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SOPA Protests 'Poisoned the Well,' Says Congressional Staffer
Techdirt has a story about statements from Congressional staffer Stephanie Moore, who had some interesting — and somewhat insulting — things to say about the 'net-wide protests against the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA). "Netizens poisoned the well, and as a result the reliability of the internet is at risk," she said. Moore went on, "Congress was criticized for not being tech savvy, but from a lot of the comments we got it became clear that the people who were calling us did not understand the bill any better than we did." The article also points out comments from Steve Metalitz, a lawyer who represents members of the entertainment industry: "Most countries in the world already have this option at their disposal to deal with this problem. If site blocking broke the internet, then the internet would already be broken."
The protests ruined the staffer's lobbying gig that is on the other side of the revolving door.
Fugue for Aaron Swartz
Moore and Metalitz still don't get it. Its not about the Internet or site blocking, its about that fundamental characteristics of our nation. Its about due process and freedom of speech.
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
"Congress was criticized for not being tech savvy, but from a lot of the comments we got it became clear that the people who were calling us did not understand the bill any better than we did."
Soooooo, we (Congress) didn't understand a law we wrote (or at least the lobbyist wrote) and all of you protesting didn't understand it either - making you just as dumb as us!
In your face!
When we do it, it is "poisoning the well", but when they do it, it is a well executed strategic victory and they should all get bonuses.
"Congress was criticized for not being tech savvy, but from a lot of the comments we got it became clear that the people who were calling us did not understand the bill any better than we did."
So you were passing legislation that you did not understand. That is not why you were elected. You were not elected to be a rubber stamp. If we wanted one of those we could probably have bought on at Staples and it would have been been way cheaper than your salary.
Undetectable Steganography? Yep, there's an app fo
In those countries where they do filter and block websites, the internet is broken. No one has any free speech. Political opposition is just blocked along with anything "offensive" like pornography. Anything the government does not agree with is shut down. That is very broken and for a country that considers itself the home of the free, then those systems would be considered completely corrupt and unethical.
But who cares. It's all for the greater good.
The greater good.
The greater good.
"Most countries in the world already have this option at their disposal to deal with this problem. If site blocking broke the internet, then the internet would already be broken."
Countries like China and Iran. Do we want the Internet controlled like those countries?
Well, yes, for residents of countries that have that power, the Internet is, in fact already broken.
There are more than enough people and resources behind each and every bill brought up before the Senate and/or Congress. There is more than enough study and research behind the scenes. Playing out "ignorance" in any respect is merely a show, merely another part of the "smoke and mirrors" game. The unfortunate advantage of the intelligent "netizens" is that we DO know, we DO have facts, we DO have experience and in general, it's those of us that helped to build what is called "The Internet" - old school BBS Sysops and hackers and the likes - that are speaking out - and we're the one's that actually understand the entire paradigm. This, to me, is mere BS marketing.
YankDownUnder Veni, Vidi, volo in domum redire
Wow. Did she really just justify US policy-making by making a "majority of nations" argument???
There are 87 UN member states that are full-fledged democracies or "fully free" according to Freedom House. There are a total of 193 UN member states.
Which means that even in the United Nations (which doesn't contain all autonomous national entities) ONLY 45% ARE EVEN DEMOCRACIES.
Dear Stephanie, if policy makers used the "most countries in the world" argument to justify policy decisions, the WORLD would be broken.
------ The best brain training is now totally free : )
"If site blocking broke the internet, then the internet would already be broken"
Most countries aren't at the center of the Internet and most countries don't play such a pivotal role in core Internet technologies like America does.
I think the content industry has an entitlement problem. We live in a democracy, not a utopia. Churchill said something to the effect of "a democracy is a terrible form of government, but its the best one anyone has come up with so far"; I am butchering the quote.
The only way for a democracy to ever be a utopia is if everyone agreed with everyone else on everything. That is not likely to happen. We all have rights, and sometimes in exercising those rights we are going to infringe in some mild way on the rights of others. Its unavoidable. One of the stated goals of our organizing document is to promote the general welfare; a big part of that is maximizing each individuals ability to exercise their rights, and putting some minimal controls in place to limit the amount of infringement on the rights of others that occurs. That infringement can't be eliminated so where permitted it should happen in a fair way, in that harm is spread around equally.
The content industry does not seem to recognize that society has already given them all sorts of concessions; which limit the rights of others in order to protect them. They have copyright extensions that go well beyond what the Constitution stated the aim of copyright to be; they have tools like DMCA, the have FBI acting like the own team of private investigators, the have the FCC requiring completely unnecessary content control features in electronics, the list goes on.
None of those things are sufficient to eliminate copyright violations. I think may of them already go to far but in any case the amount of copyright infringement going on out there is at a perfectly acceptable level. Why, well because the content industry is wildly profitable, and while I think private property is the cornerstone of freedom, these guys are not hurting they don't need more protection for the state to hold on to what is theirs. Any good it would do them is in no way proportional the harm it does to others.
Lots of folks are limited by what the content industry already has. Indie artists can't use all sorts of material because is locked up under copyright in perpetuity, small manufactures are locked out of the market because they can't implement mandatory DRM, tinkers are locked out of their hobbies by draconian FCC rules, citizens have the privacy violated by the FBI and others all the time. Giving the content industry the right to completely curb stomp our ability to express ourselves on the Internet, with no process and no appeals; is simply unjustified.
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
I love the argument that "everybody else is doing it!" Yes: China, Pakistan, India, and Iran block free speech. So why can't we? If it works for them, it has to work for us, right?
but from a lot of the comments we got it became clear that the people who were calling us did not understand the bill any better than we did
This is probably true. It is a frustrating part of fighting any legislation. Most people are emotionally motivated, not logically motivated. They don't understand what the heck they are talking about. Yet you need sheer numbers so you can't say "don't call your legislator unless you have a CS degree and can explain all this." So unfortunately, no matter what the issue, most of the people standing with you don't know what they are talking about. Same goes for most of the people standing against you too.
The problem here is that due process means courts -- long, expensive procedures are used to decide if copyright infringement took place. Nobody can make the argument that such a system is appropriate in this century. As the RIAA discovered, you simply cannot sue everyone who infringes copyrights online, there are too many people doing it.
The copyright industry thinks that the problem is with due process, as opposed to attempting to apply a concept that originated in an age of printing presses to a society where everyone has the equipment needed to make perfect copies in their homes.
Palm trees and 8
good post.
really, capitalism is greed. reduce it to what it really is and call a spade a space.
capitalism is greed, in action.
and we are SURPRISED AND SHOCKED that such a system has utterly failed us?
no boundaries, no limits and greed-driven laws and ethics.
its no wonder we are as fucked up as we are! I'm talking about the world, here; since the capitalism disease has spread thru much of the world and the US is intent on forcing it on every last nation, too.
that's what are 'democracy building' is. forcing our levels of greed on the rest of mankind.
nice......
--
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
Humans are always going to have greed. Capitalism is simply the engine that makes the best use of it.
Would it be nice if there's a better way? Of course. But no such ways are feasible.
Humans are always going to have compassion.
Humans are always going to have rapists.
Humans are always going to have intelligence.
Humans are always going to have illness.
I don't see why greed ought to be the thing to pick to base your society on. And don't forget that humans are nature+nurture - you can play down or reinforce qualities in any community.
Also, how is the xkcd reviewing going? I do tend to picture neckbeards as dilettante libertarians, so thanks for confirming another stereotype. ;-)
OF COURSE there are better ways.
curbs. curbs on how much power and wealth you can amass.
we have not tried that, not really. we have curbs on the stock market (or, we used to!) and that worked for a while.
no curbs on power in the capitalistic west. let the powerful get more powerful. and, due to that, those below that level sink even lower.
is this really the best that mankind can do? I hardly think so!
we are lazy and have given up trying to make better ways to govern and care for ourselves.
but there *are* ways to fix our broken system. its just that those in power keep the old system since it favors their situation.
--
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
I don't see why greed ought to be the thing to pick to base your society on.
Perhaps you should have a look at the historical record, and find out what happened in countries that claimed to be suppressing greed. They racked up a pretty hefty body count.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Except that they didn't even claim that. They claimed that it was bad to oppose the bill without understanding it, but good to support the bill without understanding it. Which is the exact inverse of what I would consider to be the correct sentiment for a person in Congress. If someone in Congress does not understand a bill, they should vote against it. You might be able to make a case that they could take the word of a trusted staffer who understands the bill, but in this case the "trusted staffer" is admitting that they didn't understand the bill either.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
This is what someone who hasn't actually studied capitalism thinks. This is the propagandized version.
Capitalism is the other way around. It's people who are free to vote with their dollars. If you want to succeed, you need to provide something with value. The only way to divert from capitalism is to remove its freedoms. You force the money into places where there isn't value. You make people behave according to some arbitrary government agenda rather than market demands. You ALWAYS end up shrinking the economy.
The "no boundaries" bit is ignorant nonsense as well. There are always laws regarding financial transactions. There is a huge difference between greed and self-interest. Greed generally causes damage to one's reputation and leads to laws start being broken and opens up the door to competitors...unless you have a monopoly or are aligned with corrupt government.
One more thing, capitalism is the only way a country 16T in debt is going to crawl out of the hole. We need all the economic activity we can possibly achieve.
"One more thing, capitalism is the only way a country 16T in debt is going to crawl out of the hole"
The only way to get a country into 16Tn debt is by capitalism.
But I guess it melds nicely into the fundamental depravity of religious thinking: give you a problem, then claim they are the only ones with a cure.
"Capitalism is the other way around."
Capitalism is the screed of greed. End of story.
"It's people who are free to vote with their dollars."
And then, to gather power, you get more money. Wich means more power, and the ability to get more money. Which means a continuing descending spiral of greed.
You can't vote with your dollars and not pay for food.
And if you have no money because some rich bastard has offshored your job, you have no say.
Capitalism is the only political system that takes away your rights and claims it to be your fault all along. You really are a horrible piece of slime, you are.
"If you want to succeed, you need to provide something with value."
So you're against inheritance and want it taxed at 100%, right? You want investment dividends removed, right? You want management removed, right? And charging for banking loans should be banned, yes?
After all, the only ones producing the valueable stuff you're selling are the workers, not their dependants and not the leeches who are syphoning money off the working populace merely because they've managed to leech money off someone dead or already wealthy.
"You ALWAYS end up shrinking the economy."
Yes these capitalists investing their dividends OUTSIDE the economy, who don't spend the money in the economy and who are free to remove themselves entirely from the source of their unearned wealth ALWAYS ends up shrinking the economy.
Hell, the difference between Clinton (higher taxes, reduced debt, economic boom) with shrub who inhereted the windfall economy then by removing taxes caused a worldwide recession, and with Obama's spineless kowtowing to the rabid right-wing whereby stalling the economy even further because idiotic parasites like you whine and bitch about government, should show you your unthinking and poisonous mental garbage proposition is PROVEN FALSE.
"There is a huge difference between greed and self-interest."
There isn't.
But capitalism as practiced by people like you don't bother with the self-interest beyond "am I making more money?" and is in no sense different from rapatious greed.
"... the people who were calling us did not understand the bill any better than we did"
I can't believe she used this as an argument. If they don't understand the bill, and their constituents didn't understand the bill, there can only be two reasons for trying to pass it:
1) Passing legislation for legislation's sake (Stupid)
2) Passing legislation because you are compelled to by another party that only holds it's own interests (Evil)
So they are either stupid or evil (or both)
When Bush the younger started to gut the EPA and turn it into a White House mouthpiece I suddenly developed a strange and new found respect for Richard Nixon.
That is deeply and truely sad. Perversely symmetrical too.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.