Rethinking How Congress Pushes Copyright Laws

pigrabbitbear writes "Lamar Smith just can't get a break. The Texas congressman and widely despised author of the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) ruffled the Internet's feathers once again this week with the quiet unveiling of a new piece of legislation that's drawing criticism for being plucked out of SOPA's language and rushed through Congress. The Intellectual Property Attaché Act (IPAA) would streamline the process by which the U.S. protects its intellectual property by enforcing U.S. copyright law abroad through specially assigned diplomats or attachés. These officers would report to a new agency-level position, the Assistant Secretary for Intellectual Property and push agendas that, according to the bill's language, are 'consistent with the economic interests of the United States, both domestically and abroad.'"

Comments

Follow The Money

[OrtCloud]

http://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/industries.php?cycle=2012&type=I&cid=N00001811&newMem=N&recs=20

Re:I for one

[spectral7]

Copyright was seen as necessary evil to protect investments into expensive R&D.

Those are patents, not copyright. Copyright is intended to help content creators profit from their work so they can make a living and create more content.

Re:Its funny.

[WindBourne]

The first bill WAS bi-partisan. ANd like I said, I thought it was dead. Said so at the time.
HOWEVER, it is the neo-cons that continue to bring it up in different fashions. And it is fuck heads ACs like you that are worthless and serve to retard all down to your level

Re:I for one

[Anonymous Coward]

The discussion system understands HTML (this post is written with <p>'s around the paragraphs).

When you link, just use HTML:

<a href="http://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/summary.php?cid=N00001811">OpenSecrets<a>

...displays as:

OpenSecrets

If you just want the link displayed and clickable, here is pseudo-html:

<url:"http://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/summary.php?cid=N00001811">

...displays as:

http://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/summary.php?cid=N00001811

Vote Him Out

[misfit815]

Lamar Smith's Democratic opponent in the 21st Congressional District of Texas is Candace Duval (http://www.candaceduval.com/). I'm sure donations are welcome.