by TheNastyInThePasty · 2012-01-31 03:40 · Score: 1

This is exactly how I explained it to my girlfriend and I think it's a perfect analogy.

--
The best thing about UDP jokes is I don't care if you get them or not
Re:DNS is like a phone book by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 04:18 · Score: 0

Except that most content intensive sites will leverage a CDN. Without DNS to point at the vast network of edge points the whole thing falls apart. For the phonebook analogy to be more appropriate the listing would need to be removed, the phone # 'forwarded' to an esoteric IVR which you must key in one of the rotating 'correct' phone numbers under the residential listings for 'Smith' in order to connect your call.
Re:DNS is like a phone book by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 04:50 · Score: 0

I used this analogy too, but I said it referring to the contacts on your phone. Now the number still works, but you can't just say "Call mom", you have to use/know her number directly. To make matters worse, calling that number directly may now be questionably legal, so now if you want to dial that number, you need to call collect.
Re:DNS is like a phone book by mepperpint · 2012-01-31 04:52 · Score: 1

Be my guest. I'm fully in favor of the free flow of ideas, especially those that help to educate people.

Occam's Razor by trongey · 2012-01-31 02:49 · Score: 3, Funny

The simplest solution is usually the best.
Just shoot him.

--
You never really know how close to the edge you can go until you fall off.

Re:Occam's Razor by JAlexoi · 2012-01-31 02:56 · Score: 1

Nah... Accuse him of being a pirate(copyright violations are identified as piracy these days) and let the cops shoot him!
OH... Wait! Make him walk the plank! Arghhh...

Do you know how? The Christmas song 12 Days has an add-on in the form of a copyrighted line about the ring... Remind him of that!(If he celebrates Christmas)
Re:Occam's Razor by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 04:01 · Score: 0

Nuke him from orbit... it's the only way to be sure.

Don't bother, they are clearly a moron by nedlohs · 2012-01-31 02:50 · Score: 1

Seriously.

Here we have an example of a Hong Kong based company with German and Dutch executives living in New Zealand. It was completely shutdown under the existing rules.

And somehow that means they need new powers? Because the existing ones aren't enough?!?

Start witht the basics by somarilnos · 2012-01-31 02:51 · Score: 2

DNS, while a very technical description, can be described in a very non-technical way so that people can get it. If you have an old phone book around (probably unlikely), a good way to describe it would be to flip through the phone book, find a number, and cross it out with a marker. Cross out several more names and numbers, and explain that that's what the trade organizations (RIAA/MPAA) can do if the laws pass, without giving the affected party a day in court, first. You can explain that if you know someone's phone number, then you can still call them. But you can't find anywhere that can legally give you that phone number, and if they change it, you'll have no way of getting the new one legally. In lieu of a phone book, you could always go to the index of a technical book. I wouldn't recommend vandalizing the index of one that matters to you, though.

You may not be able to convince him by DickBreath · 2012-01-31 02:52 · Score: 5, Interesting

Even with all of the useful suggestions posted here, you may not succeed.

Back in the day, when SCO started their ill fated lawsuit against IBM (but actually against Linux), I had a co worker who I discussed this with. He didn't know much about what was going on, but read the various industry rags and loudmouths, and thus believed that (his words) "SCO has a strong case".

Rewind about three years. I was talking to him about open source and Linux. His reaction about a free high quality OS always came back to "but how do they make their money?". After explaining about open source more, he finally understood it was not about money. I'll never forget his reaction. His words caused my jaw to drop to the floor: "They can't be allowed to do that!"

From that point on, we always were at odds over a lot of fundamental viewpoints. He tended to take the view that anything big business did that was profitable was therefore morally right. Yes, I kid you not.

My point? You may not be able to convince your non techie friend.

Oh, and when you say "unbiased" I think you might have meant "reasonable". There's nothing wrong with being biased because you have a particular viewpoint that you advocate.

--

I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.

Re:You may not be able to convince him by skywiseguy · 2012-01-31 03:44 · Score: 1

actually, he complains all the time that the opponents of SOPA tell him the sky is falling when he does not think it is. so unbiased means something that does not resort to hyperbole to make the point. i'm pretty sure he will not be convinced, he actually said he'd like to see something *like* the DMCA but not like the DMCA to replace what has become of SOPA. but at least i want to make him understand the issue, as he does not seem to get it at all right now.

Simply talk about the expansion of it by gurps_npc · 2012-01-31 02:53 · Score: 1

That is, assume your neighbor had a stolen car. Would that mean the city could take possession of not just the car, but their house AND every car and house on the same block? Because that is what blocking an entire domain is equivalent to.

--
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com

The surest way to build opposition to copyright... by SuricouRaven · 2012-01-31 02:56 · Score: 1

Is to enforce it.

For example, today I get to tell a History teacher that he cannot show MLK's 'I have a dream' speech in a lesson because it's under copyright still, and the copyright holder (A relative of King's who inherited the rights) enforces it quite strictly.

Re:What does being a non-techie have to do with th by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 02:57 · Score: 0

It's the submitters way of going "HERP DERP THIS GUY IS TEH STUPID!!!" because then it plays into his and Slashdot's bias of the fact that if you're not a techie you're just a "luser". Ignoring the fact that technies havce been wrong about many things.

Simple: ALL PORN WILL BE GONE! by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 02:58 · Score: 0

That should do it.

For managers, tell them that it will be complete lawsuit nightmare, with everybody being able to sue everybody else out of business over mere accusations, until they go bankrupt from half their employees consisting of lawyers just to fend it off. Also easy to prove with links to the bazillion such cases.

For parents, tell them that their children will go to jail and that they will be sued into oblivion when somebody puts a video of them singing a childrens' song online or anything similarly harmless. Easy to prove with the countless cases where this already happened.

For non-porn-loving women: Women hate everything that disturbs the social harmony and love socializing. So tell them how their loved ones will suffer, with widespread censorship and bullying. Tell them that the content industry is the drug-abusing pimp, and the artists are forced into prostitution, while they take most of the money, and want to come after us if we ever dare to love a artist without paying him. That is the honest truth and should get them.

It's actually quite easy, I think.

For added bonus: Remember: Evil usually triumphs over good, because good abides to a certain standard of rules, while evil does not.
The content mafia doesn't give a fuck about truth, and they use terror words like "pirates", "stealing" and "intellectual property".
So it's way easier to win, if you also loosen some rules with regard to how you treat them (but not in regard to others). To create a counter-weight, you could go full-FOX-level bullshit. But I'm not saying it's right, as it will make you a bit like them in the process.

My take on educating people: by jesseck · 2012-01-31 02:58 · Score: 2

I think a good analogy for DNS is the phone book: suppose your friend is gay or lesbian, and use the Yellow Book to find services that cater to their needs. However, the local churches petition Yellow Book to stop advertising such establishments. Unless your friend knows where to find a different phone book, they won't be able to find said services. However, the services didn't cease to exist or move.

That is what the law's DNS provisions did- they didn't stop anyone who knew of alternate DNS servers to access.

As for the destructiveness of the other parts of the law- point to the cell phone manufacturer sue-party going on right now, the "John Doe" mass suing pursued by the *IAAs, and Righthaven's actions. If your friend still feels that Righthaven was right to take down content used under the "Fair Use" provisions, then they will never learn (until it's too late). When that happens, I'm sure they'll ask you about alternate DNS and Tor.

Re:My take on educating people: by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 06:37 · Score: 0

suppose your friend is gay or lesbian, and use the Yellow Book to find services that cater to their needs.
What does this even MEAN?
Here, let me help you... read this and see if it makes any sense: "suppose your friend is heterosexual, and use the Yellow Book to find services that cater to their needs."
I fail to see the relevance of the sexual orientation here. Are gay/lesbians supposed to be

Easy enough by stanlyb · 2012-01-31 02:59 · Score: 1

SOPA/PIPA bill to freedom of internet is exactly what is NDAA bill to the freedom of people. Explain him how the existing laws are working perfectly fine, and there is no need of a monster like NDAA, and that SOPA/PIPA is all the same, we already have the required legislation to fight piracy.
BONUS: Tell your non-techie that with the NDAA bill, USA becomes USSR. Read my lips: ANYONE could be arrested at ANYTIME, without ANY reason, and put in Siberia....i mean somewhere in USA, for UNKNOWN period of time, and WITHOUT informing his/her relatives if that happened. Again read my lips: GULAG

Good explanation of the issues with SOPA by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 03:00 · Score: 0

This video seems to do an excellent job of explaining what's wrong with SOPA/PIPA.

http://www.khanacademy.org/video/sopa-and-pipa?topic=new-and-noteworthy

Re:Good explanation of the issues with SOPA by kievit · 2012-01-31 03:36 · Score: 1

Maybe parent was modded down because it was posted anonymously, but I totally agree that Sal Khan gives a very instructive explanation of SOPA/PIPA. I'm a big fan of the Khan Academy. Here is link again, this time clickable.

Clay Shirky's TED presentation by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 03:02 · Score: 1

Here is a short video with eloquent arguments:
http://www.ted.com/talks/defend_our_freedom_to_share_or_why_sopa_is_a_bad_idea.html

Easy by AlexVye · 2012-01-31 03:02 · Score: 1

Edit the host file on their PC to have their favorite sites (say youtube, google, etc..) go to nowhere. Then tell them to hit their favorite sites. When they reply "but that's arbitrary, you blocked certain sites arbitrarily" you reply "Exactly.

Mess up his PC's DNS... by FaxeTheCat · 2012-01-31 03:05 · Score: 1

Mess up his PCs DNS for some sites. It is really easy.

Find his most frequently used web sites. (I bet www.google.com is one of them, and you may enjoy including the DNS name for his mail provider as well...
Find the "hosts" file on his PC.
Enter the sites DNS names and let them point to 127.0.0.1

Now he knows what may happen.

Re:Mess up his PC's DNS... by PhxBlue · 2012-01-31 03:44 · Score: 1

Better yet, point it to a website that has one of those SOPA takedown notices.

--
!#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.

Start by getting informed yourself by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 03:06 · Score: 0

The DNS provisions haven't been in SOPA since December. What you are spreading is hysteria and misinformation. Please stop poisoning the democratic process -- it's no different than poisoning the DNS, only one would hope at least you would feel guilty about it.

Khan Academy by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 03:09 · Score: 1

There is a great video on Khan Academy about SOPA/PIPA. The video explains what SOPA does and how it gives copyright holders enormous power to bring down "enablers" of piracy (search engines, pay sites, advertisers, DNS, etc). He draws pictures to show how everything is connected and explains the language and repercussions of the law in a way non-techies will easily understand. Highly recommend, anyone who watches the video will leave much more informed in only 11 minutes.

http://www.khanacademy.org/video/sopa-and-pipa?topic=american-civics-1

Compare the *AA to the East India Company by samjam · 2012-01-31 03:09 · Score: 4, Interesting

The *AA and related music publishers are government sponsored pirates.
They raid the public domain, the prevent their own work from being in the public domain.
They sell music to which they do not have the rights.
They rob their own artists with dodgy accounting.
They falsely inflate damages by infringers in order to punish them way beyond worse offenders
They use other peoples materials without rights because they (like everyone else) can't be bothered to follow the laws they sponsor
They issue false take-down notices to material that they do not own (some of which they or their artists use illegally).
They interfere with the politics of other nations in order to further their own interest.
They attempt to make a criminal out of every man woman and child in the world in order to increase revenue.

These are all behaviours observed over the last few years.
Will other slashdot readers please provide citations for each type of behaviour or add new behaviours.

We then ask why elected officials pay more attention to this group of pirates than individuals who have the democratic right to vote.

--
blog.sam.liddicott.com

Re:Compare the *AA to the East India Company by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 20:47 · Score: 0

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It's a not-so-wonderful life by apcullen · 2012-01-31 03:10 · Score: 1

When I try to explain how bad these laws are, I describe what the internet would be like if these laws had been passed circa 1996. No google. No youtube. Go on from there. Thus, the laws are bad because they make our life suck. For economy-minded types I point out that the music and movie industries would not have hired more people had these laws been on the books, but the laws would have squashed thousands of highly paying tech jobs from being created. Thus, the laws are bad because they are anti-job.

These bills aren't the problem by countertrolling · 2012-01-31 03:11 · Score: 1

You need to show him how destructive copyright is... that enforced exclusivity is bad m'kay? Read him some of Jefferson's thoughts on the matter.

--
For justice, we must go to Don Corleone

All scripted by Curunir_wolf · 2012-01-31 03:12 · Score: 1

I'd like to say there is some hope for educating people like this person you know, but I'm afraid the PR machine is massive, and the rabbit hole goes much deeper than anyone suspects. Think for a minute about the SOPA/PIPA timing and the seizure of MegaUpload. Think it's coincidence? I don't. The only thing I think didn't work out right was the unexpected response to black-out day, which got the SOPA vote delayed. It would have been better marketing if the bill had passed and the arrests used to justify it.

If you read the indictment, you'll notice a lot of emails (unencrypted) with damning evidence, including a lot of "users" from places like Northern Virginia, Norfolk Virginia, Alexandria Virginia, etc. And Kim Dotcom was the obvious "ne'er do well" criminal kingpin type, with her castle-like mansion and staff of 12 to run the place. A very movie-like villain in the Scarface drug lord tradition. Except the Great Evil that the heroes at the Justice department were combating is IP Infringement - the great Internet-enabled scourge of our time that is OMG! costing jobs!

I don't believe for a minute that this is anything but a well-orchestrated PR stunt. The actors playing the MegaUpload executive are not going to prison - more likely they'll be given new identities and left in nice little homes in Paraguay to serve out their "sentence". The public is being completely duped with this thing. Sorry, but, please, I'm not buying it.

--
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia

Re:All scripted by Theaetetus · 2012-01-31 03:45 · Score: 2

Think for a minute about the SOPA/PIPA timing and the seizure of MegaUpload. Think it's coincidence? I don't.
I don't believe for a minute that this is anything but a well-orchestrated PR stunt.
I am a crackpot
Yes, it's a coincidence... The grand jury indictment was more than a month earlier. Do you really think that the government can coordinate an international seizure operation involving authorities in New Zealand and Virginia in the space of 12 hours?
Re:All scripted by Curunir_wolf · 2012-01-31 04:15 · Score: 1

Do you really think that the government can coordinate an international seizure operation involving authorities in New Zealand and Virginia in the space of 12 hours?
What do you mean 12 hours? The investigation, and the planning / writing / introduction of SOPA has been going on for years. That's why it couldn't be stopped like the vote on SOPA was - it was already laid out. SOPA didn't pass, but they couldn't stop the bust.

--
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia

Easy. by JustAnotherIdiot · 2012-01-31 03:13 · Score: 1

Find his favorite porn site, news site, and/or gaming site. Tell him it will vanish wrongly if bills like these pass, especially the porn site.

--
What do I know, I'm just an idiot, right?

Eh? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 03:14 · Score: 0

So you want an unbiased way to get your bias across.

Re:Eh? by kiwimate · 2012-01-31 03:19 · Score: 1

Yep. Here's the other biased way to describe it.
* The bills are a symptom.
* They only exist because of a cause.
* The cause is illegal downloading.
* So the answer to everyone whining here on Slashdot is to stop downloading illegally and these bills will disappear in a puff of impeccable logic.
Watch how quickly this gets modded down...
Re:Eh? by fibonacci8 · 2012-01-31 03:32 · Score: 1

The cause is also legal downloading. The bills keep occurring when innovation occurs interrupting the comfortable monopoly on distribution.

--
Inheritance is the sincerest form of nepotism.

Scan his computer by ubrgeek · 2012-01-31 03:18 · Score: 1

And hand him a list of all of the pirated MP3s he has.

--
Bark less. Wag more.

DMCA by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 03:23 · Score: 0

Their biggest problem now is ISPs are immune from lawsuits. (MegaUpload don't count, they had a fake DMCA take down system, they had 1 copy of each file, but multiple links, when a link to the file was reported, they took down just that link, leaving all the other links and file intact).

ISPs got immunity in exchange for DMCAs ridiculous extreme copyright penalties and DRM protections.

Those insane penalties in turn was the result of MPAA & RIAA lobbying. In other words they created the problem they now face. They wanted insane penalties for copyright violations, but they had to give ISPs immunity to get them in exchange. Here we are today.

So the first thing you need to explain to someone is that MPAA & RIAA are idiots who create ridiculously extreme laws and in the process the backlash hits them.

If they hadn't had the DMCA, we wouldn't be in this mess that we're in today. They'd be balance of probability civil liability for rapidshare, youtube etc. and sites like Hotfiles would be liable and sites like youtube not and everything would be regular business as usual. But there's no way they'll get that now with copyright laws now so extreme that criminal penalties are involved, searchs at borders, censorship... insane extreme laws being suggested to fix laws that were just badly thought through!

Re:The surest way to build opposition to copyright by PhxBlue · 2012-01-31 03:24 · Score: 1

For example, today I get to tell a History teacher that he cannot show MLK's 'I have a dream' speech in a lesson because it's under copyright still ...

You might want to read Section 110 of the U.S. Copyright Code before you actually say something that stupid.

--
!#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.

bloody simple by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 03:25 · Score: 0

Do they believe in due process?

You can't because it is not about DNS by SmallFurryCreature · 2012-01-31 03:28 · Score: 1

The debate is not about DNS or filesharing or freedom of speech or right to privacy or US law being enforced beyond its borders.

The basic discussion should be about whether a business model that benefits a few should be protected against the interests of they many AND on whether society needs commercial art.

When cars were first introduced, the horse industry did not just accept it, this led to the extreme that in England a car had to be preceded by a man on foot carrying a red flag. Because cars were so dangerous. Of course horses being insane animals never bolted and never killed anyone (they killed many) and weren't a severe pollution factor (what do horses do to busy roads and this is not one horse on a parade but thousands and thousands of horses all day long).

As a society we can certainly see the benefit of one industry and its business models (if you travel through Amsterdam and can look away from the red light district for just one second, you might notice quite a few old houses with stables build in, places you could park your horse and have it taken care off) being replaced by a new one. Business selling food stuffs were replaced by chemists selling petrol and later of course gas stations.

Would we tolerate it today if Electric cars had to have special measures to be tolerated by the petrol industry... gosh... didn't we have a few stories about how electric cars were to silent and need special laws? Being silent was never a problem for Rolls Royce, why all of a sudden would it apply to electric cars which really aren't all that silent?

So, we had the car anology, now for the content industry. With digital media, it has become possible to share files with no loss in quality and thanks to the internet that file can be shared by anyone. In itself, sharing content is nothing new. When the Dutch traded with Japan, the Japanese copied many a Dutch text book and boosted that countries tech level with all the western advances. This was an extreem example but before the invention of the book press, the only way to get copies of a book was for other people then the author to make copies. Painstakingly copying them by hand one letter at a time. It was the only way to pass on knowledge and before writing was available, passing the stories on by word of mouth was the default... none of this would have been possible with current copyright laws... NOR has the need for this ceased.

The BBC itself has violated encouraged copyright violation when it asked for people who had recorded old TV episodes to give them back for restoration because the BBC had DESTROYED the nation cultural heritage! But the content industry at the time of those recordings was arguing in court that recording programs was a copyright violation. HANG the BBC for using these blatant criminals!

--- That doesn't work does it... but it shows just how silly copyright laws are, the ones we have on the books now are there so content presses (CD's, sheet music, etc) can do so without anyone else being able to do it as well for a specific piece of content. It is NOT about protecting artists who have done just fine for thousands of years without. Current copyright was for a long time used to pay the author a small fee, then have the right to print that work for decades with no balance between what the author was paid and the printing company made from it (copyright started with sheet music, not recorded music).

As with the car, new tech has come along which made a business model based on old tech obsolete. It would have been trivial to force a law that forced car makers to only include small gastanks so that the inns that serviced horses could continue to do business. We didn't because the advance of technology was considered more important then the lively hood of thousands upon thousands of people.

We could have mandated that electricity is delivered by battery only to your house so the coalman would still have a route to run... we didn't.

So why are we so intent on keeping the music industry distribut

--

MMO Quests are like orgasms:

You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.

Re:You can't because it is not about DNS by Ralph+Spoilsport · 2012-01-31 04:40 · Score: 1

Excellent. Thanks you. You deserve a massive mod up.

--
Shoes for Industry. Shoes for the Dead.
Re:You can't because it is not about DNS by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 07:21 · Score: 0

This is very good. I'm an independent singer-songwriter, and I no longer records CDs. I don't even charge for downloads on my website - everything is free for the taking, free to share, and free to record on another performer's CD, provided they do not charge for their own work. Funding for my concerts comes from live performance fees (tickets to the show). I've not yet worked out all the details of how best to approach artist compensation in terms of songs, if it is indeed appropriate, because it is indeed a full-time job to tour full time and write good music, and doing that while also holding another full-time job to pay the bills is difficult. But I completely reject the current media efforts at control.

READ the bills together by Theaetetus · 2012-01-31 03:35 · Score: 1

Without casting any doubt on you, personally, Submitter, most people arguing on either side of the SOPA/PIPA/ACTA debate don't know very much about the bills and have never read them, and are just parroting information from others. You should read them together, and discuss what the different paragraphs mean.

ACTA: http://www.international.gc.ca/trade-agreements-accords-commerciaux/assets/pdfs/acta-crc_apr15-2011_eng.pdf.
SOPA: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c112:H.R.3261:.
PIPA: http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=s112-968.

Also discuss the differences in what they are. ACTA is an international trade agreement, like the Berne Convention, the Paris Convention, the TRIPs treaty, the Patent Cooperation Treaty, NAFTA, etc. It's not legislation, but rather an agreement between signatory countries to pass legislation in their own countries. Accordingly, ACTA sets out minimum standards that each country has to meet. Contrary to what some people think, it doesn't need to be ratified by Congress, because it's a non-enabling treaty... instead, Congress has to write legislation implementing it, at which point they get to weigh in on what it means. Until they pass that legislation, ACTA effectively has no teeth in the US.

SOPA and PIPA are house and senate bills, respectively. They implement many of the provisions of ACTA, but they differ in important ways. Reading them side by side is probably a good thing. Note, however, that even if both were passed, a joint committee would then figure out a compromise position, so neither one is what a final statute would look like.

Simple demonstration by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 03:40 · Score: 0

Wait till he leaves for work, then change all the locks on his house. When he comes home, tell him he can't come in unless he can *prove* he wasn't actually doing anything illegal in there.

Re:Setup your own DNS server and point his PC at i by Runaway1956 · 2012-01-31 03:43 · Score: 1

How about, "The law is unjust, and I don't recognize them as legitimate."

That is all the reason I need to "break the law".

--
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br

Do this, by wbr1 · 2012-01-31 03:44 · Score: 1

Set up a dns server or proxy that blocks halv of whar he does and repale the sitea with takedown notices. Route him through it secretly and see how he responds. (on mobile and do not feel lile scrolling, so.sorry if thia has been said)

--
Silence is a state of mime.

Amputation Analogy by invid · 2012-01-31 03:45 · Score: 3, Insightful

I prefer the amputation analogy. Stealing is bad. Chopping off the thief's hand is even worse. Chopping off the thief's hand and the hand of anyone who bought stolen goods from the thief is even worse than that. Chopping off the thief's hand, the hand of anyone who bought stolen goods, and anyone who might or might not have bought stolen goods is SOPA.

--
The Moore-Murphy Law: The number of things that will go wrong will double every 2 years.

Re:Amputation Analogy by thereitis · 2012-01-31 04:41 · Score: 1

Nice. SOPA indirectly gives *anyone* the ability to take down a website: Just post some illegal content in the comment section. How can that be right?
Re:Amputation Analogy by SuricouRaven · 2012-01-31 04:49 · Score: 1

Even under SOPA, a court order would be needed. Not much in the way of evidence, just a court order on the authority of one judge and no penalty for filing frivilous requests, but a court order nontheless... and you can be sure that any judge good enough to stay in the position more than a week knows that you don't grant court orders against any company that earns more in a week than he does in a lifetime, unless the other side is just as well-funded.

Re:The surest way to build opposition to copyright by SuricouRaven · 2012-01-31 03:47 · Score: 1

Firstly, I'm British. Secondly, I spent a good part of the morning going through the CDPA 1988 looking for a loophole. There is one that states that showing a work in an educational setting isn't public performance, but it still requires we buy an officially authorised DVD - all the teacher in question had was a file that looks like they recorded it off of a TV program. If they want to show it, they need to buy the DVD... and then they won't show it, because searching through a department to determine where the DVD has been lost and finding a specific place on a DVD with play-and-reverse buttons is just too much hastle.

Re:Setup your own DNS server and point his PC at i by Dhalka226 · 2012-01-31 03:47 · Score: 1

You're suggesting that he commit perjury, and got modded to +4?

Very tough argument by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 03:50 · Score: 0

Anonymous, because it'll burn karma, I'm sure...

One of the biggest problems I've seen when techies try to explain this to non-techies is that they go off on a foaming-at-the-mouth "copyright is evil, information wants to be free" tirade. Remember, right or wrong, this legislation was lobbied for because companies and artists lose money when the piracy advocates don't pay for software, movies or music. Physical goods manufacturers also lose when cheap knock-offs are made of their designs (it's not just handbags...see all the stories about gov't contractors buying cheap Cisco gear that turned out to be unsupported.)

Is the proposed legislation a bad way to handle this? Yes. But, can you blame rights holders? We've had "manufacturing doesn't matter, it's all a service economy from now on" drummed into our heads for a long time now. If our future is headed for a place where the only way to make any money is to create and sell content, then I'm not surprised that people are trying to protect their industry. That, and too few people are big boys and girls, and pay for their software/movies/music, or argue that they shouldn't have to pay the set price to compensate the creators.

Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by RobotRunAmok · 2012-01-31 03:50 · Score: 2, Interesting

...that entertainment is not "information," nor should it be free, whether or not it has been "digitized," and to be certain to compensate the writers/musicians/artists/designers/videographers and other creators whose work he/she enjoys.

Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by DerekLyons · 2012-01-31 04:05 · Score: 1

Indeed. Both the questioner and especially the poster to whom you replied have taken the stance that "education" is merely a synonym/thin disguise for propaganda and spin of a very particular and very narrow viewpoint.
One which, as you so ably illustrate, is not a universal one among "techies". (Making the shaky assumption that "Slashdot reader/poster"=="techie".)
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by cheekyjohnson · 2012-01-31 04:16 · Score: 1

Indeed. Both the questioner and especially the poster to whom you replied have taken the stance that "education" is merely a synonym/thin disguise for propaganda and spin of a very particular and very narrow viewpoint.
And it appears that that even applies to the very poster you replied to.

--
Filthy, filthy copyrapists!
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 04:20 · Score: 1

...that entertainment is not "information," nor should it be free, whether or not it has been "digitized," and to be certain to compensate the writers/musicians/artists/designers/videographers and other creators whose work he/she enjoys.
OK. Explain how, given that when someone uses "Happy Birthday To You" royalties are paid to Warner Music, these monies compensate the writers/musicians/artists/designers/videographers and other creators involved in this work. In your answer, include the non-disputed facts that: (1) the melody is identical to the song "Good Morning to All", written and composed by Patty and Mildred in 1893; (2) the combination of melody and lyrics in "Happy Birthday to You" first appeared in print in 1912 and (3) the Summy Company registered for copyright of this work in 1935.
You will automatically receive an F if you discuss or reference any post-World War 2 work.
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by Wain13001 · 2012-01-31 04:35 · Score: 5, Interesting

...that entertainment is not "information,"...
you are simply wrong...at it's base level it is all information, and what and how it communicates is different to different observers. As a composer I listen to a lot of music as research, that is damn important information. Even if I am simply being entertained, I am only able to be entertained by being communicated to, it is all information, it is all data.
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by Son+of+Byrne · 2012-01-31 04:36 · Score: 2

Care to elucidate, then, on how you plan to protect said "digitized" goods?
Don't forget that everyone agrees that writers/musicians/artists/designers/videographers and other creators ought to be compensated. Unfortunately, that compensation is rapidly changing.
Look at it this way: their compensation is commensurate with what the market will bear. For digital goods, the value on the *free* market (I say free in the sense of free of regulation) is pretty dang low.
Sometimes, the truth hurts. But, as the earlier poster mentioned, that doesn't mean the end of said entertainment, it just means that the creators are going to have to change the way that they do business. In fact, this whole movement of the market *needs* to originate with the creators. The creators hold the reins of entertainment (no creators, no entertainment) and are therefore in the perfect position to dictate how they'd like to be compensated for their work. They can choose to try to defend an outdated, cumbersome, and downright ridiculous business model that is tied to the notion of physical media or they can move on to something that may be better.

--
I'd happily pay you Tuesday for a biopsy today!
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by cheekyjohnson · 2012-01-31 04:38 · Score: 1

Don't forget that everyone agrees that writers/musicians/artists/designers/videographers and other creators ought to be compensated.
"Everyone"? How can you be sure of that?

--
Filthy, filthy copyrapists!
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by aztracker1 · 2012-01-31 04:43 · Score: 4, Insightful

So people should have to pay to sing Christmas Carols, or join in campfire songs? Or kids going outside and playing "tag" should pay who? That's entertainment. Those dirty thieves should have to pay, huh? How dare people entertain themselves without compensation. How dare someone stop and look at a public performance, or piece of art without paying the original artist (dead for over a century).

And to what end does your perpetual view of copyright end? Disney has been dead for far longer than original copyright was, with renewal. IMHO businesses should not be able to own copyright, or patents.. and if they are permitted, it should be considered the after death portion of copyright, since it would be owned by a non-living entity.

Here is a fact for you... Nobody is owed anything. I can write a song that nobody ever hears, that doesn't mean I am owed anything. If someone hums the melody on a public bus does *NOT* mean they should have to pay me (or ascap, or bmi) a performance fee. When I'm dead, I won't be making any more, so copyright protection does not incentivise my corpse to create crap. The only thing that extending copyright past death + 5 years (max) does is protect an industry that actually creates produces nothing. Especially with distribution channels with nearly zero cost.

--
Michael J. Ryan - tracker1.info
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by Son+of+Byrne · 2012-01-31 04:47 · Score: 1

Good point. Allow me to change that to everyone that matters.

--
I'd happily pay you Tuesday for a biopsy today!
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by korgitser · 2012-01-31 04:59 · Score: 1

Even if one would accept the argument of entertainment not being information, it would still remain fact that copyright is just a means to the end of rewarding authorship. (This being itself a mean to the end of cultural progress.)
The means of this end, the copyright, has been progressively abused by the owner of the printing press, to leave the authors with as little reward as possible (these days the author often ends up with net loss), while reaping massive profits for the industry.
It is sad we are to accept such abuse, all while swallowing a lying rhetoric from the very same industry that has made a farce of our good intention to support the authors. It is therefore the moral duty of everyone to push for an end to this copyright regime, to dismantle this unenforceable legacy machine, and to start actually taking care of our authors.

--
FCKGW 09F9 42
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by John_Yossarian · 2012-01-31 05:52 · Score: 1

You are 100% right, aztracker1. Copyright is no longer an incentive for artists to produce content. Bands make money off of concerts, the labels take all the money from music sales. I think we are eventually going to see a switch from centralized music production to distributed patronage. http://www.pledgemusic.com/ allows content creators to get interested people to pledge their support for an album. If (and only if) the goal is reached, credit cards are charged and the artist begins creating their album. When its done, everyone who pledged gets a copy of the album. If we can keep crap legislation from doing too much harm, the industry will adapt and the idea of copyright will go the way of the horse drawn carriage.
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by pixelpusher220 · 2012-01-31 05:59 · Score: 1

Care to elucidate, then, on how you plan to protect said "digitized" goods?
You don't. Period. However, you do protect any and all commercial uses of a copyrighted work - digital or not. But personal digitized use is something that simply can't be stopped given the non-existent costs of duplication and distribution.

--
People in cars cause accidents....accidents in cars cause people :-D
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by Son+of+Byrne · 2012-01-31 06:13 · Score: 1

...personal digitized use is something that simply can't be stopped given the non-existent costs of duplication and distribution.
Agreed. This is the reality that creators now have to come to grips with. I'm excited to see that (with respect to techie types anyway), collectively, we are gradually realizing that these laws and the rampant lawsuits are the dying gasps of an industry that is struggling to hold onto the market that has already moved on.

--
I'd happily pay you Tuesday for a biopsy today!
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by Fritz+T.+Coyote · 2012-01-31 06:13 · Score: 1

The only thing that extending copyright past death + 5 years (max) does is protect an industry that actually creates produces nothing. Especially with distribution channels with nearly zero cost.
First - US copyright laws will keep extending the 'after death of creator' time so that The Mouse(tm) will NEVER enter public domain (unless the owners of That Damned Rodent are foolish or impoverished enough that they can no longer afford any Senators).
The SOPA/PIPA laws were never designed to insure that artists and creators are justly compensated... just look at who is bankrolling them: the mass media distribution companies that have made a science out of cheating artists and creators out of the profits.
SOPA/PIPA is an attempt to head off the disintermediation that threatens to allow us to buy our music, movies and books directly from the creators, or via more efficient channels where the cost of product more accurately reflects the distribution plus royalties cost, and minus the many, many lawyers, accountants and various suits that are part of the overhead of the old media empires.
I cannot blame the parasitic classes in Old Tyme Big Media from trying to hold on to their slice of the pie (actually, most of the damned pie, leaving a few crumbs for most artists), as who wants to voluntarily jump off the gravy train?
(is that enough mixed metaphors?)
Now for the mandatory car analogy -
If a Hundred and Ten Years Ago the Farriers, Harness-makers, Wainwrights and Others in the Horse and Buggy industry had asked Congress to make it a crime to allow anyone to use a "Horseless Carriage' on the public roads, and that any town that contained a Horseless Carriage be cut off from the public road networks.
Hows that for an analogy?

--
http://visualizecommonsense.com/
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by Corwn+of+Amber · 2012-01-31 06:55 · Score: 0

First Sale doctrine.
So you have made a painting? Great! I'll give you $2,000 for it.
And when I resell it, I keep all the money.
Want more money? Go paint some more.
So you have written a book? Great! I'll buy the manuscript for $20,000.
So you have composed an opera? Great! I'll buy the songs for $10,000. Oh, you have made costumes too? More $.
Fuck royalties, yeah. Of course artists will be compensated.
Let's put it this way. You buy land and have a house built. Then you have to pay the architect continuously as long as you live in it; and if you sell it, he gets to keep a part of that money.
THAT is current copyright.
And that's wrong.

--
Making laws based on opinions that stem up from false informations leads to witch hunts.
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by Pieroxy · 2012-01-31 07:36 · Score: 1

You should have tried harder to read me then, before assuming my "stance" which really I take as an insult. But I'm used to people applying their point of view to anything they read and if someone doesn't agree with them 100%, (s)he must be of the exact opposite viewpoint as yours. Talk about narrow viewpoints.
Entertainment is not information. But some entertainment produces information that is transferable through the internet. That part is changing. For good, unless someone shuts the internet down. There is nothing to add to that. It's already happened.

--
Write boring code, not shiny code!
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by AliasMarlowe · 2012-01-31 09:20 · Score: 1

Explain how, given that when someone uses "Happy Birthday To You" royalties are paid to Warner Music, these monies compensate the writers/musicians/artists/designers/videographers and other creators involved in this work. In your answer, include the non-disputed facts that: (1) the melody is identical to the song "Good Morning to All", written and composed by Patty and Mildred in 1893; (2) the combination of melody and lyrics in "Happy Birthday to You" first appeared in print in 1912 and (3) the Summy Company registered for copyright of this work in 1935.
You will automatically receive an F if you discuss or reference any post-World War 2 work.
Probably because of the kind of people and organizations that Teddy Roosevelt referred to as "malefactors of great wealth", and which caused him to set up the trust-busting organs of the US government when president of the USA (he also established the national parks and bodies for food inspection, drug purity, and so forth). If only the US had a comparable individual among its candidates today...

--
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by grcumb · 2012-01-31 09:51 · Score: 1

Don't forget that everyone agrees that writers/musicians/artists/designers/videographers and other creators ought to be compensated. Unfortunately, that compensation is rapidly changing.
Unfortunately? Think again. According to this report at least, widespread copying is actually making things better for said writers/musicians/artists/designers/videographers. Even the content distributors (who are the ones we're really talking about when we mention SOPA/PIPA/ACTA) are profiting more than they ever have, deriving more 65% of their revenues from technologies they swore would kill them.

--
Crumb's Corollary: Never bring a knife to a bun fight.
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by Son+of+Byrne · 2012-01-31 10:00 · Score: 1

Thanks for the stats. I honestly did not do any research to qualify that statement, so I'm going on sheer intuition. That said, I did wonder where all the money that flows from itunes, amazon, and others was flowing to.

--
I'd happily pay you Tuesday for a biopsy today!
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by rtb61 · 2012-01-31 10:09 · Score: 1

Best to avoid the technical aspect all together. Stick with the truth, they are guilty until proven innocent laws with very recrimination for false accusation.
So they think they have indentified some pirate by name only use automated equipment, they don't give a crap if it's faulty because there's very little punishment for false accusation.
Your name matches, they automatically kick you off the internet, get your electronics confiscated and, have you arrested. Now you have to spend the next three or so months proving your innocence (it could take far longer as they bog down courts with false accusations, they are not paying so they don't give a crap). So you either rebuy everything after you get out of jail on bail or go without.
After all this is over and you prove your innocent, well, it's tough luck sucker, till the screw you again (far more likely to occur as you have been accused once and are already suspicious). When they say, naw, it won't happen, just remind them the MPAA/RIAA wont be paying for it the tax payer foots the bill and let them think how that will pan out.

--
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 10:19 · Score: 0

Whether you're trolling or not, there are very few people here who would agree that 'entertainment' is somehow not 'information'. If you digitize them, do they not have bits?
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by chrismcb · 2012-01-31 15:56 · Score: 1

IMHO businesses should not be able to own copyright, or patents.

To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts...
It will be hard to promote progress if only people can own copyrights and patents.
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by Lundse · 2012-01-31 22:39 · Score: 1

Anything that exists as a string og 1 and 0's (or any matrix of formal signs) is information. Not all entertainment is information, but the entertainment which has been codified as information is, unsurprisingly, information.

--
IAIFARSIJDPOOTV - I Am In Fact A Reality Star; I Just Don't Play One On TV
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by Coren22 · 2012-02-01 07:32 · Score: 1

What I have never understood about the whole mouse issue is, why do they care if it falls out of copyright? The mouse is trademarked, I can't make my own mouse that looks like him, and it isn't like they are making any perpetual income off of Steamboat Willie.

--
APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
Re:Be Sure to Clarify to Him/Her... by aztracker1 · 2012-02-08 10:24 · Score: 1

A person/people can create something... a company can not.

--
Michael J. Ryan - tracker1.info

Non-techie by uigrad_2000 · 2012-01-31 03:51 · Score: 1

I've found that in discussions like this, it's a bad idea to ever think of someone as a non-techie.

If the person truly has no interest in tech, then your discussion is not going to be productive. But, most everyone (even self-proclaimed Luddites) actually do have an interest in tech.

So, instead, separate people into "techies" and "techies-in-training". Look at your friend as a person who wants to learn about how the tech works, and then explain it to them, bringing in the SOPA discussion at the appropriate times.

By not dumbing it down, you have avoided sounding patronizing.

--
Free unix account: freeshell.org

Favorite Analogy by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 03:52 · Score: 0

Think of DNS is a phone book. It pairs people's names with phone numbers. If you want to call someone you look up their name in the phone book and punch the corresponding number into your phone. On the internet, your computer looks up the IP of a site via the DNS listing and connects, just the same.

Now for DNS blocking: SOPA proposed solving the issue of getting to infringing sites by blocking the DNS from US based registrars and DNS servers. If a name is removed from the phone book, does that prevent you from calling the number? People 'unlist' their number all the time. That doesn't prevent them from getting calls. SOPA fails in the same way.

Now for the bigger issue: Lets just say that there was a law passed where people could submit to the phone company on phone numbers that were for phone sex numbers and the phone company would be required to to delist the number. Sounds admirable enough... But what if your ex was angry and reported YOUR number as a phone sex line. Its false, but because the acusation is made, they remove the number until they get around to an investigation, which may be 6 months. Now, what if instead of your ex, it was just someone who was in love with you and didn't want you called, or anyone who was just being a jerk? If you give that power to anyone, abuse will happen, especially if they have something to gain out of it.

During the period when you're de-listedonly people that already know your number or know someone that has it can call you, because they can't look it up. But that doesn't really prevent them from calling you, does it?

If you're a popular person, that's not a problem, because lots of people can still give out your number. But what about someone that's not as popular? No one knows the number and no one can look it up, so it effectively inactivates them.

Okay, on a personal scale this may sound alright. Abuse would be limited and things would blow over quickly enough. But when you extend that to businesses... Business A can start reporting any new competitor (or have an anynomous, or new business) report all their competitors and have them all de-listed, giving Business A a monopoly when people are looking up the service that they offer. Worse, when they report a new competitor, that new business is still paying their overhead and thus have a good chance of going out of business before the adjudication happens. Thus the report killed them.

Conclusion: It has been proven, time and time again, that when people are given a tool to gain an advantage, they will use it. They will step on others to get ahead and not look back. More-over, since infringing sites already exist and are extremely popular... enough so that the IP address can be passed around freely... Those sites will not really be stopped. So your original problem is still a problem and you've given people a new tool to squash their competition legally.

Re:Setup your own DNS server and point his PC at i by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 03:53 · Score: 1

Nope. The beauty of the typical DMCA take-down notice is that you swear, under penalty of perjury, that you are who you say you are. Then, in a separate section, no longer sworn under penalty of perjury, you make your claims about the work in question.

captcha: tricked

Keep it simple stupid by brainzach · 2012-01-31 03:53 · Score: 1

No one is going to understand a lesson on technology.

Just talk about the websites that will be affected like Youtube, Google, Facebook and Wikipedia. Most people will agree that they are legitimate websites, and will think it will be stupid if they are blocked or censored because of some user generated content.

Protocols are unbiased by CapitalOrange · 2012-01-31 04:08 · Score: 0

I have found the best line of reasoning is to show them that the Protocols that make the internet work are "dumb". By dumb I mean that they can't distinguish between those with "benevolent" intentions and those with malicious intentions. In the world of SOPA like legislation, this means that the bad guys could very easily copy -impersonate the "good" guys and trick the protocols used to attack people. On the flip side if you make traffic more secure and have it act as its supposed to (ie as an end to end communication without the possibility of breaking or intercepting traffic) then the you have to be willing to accept that the illegal actors will use the same technology. The flip side is that to allow the government to stop copyright infringement, attackers could also redirect our banking and commercial traffic which is of far greater importance. Note- I used the term bad guys and good guys extremely liberally (past a point I myself would agree with) to simplify the issue and to make it sound more unbiased.

What can you do. by Captain+Hook · 2012-01-31 04:11 · Score: 1

What can I do to show him how destructive these bills actually are

Install a hosts file on his machine that redirects everything which might be affected by SOPA to localhost.

See how long it is before he complains that he can't do anything.

--
These comments are my personal opinions and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the other voices in my head.

High Level Approach by forkfail · 2012-01-31 04:12 · Score: 1

What I, at least try to do, with some modicum of success, is to keep things at a fairly high level, and not drill down into what the specific technologies are, and what they do.

What I usually do is provide a very brief history of the 'net; that it is an inherently open and distributed framework, due to the original DARPA and MILNET requirements that it be a network that survive a nuclear attack, and also, due to the fact that the other primary original component, BITNET, grew in an disorderly and... ah... bitwise... manner as universities hooked up to each other.

Once this is established, I make the point that what DC is trying to do with all of their 'net legislation is effectively provide centralized control of a decentralized system. Even if my listener doesn't understand the technology completely, if presented correctly, it seems that it often makes sense at an intuitive level that the DC approach can't work well to start with, and that it attempts to impose an inordinate level of control over the net in general. It also allows me to explain why it won't work anyway for those who really do want to steal IP, and why darknets and such will still be possible.

Of course, your millage will very with your audience.

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Check your premises.

Ask for 30 minutes of his time by E-Prime · 2012-01-31 04:41 · Score: 1

I have found no better illustration (of how our rights have been eroded) than the one given by Lawrence Lessig at OSCON 2002, captured as flash presentation here: http://randomfoo.net/oscon/2002/lessig/free.html (sadly, the sound quality isn't too good, but the content of the presentation is well worth it).

Re:Setup your own DNS server and point his PC at i by SuricouRaven · 2012-01-31 04:50 · Score: 1

If you just take that perjury bit our of your fake-notice, I doubt anyone would notice. The victim of this hoax is unlikely to be versed in legal form.

You can't by future+assassin · 2012-01-31 04:53 · Score: 1

They need the local news to tell them which is not happening here. For example The Province and Vancouver Sun rather have some bull shit stories about absolutely nothing on the front page than the ACTA protests in Europe. I tried posting link to the protests on some of the stories they allowed comments on just to see them removed.

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by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*

The Khan Academy video for starters by Mostly+a+lurker · 2012-01-31 04:54 · Score: 1

First, unless you are an expert debater, recognize that others can argue this better than you can. I suggest you ask him to spend 10 minutes watching the educational video on SOPA/PIPA put together by the folks at Khan Academy. Next suggest that he browse Doc Searl's (Harvard Law School) blog post on why SOPA/PIPA is a disaster waiting to happen. You might casually ask why he thinks even the sponsors of SOPA (once educated on the issues) have withdrawn their support.

if the internet were tangible... by alienzed · 2012-01-31 04:57 · Score: 1

The internet is like a bridge, SOPA would give the authorities to shut down the bridge indefinitely if there's a jay walker crossing the road the wrong way somewhere along it.

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Never say never. Ah!! I did it again!

Re:Setup your own DNS server and point his PC at i by JAlexoi · 2012-01-31 05:06 · Score: 1

How was it not informative? I informed him of the options he had. There is an option just to shoot him, as well.

Play him the recent TED talk on SOPA and PIPA by kybur · 2012-01-31 05:16 · Score: 1

The presenter did an excellent job of explaining the evilness.

the problem with big media companies by amoeba1911 · 2012-01-31 05:30 · Score: 1

The problem here is that the media companies want to turn the Internet into television: a read-only medium where you can pick one of thousands channels. Instead of using a remote control to flip channels you type the url on the address bar. Their version of the Internet will be as user generated as television or newspaper. Once in a while they will allow a "comments from readers" section heavily filtered and moderated to show a particular point of view, but essentially this is TV/Newspaper, the traditional forms of one-way communication they are familiar with, the kind of communication form that gives them all the control.

Just do what most tech-nerds do by 93+Escort+Wagon · 2012-01-31 05:39 · Score: 1

Continue to talk about it incessantly - preferably without pauses that might let someone else derail the conversation. And if anyone tries to shift the conversation to another topic, such as sports, keep talking... but faster and louder than before.

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#DeleteChrome

Censored Yellow Pages by Marillion · 2012-01-31 05:41 · Score: 1

The Yellow Pages is a vital service that helps people who use telephones find the services they need. These types of laws allow the government to remove entries from the Yellow Pages without any due process just on the unproven suspicion of wrong doing. Furthermore, the big companies who buy full pages ads in the Yellow Pages often claim and insist that dozens of other listings ought to be removed because they're stealing their services. Since there have been enough examples of erroneous claims to service theft, there should be plenty of doubt the accuracy and motives of those big companies.

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This is a boring sig

childhood by superwiz · 2012-01-31 05:42 · Score: 1

Mention to them that copyright terms are so long that the IP ownership industry now owns everything they learned as a child. And if they can't use their childhood stories/songs/pictures without paying someone money, then they can't develop as creative adults.

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Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.

Re:childhood by PPH · 2012-01-31 06:17 · Score: 1

And inform them of that every time you sing Happy Birthday at their birthday party.

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Have gnu, will travel.

Eagerly Anticipating by Rydia · 2012-01-31 06:02 · Score: 1

I'm looking forward to the next edition of Ask Slashdot: "How to Inform a Non-Auto Mechanic about Multiple-Bypass Surgery."

the twitter version by RobertLTux · 2012-01-31 06:05 · Score: 1

the key you need to hook on is under SOPA rules

SOPA =Association is Collaboration & Accusation is Conviction

it can cause the effect of an MIB squad (with National Guard support) arresting an entire neighborhood just because one house just happens to be a Drug Den

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Any person using FTFY or editing my postings agrees to a US$50.00 charge

Re:Setup your own DNS server and point his PC at i by gknoy · 2012-01-31 06:20 · Score: 1

This can be easily simulated with a hosts file that points at it (or at a local web server instance serving the same thing).

Megaupload proves that we DON'T need SOPA/PIPA by s.petry · 2012-01-31 06:24 · Score: 1

I know someone who continues to argue that the takedown of MegaUpload shows that the existing laws are not adequate and that we *need* SOPA/PIPA to protect the movie/music industries from offshore (non-US) piracy. I keep trying to inform him of the history the *AA's have brought to bear on the copyright laws and how these bills are something that will continue the abuse of copyright instead of ending piracy as they are claiming. He has no grasp on how DNS works, much less the internet in general. What can I do to show him how destructive these bills actually are, preferably with something that is as unbiased as possible?

FACTS:

Megaupload is shut down.

The company and it's owners are in court.

If nothing was done and Megaupload were still able to operate with impunity, it would show that we do need SOPA/PIPA. Obviously this is not the case, we are just fine without.

Forget the dangers involved for a moment. Lets look at what we in the US as a Constitutional rights. We have the right to a fair trial, and the right to due process. SOPA/PIPA are attempts at creating legal ways of bypassing both of those.

It's hard to come up with an analogy to show how bad this is since we in the US follow due process for everything else. Even if someone commits a murder the police can't make an arrest without following due process. Warrant needs to be issued, or someone is caught in the act of committing a crime, or they were caught at the scene of the crime right after it occurred. We do this because by law we are supposed to be innocent until proven guilty.

SOPA/PIPA not only deny the right to due process, and not only deny due process, but they allow massive punishment to anyone else associated with the criminal. It would be like you getting hauled off to jail, only to find out days later that the reason you are in jail is because an acquaintance of yours ran a red light last month. Worse, you are stuck in jail until the court decides to hear your case on why you shouldn't be in jail any more. Of course after months in jail waiting, you will lose your house, your wife, your job, and society will deem you a criminal.

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-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.

Logic doesn't work. by pavon · 2012-01-31 06:25 · Score: 1

The mentality of those sort of people is that if crimes are still occurring then the law isn't strong enough. Of course that is an insane position - laws can't stop crime just punish it after the fact - but it is one that is held by a huge number of people. Every time an atrocious act is committed, they are right there demanding that we need harsher punishments, more intrusive policing, fewer freedoms, anything to make them think something is done to end <PROBELM>, and the power hungry in politics are happy to oblige.

There is no reasoning with them, the best you can do is try to prevent them from corrupting their children with the same mentality, and make sure that you are just as loud to your congressman as they are.

I've done this successfully by mentil · 2012-01-31 06:35 · Score: 1

I had a conversation with my father (a professional musician with a few CDs released) about SOPA. He's not very technically adept, but he seemed to understand and accept that the vast majority of copyright infringement is done in Asia, Africa, Eastern Europe, and other places where his music can't be legally obtained. Furthermore, American legislation wouldn't stop these people in other countries from being able to access foreign websites that have infringing copies of his work.
Finally, tech-savvy Americans could easily get around the proposed measures.
I didn't even get into how the legislation is bad for DNS or legitimate businesses, this seemed to convince him that the bills would have no positive effect.

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Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.

Re:I've done this successfully by Whuffo · 2012-01-31 23:51 · Score: 1

Suggest to your father that the countries you mentioned are largely third-world countries where $3 per day is a good living wage. That should help him understand that those folks are unable to purchase music at the retail price, and the only option they have to listen to tunes is piracy.

Re:Easily done: Some History by binkless · 2012-01-31 07:04 · Score: 2

I think your timeline is a little off here. The so-called Fairness Doctrine was started up in the late 1940's, which is before Rush Limbaugh was even born! The FCC stopped enforcing it in the 1980's which I think is a just after Rush started in radio.

Content Creators Need to Assert Control by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 07:49 · Score: 0

Content Creators or the distribution companies that sell the content will eventually have control over their work through the very mechanism that a poster above suggested. To paraphrase: the only people who know what's being transmitted are on both ends of the keyboard if said transmissions are executed carefully. Ultimately the only way to keep information safe will be to limit it's dissemination to the internet. In the future we'll watch movies, television, play video games, read books or listen to music on devices that allow me to access this data through an encrypted wireless ubiquitous internet connection. When I go to the theater a connected projector (or maybe a 200ft OLED screen) will screen a new release movie for me.

Sure there will be piracy and theft and network breaches and all that jazz but the only way the distributors and creators can control it will be to minimize the cost of these services so that it's more appealing to just pay the fee than it is to try and steal media that is of a questionable nature. Even today I'd rather rent a movie or pay to go to the theater than watch a bootlegged version on MegaUpload to save a few bucks. The ironic thing is that the model that MegaUpload implemented is the right idea but they don't have the rights to the ideas. The companies that have gone after MegaUpload should instead have hired them as consultants and evolved their business model.

This of course means that the sooner one of the companies moves towards this model - and many already are - the less content will be lost to the wild west internet like it is today. All of the Copyrighted material create so far needs to be written off as lost.

Re:Content Creators Need to Assert Control by Elaugaufein · 2012-01-31 10:16 · Score: 1

You've got the analogue conversion problem their for everything but interactive media. People can just record the clear text version on their display device.

You've got the key and lock problem for interactive media (that doesn't do a significant chunk of its processing server side and only send the results), ie you're trying to stop someone from accessing the content (making a copy) who you want to be able access the content (viewing it).

Encryption is great for stopping copying by intermediaries but as for stopping copying by the receiving party, the strength of the encryption is irrelevant (they have the key), you have to instead rely on the strength of your obfuscation of the key (and perhaps the encryption methodology).

perhaps by AdamWill · 2012-01-31 08:10 · Score: 1

You could point out that neither SOPA nor PIPA has actually passed, and yet the takedown of megaupload is still happening. Which rather seems to suggest that current copyright legislation is more than adequate to the purpose.

Simulate DNS blocking of the usual suspects by Citizen+of+Earth · 2012-01-31 08:17 · Score: 1

What can I do to show him how destructive these bills actually are

Just program your friend's computer so it cannot access Google, Facebook, or Wikipedia. Ask him a week later how he likes the SOPA Internet.

Re:Easily done: Some History by langelgjm · 2012-01-31 09:18 · Score: 1

He's referring to the occasional discussion amongst Congressional Democrats about bringing back the Fairness Doctrine, which many conservatives believe is simply a ploy to muzzle talk radio.

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"Anyone who [rips a CD] is probably engaging in copyright infringement." - David O. Carson

Use a good infographic by Daniel+Zappala · 2012-01-31 09:26 · Score: 1

http://venturebeat.com/2011/12/08/sopa-infographic/

Re:Easily done: Some History by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 09:50 · Score: 0

Yes, you are correct. Here's a wikipedia link

In June 2007, Senator Richard Durbin (D-Illinois) said, "It's time to reinstitute the Fairness Doctrine,"[21] an opinion shared by his Democratic colleague, Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts.[22]

On February 4, 2009, Senator Debbie Stabenow (Democrat of Michigan) told radio host Bill Press, when asked whether it was time to bring back the Doctrine:

“ I think it's absolutely time to pass a standard. Now, whether it's called the Fairness Standard, whether it's called something else — I absolutely think it's time to be bringing accountability to the airwaves. ”

When Press asked if she would seek Senate hearings on such accountability in 2009, she replied:

“ I have already had some discussions with colleagues and, you know, I feel like that's gonna happen. Yep.[27]

It's crazy to realize how similar it is to the DMCA. Both give teeth to the government in crippling open dialogue, and both do it by disabling the tech at the time (FCC Licenses and DNS registrations).

Most liberals that I know think of stopping SOPA as a liberal stance, but I just don't see it. Why was every name associated with the Fairness Doctrine a democrat? How can someone hate SOPA so much, but think that radio should be censored based on bias?

Maybe the commonality that people on both sides have can eventually bring us together. Now that you liberals want to stop government intrusion here, I can think of quite a few other issues you should consider :)

I'm posting as anonymous coward this time, because I'm not a karma-whore

What Would Jesus Do? by cmholm · 2012-01-31 09:58 · Score: 1

Many comments have already given excellent examples of how destructive SOPA/PIPA (and for that matter) ACTA are to our ability to use the internet, so I won't rehash them.

However, you may need to address the reason these battles are fought: the idea that copyright violation/piracy is theft.

As Matt Yglesias put it, the difference between theft and copyright violation is the difference between stealing a jar of spaghetti sauce from The Sauce Factory, and reading the label to replicate the recipe at home. In the first case, I've taken a physical thing from The Sauce Factory, and they can't sell it. In the second case, they have the recipe for the sauce, and I have the recipe for the sauce. If I use the recipe to make the sauce instead of buying it, I may have denied The Sauce Factory a possible sale. That is what SOPA/PIPA/ACTA are all about, making it easier for someone with an idea to keep selling the idea, known in the trade as collecting rent.

So, what would Jesus do? If your friend is an observant Christian, an excellent analogy is Feeding the multitude: Jesus' disciples had bought some bread. Via the agency of the Lord, the idea of bread is used to miraculously multiply the supply to feed the multitude of people that had followed Jesus from nearby towns. Instead of sending the people home to buy their bread from the bakers, he freely provides it, thus denying the grain farmers and bakers the sales, or rent, that they would otherwise have collected money from. In modern copyright terms, this made Jesus a pirate. Was Jesus wrong to use the knowledge of breadmaking to make more?

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Luke, help me take this mask off ... Just for once, let me butterfly kiss you with my own eyes.

Re:Setup your own DNS server and point his PC at i by Elaugaufein · 2012-01-31 10:06 · Score: 1

Or he's figuring that if enough people regard a law as illegitimate and refuse to obey it (or aren't aware of it and its not intuitively obvious) , it becomes unenforceable whether or not they all deliberately try to get caught (like what happened with the Prohibition, where instead of stopping alcohol sales it created an impressive criminal market because people weren't impressed by the law).

Pretty much every English-as-a-first-language person on the planet is guilty of infringing on Happy Birthday, see how well the enforcement campaign on that one would go over.

the great picture by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-31 12:09 · Score: 0

in the great picture, it is all about the "old" trying to fit internet to their existing world of copyright and the "young" telling them that they have to fix the copyright to be compatible with the internet. it's evolution.

Their Own Medicine? by LucienChase · 2012-01-31 12:45 · Score: 1

Obviously, it's not a good thing if these bills get put through. On the other hand, if SOPA or PIPA got through, what would be stopping every Tom, Dick and Harry from filing and avalanche of SO/PIPA notices against the *AAs and their constituents in a huge, continual onslaught that would take years and years to be sorted out in the courts? That would at the very least inconvenience them greatly (from an advertising point of view), if not cripple their distribution channels. I would also be deliciously fitting if they were to meet their ends at the hands of their own "weapons".

Take away something he needs to do his job by mykos · 2012-01-31 13:03 · Score: 1

Take it suddenly, with no warning. Make him prove that the item you took really is his, then give it back two weeks after he provided proof. If he gets mad about it because it screwed him at work, tell him that it's no fault of your own. You believed in good faith that the item is yours and you get no repercussions whatsoever for your actions.

Now ask him if he thinks it's a good idea to give media companies the power to veto anything they see as competition.

Perjury? Ha. by mykos · 2012-01-31 13:06 · Score: 1

Name one case in which a media corporation representative was found guilty of perjury in a bad takedown notice.

Yeah, right by tehcyder · 2012-02-01 00:40 · Score: 1

From TFS: "What can I do to show him how destructive these bills actually are, preferably with something that is as unbiased as possible?"

Good luck finding something that isn't biased entirely either for (media companies) or against (slashdot) copyright..

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To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it

By analogy by nilbog · 2012-02-03 05:01 · Score: 1

Say your neighbor is running a meth lab in his basement. In order to combat this, the government passes a new law that no meth houses can have street numbers. A police officer comes by and removes the numbers from your neighbor's house.

Does the meth lab still pose a risk to your neighborhood? Has the law successfully addressed the flow of meth into your community?

This is how SOPA works. The government takes away a server's street number (domain name). The server is still there, and anyone who knows where to find it can still find it. If it happens enough, then the people just come up with their own address system and start ignoring the one that the government controls.

That's pretty straight forward isn't it?

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or else!

Modify his hosts file! by Anonymous Coward · 2012-02-03 05:54 · Score: 0

Ok, I'm not the first one to think of this but I would suggest redirecting their favorite sites to mafiaa.org and mpaa.org...
Wouldn't it suck if every time he went to facebook.com he was redirected to a www.facebookcensorship.com

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Ask Slashdot: How To Inform a Non-Techie About Proposed Copyright Laws

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