While many of us were entertained by the impeachment trial of the chief justice, a very important matter concerning our freedom as humanity is currently being debated in the US Congress and Senate as well as in the online world.
What is SOPA and PIPA anyway? SOPA which means “Stop Online Piracy Act” is a bill proposed by the US Congress and PIPA or Protect IP Act is the corresponding bill in the US Senate. These two laws attempt to protect the intellectual property of content or media producers whose business have been severely affected by online piracy. The problem is that these proposed laws have so much room for abuse because the content provider only needs to convince a judge that a certain website is doing piracy and the Attorney General can then order ISPs to block the website. It can also block its source of revenue by ordering payment processors like Paypal to disable accounts.
Why would SOPA and PIPA affect us in faraway Bohol, Philippines? Because if the proposed laws are enacted and enforced to the letter, it would be very easy for content or media producers to allege that websites like Google, Facebook, Wired.com, Wikipedia, Tumblr, WordPress, Blogger, and many more, contain links to pirated content and therefore could be blocked. Then other countries might follow suit. If left unchecked, the Internet might become tiny islands instead of one big network. The impact of such laws would be worldwide but the benefit is only for the media and content industry.
On January 18, 2012, several popular websites like Wikipedia, Wired.com, Google and Facebook showed their protest to the proposed bills by doing a “blackout” or “censorship” of their own websites. US viewers were shown modified home pages with links to various websites that explain the proposed laws as well as links were the user could send a protest message to US Congress.
Two days later, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nevada) delayed indefinitely a vote on the Protect IP Act. “In light of recent events, I have decided to postpone Tuesday’s vote on the Protect IP Act,” the senator said in a statement. The development was considered a victory by the online community.
Sources: http://www.theverge.com/2012/1/18/2715300/sopa-blackout-wikipedia-reddit-mozilla-google-protest
http://democrats.senate.gov/2012/01/20/reid-statement-on-intellectual-property-bill/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop_Online_Piracy_Act