Wikipedia supports piracy

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What's up with this Wikipedia shut down in the name of supporting "freedom of thought and freedom of expression"? This is the equivalent of people protesting stores closing their doors at night to prevent theft.

I have intellectual property that I am constantly battling when pirates GIVE my stuff away for free on sites like PirateBay. I don't have $20,000 to file a lawsuit every time this happens, and waiting months just to go after some out of work dude who will just declare bankruptcy, meanwhile there's seeders all over the world so within hours it's a lost cause. The only thing I can do is post decoy torrents, but that's only somewhat effective.

Also I know that our "friends" over in Russian are having a field day setting up online stores to sell pirated software. This is blatant theft. People who support Wikipedia are just freeloading thieves who don't want the looting to end.
 
You, my good sir, are either not too bright or ignorant.

They're raising awareness- and being one of the top visited websites in the world---- A LOT of people will learn about SOPA when they visit Wikipedia and *tah dah*.

SOPA is bad, end of story.

It will be a major step to a heavily censored internet (not wanting China's laws, thank you very much)-
of major censorship, near-total loss of privacy, gov't racketeering, (additional) outrageous fines, ect...
And if you don't realize that SOPA is bad news, you need to educate yourself some more. (read some history)

There are ways to combat piracy and theft/loss of artist profits.
SOPA is the wrong way to do it.

And thank you for showing your ignorance with "People who support Wikipedia are just freeloading thieves".
 
There are ways to combat piracy and theft/loss of artist profits.
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Really? You tell me how you stop a torrent immediately? Immediately is the ONLY way to stop a torrent from spreading like wild fire. The court process doesn't work. It's impractical for stopping piracy. People post illegal torrents and there's nothing you can do about it. Piracy must be stopped from the get go as soon as an illegal torrent is posted. The record, movie and software industry has taken it in the chin for years.

Boy you are really ignorant. Try releasing a CD or movie and then watch powerlessly when people start giving it away for free.
 
I understand that you're frustrated by pirates - but neither SOPA nor PIPA are the answer. If these laws are enacted Bryce here would potentially liable to jail time if I posted a link to a Windows torrent. Taking down the link and banning me as soon as he became aware of it wouldn't be enough, he'd have to physically screen every single post in advance of allowing it to go live.

It would kill the community internet as we know it within months.

Maybe you should familiarise yourself with what you're supporting?
 
Additionally the people who will have to bear the increased costs of the ISPs, Youtube etc. will be us. Why should I pay to protect your IP?
 
There are two issues at hand here.
Stopping piracy is one thing but SOPA/PIPA is so broad that its endangers the future of the internet.

For example, lets say you own a website. Its popular and the money it makes might even be your entire income. I can claim that you have copyrighted material on the website and the internet powers will shut down your site. There is no due process.

Now, maybe you didnt do anything wrong, maybe a random user posted that content like in a forum or comment. Even though you didnt post it, you could face up to 5 years in prison for it.

MAYBE there wasn't any copyrighted material on there in the first place and you are proven innocent. Well, your site has been down for months or even years while you prove yourself innocent. Too bad for you eh?

If SOPA/PIPA went into action, it would be too dangerous for site owners to allow user comments/content/forum posts to go live the moment the user presses submit. They would have to be approved by a moderator. The Technibble forums wouldn't be fun for either of us if I had to do this.
 
Bryce W said:
There are two issues at hand here.
Stopping piracy is one thing but SOPA/PIPA is so broad that its endangers the future of the internet.

For example, lets say you own a website. Its popular and the money it makes might even be your entire income. I can claim that you have copyrighted material on the website and the internet powers will shut down your site. There is no due process.

Now, maybe you didnt do anything wrong, maybe a random user posted that content like in a forum or comment. Even though you didnt post it, you could face up to 5 years in prison for it.

MAYBE there wasn't any copyrighted material on there in the first place and you are proven innocent. Well, your site has been down for months or even years while you prove yourself innocent. Too bad for you eh?

If SOPA/PIPA went into action, it would be too dangerous for site owners to allow user comments/content/forum posts to go live the moment the user presses submit. They would have to be approved by a moderator. The Technibble forums wouldn't be fun for either of us if I had to do this.
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Thanks for that Bryce.

IMHO, this is most likely THE number one issue of ours and the next generation. This goes to the heart of core freedoms in our society. SOPA/PIPA legislation represents a regressive path designed to take control of virtually all electronic creative expression. :mad: It IS that important.

Time to act ladies and gentlemen.
 
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Well it looks like some more are joining in. More the merrier as far as I'm concerned.

Google, Reddit, Wikipedia, BoingBoing, Imgur and Tucows

All the new editions :)

Protests against SOPA, PIPA go viral
Google, Wikipedia, Reddit, BoingBoing plan unprecedented Internet 'strike' Wednesday


Computerworld - In a remarkable example of a grassroots campaign gone viral, several websites including Google, Reddit, Wikipedia, BoingBoing, Imgur and Tucows, are planning an unprecedented Internet "strike" Wednesday to protest controversial anti-piracy legislation being considered by Congress.
Many of the sites plan to go completely dark on Jan 18 to show opposition to the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the Protect IP Act (PIPA). Google will not go dark, but plans to note its opposition by sticking a protest link on its home page.
"Like many businesses, entrepreneurs and web users, we oppose these bills because there are smart, targeted ways to shut down foreign rogue websites without asking American companies to censor the Internet," Google said in a statement. "So tomorrow we will be joining many other tech companies to highlight this issue on our US home page."
According to Fight for the Future, one of the groups organizing the protests, nearly 12,000 websites have said they will join the blackout. That number is still growing.
The planned strike prompted a sharp response from at least one major supporter of the legislation. In a statement Tuesday, former Sen. Chris Dodd, now chairman of the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), blasted the so-called Internet Blackout Day.
"It is an irresponsible response and a disservice to people who rely on them for information," Dodd said. "It is also an abuse of power given the freedoms these companies enjoy in the marketplace today.
Dodd pointed to comments from the White House last week about concerns over the two bills and called for cooperation between all stakeholders.
"Only days after the White House and chief sponsors of the legislation responded to the major concern expressed by opponents..., some technology business interests are resorting to stunts that punish their users," Dodd said in the statement.
Both SOPA and PIPA are aimed at giving copyright and IP owners more tools to go after foreign sites they claim are dedicated to the theft and sale of U.S. goods, music, video and other material. SOPA is being considered by the U.S. House of Representatives; PIPA is under consideration in the U.S. Senate.
Opponents argue that the bills will give content and IP owners too much power to go after websites they decide are infringing on their rights. Though the bills are ostensibly targeted only at foreign websites, critics contend that legitimate U.S. websites will inevitably be forced to undertake costly and impractical monitoring of their sites to ensure compliance with SOPA and PIPA.
Many contend that the provisions in the bills will enable a sort of Internet censorship and prior restraint on free speech, though supporters have insisted that such criticisms are overblown.
Concern about the bills has been simmering for weeks and appears to have boiled over in the last few days. Late last week, Reddit announced that it would black out its site for 12 hours on Wednesday to express opposition to the measures.
The company was soon joined by Wikipedia, which said it would black out its site all day Wednesday. Numerous other sites then adopted the same plans.
Tiffiniy Chen, a co-founder of Fight for the Future, said protests against the bills is now so widespread "it is in many ways beyond us."
The organization's Sopastrike.com site offers various tips and links designed to make it easier for Website owners to participate in the strike or to register their protest with elected officials. "I'm not surprised at the response," Cheng said today. "These bills are extremely disrespectful to how the Internet works."
Garlin Gilchrist II, national campaign director for MoveOn.Org, another site that will go black tomorrow, said that so far more than 240,000 MoveOn members have signed petitions expressing their opposition to SOPA and PIPA.
"The bills are incredibly problematic, both as intended and as designed," Gilchrist said.
 
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It is not piracy there worried about it is royalties? money, money, money.

I live in Australia, back in the seventies we had to wait 6 months for new music to hit our shores and when it did we were paying somewhere between $20 and $40 for a LP, if my friends wanted a copy of I would record it to a blank cassette tape. The authorities and music companies at the time never said jack **** because they were making so much money through inflated wholesale pricing.

I am dead set against someone sitting inside a cinema and filming a movie, or someone leaking a studio copy of album, but if I want to share a song or movie that I have bought legitimately with my neighbor, whom happens to be over the other side of the world or down the road then that's my freedom to do so, no government or authority is going to stop me.
 
I'm sorry but if you create software, then you are responsible for locking it down and making sure someone cant mass pirate it. Yes there is always someone who can crack it. But Change your serial registration process, do other things that fight it. Make the damn thing connect to your server to verify its a legit copy.
 
but if I want to share a song or movie that I have bought legitimately with my neighbor, whom happens to be over the other side of the world or down the road then that's my freedom to do so, no government or authority is going to stop me.
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The torrents on Pirate Bay are not private torrents. They are public for the world to download. I've never been sent or seen a Pirate Bay private movie/ music torrent in my life and I don't know anyone who has. There are tons of so-called "private" torrents on RapidShare, MegaVideo, MegaUpload, zShare.net, and others. The problem is that there are 3rd party search engines and forums that help people easily find the pirated content.

The sky isn't going to fall. The worst offenders will just get shut down.
 
The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

Today piracy, tomorrow it's reinterpreted and expanded for some other means. Its been done in history many times over. I can go into detail but I rather someone else do the research.

Bottom line this is another attempt at control. It used to be said, control the media control the world. Media is somewhat antiquated, the newest propaganda tool is the net control the internet control the world.

Don't buy into it, its a farce. They want the first stepping stone toward control, and since when did this become a government priority? Are people dying on the streets because Spy Kids 3D is being pirated?

You don't throw a frog into boiling water, you put it in at room temperature and boil it slowly.

For the first time in human history a simple man's wisdom can reach anyone who is willing to listen. And you want to government to control this for mega million dollar corporations? for who's benefit? Not ours!

Guess what make everything that could be slightly interpreted as bad or evil and remove it. You don't have freedom, you have... North Korea.

Iran, Egypt, Libya, and ... have revolutions over tyranny and suddenly we need to limit piracy. Hmmm
 
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When the powers that be have too much power, sometimes a lot of good CAN come from it. Imagine how many criminals that could be caught if the U.S. was a police state? They could just pull people over for no reason, search them, hold them, question them. Lots of criminals would be put away. But do we want that? NO! Imagine how many criminals get out on technicalities and loopholes. Why? Because the accused is presumed innocent, and the jury must find beyond a reasonable doubt that they are guilty. More criminals would get locked up if we did things differently, but so would more innocent people. So these regulations in question are ludicrous. Absolutely ludicrous. Such laws will hurt the little guy every which way, and hurt the big guy in some ways (which is why google is against it).
 
RegEdit said:
Try releasing a CD or movie and then watch powerlessly when people start giving it away for free.
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I hope one day, all the terrible artists that dominate the radio and are doing it solely for the money go away.. There is sooooo much music out there that is way better than the filth the big labels put out that people will gladly make for free/enough money to make it to the next show.

Don't like piracy? Stop making music/movies/software.. The world probably won't notice.


And this sopa/ndaa arrest/detain first ask questions later/never bs taking the country by storm is against everything this country stands for and I'm willing to fight to the death to stop it.
 
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In a statement Tuesday, former Sen. Chris Dodd, now chairman of the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), blasted the so-called Internet Blackout Day.
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This is the biggest problem. Politicians support bills like SOPA for their own self interests. Dodd was offered the job at MPAA shortly after leaving politics, that was a reward for his support. These bills are not about stopping piracy, they are about protecting revenue for big business. Monster cable has already stated they will go after ebay and crags list because those are the biggest distributors of fake products. But both sites are not the distributors, a small portion of their customers are.
Let the legal system handle copyright infringement and stop this bill that is just another step on a slippery slope of losing our freedoms.


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I hope one day, all the terrible artists that dominate the radio and are doing it solely for the money go away.. There is sooooo much music out there that is way better than the filth the big labels put out that people will gladly make for free/enough money to make it to the next show.
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Piracy does not discriminate.
You may think that labels are making money hand over fist but in reality it takes 20 artists to get one that floats to the top. So for every big money earner there's 19 failures.

Actually it's piracy that has caused the film industry to shy away from originality. It's too risky to make a movie so they do warmed over remakes.

You may think that terrible music dominates the airwaves but record companies actually look on Pirate Bay to see who are the most popular artists. When they see it's Lady Gaga then they spend more money pushing her. So it's not a couple of suits in a New York skyscraper that decide who gets all of the ad dollars.
 
SOPA and PIPA are both geared for government censorship of the Internet, not anti-piracy. It's effectively providing the government authority to be the enforcement agents of people like you with an axe to grind.

Right now, most nations do not impose any restrictions on the Internet out of an international agreement, especially ours. The entire reason everybody's up in arms is because we will effectively kill the Internet. If our country can start to take action against Internet-based issues -- the country that makes up a large portion of literally everything online -- we are effectively enforcing OUR country's policy on the rest of the Internet, similar to what China and some third world countries do. We do this and we literally fragment the Internet as other countries don't want U.S. laws imposed on their people or their portions of servers that make up the Internet. We do this, we break the agreement, so does everyone else.

So yes, while you don't feel like spending money to enforce a copyright on intellectual property on people who would have never bought your software if it wasn't for free is stealing, the rest of us are looking at the big picture. This will be the first time the U.S. has passed legislation to effectuate control over any portion of the Internet. Those protesting know that keeping governments out of the Internet is the only way to keep it running.

And just FYI, the blackout idea wasn't started by Wikipedia or Google, or any other Fortune 500 company. It was started by Anonymous.

Anyway, I guess I support privacy, too. *shrugs* Oh well. I shut down my company's site and twitter (including my own) hours ago. :rolleyes:

nk-SOPAblackout.png


Section 102 impose new requirements that ISPs need to disallowed given IP addresses to resolve on their privately-owned DNS servers, search engines must remove links from their privately-owned servers, payment network (e.g. PayPal, etc.) must prevent/prohibit/suspend transactions on their own privately-owned servers, ad networks must stop serving advertisements and cease any compensation; all because someone says there's intellectual property on a single server.

Section 103 creates a notice and cut-off system that allows a person to allege copyright infringement and all payment and ad networks must cease doing business and close accounts for that site, whether or not the site has complied with 512 of the DMCA, if the "infringing content" is in some weird corner of the site operator or if the site operator is even aware of it... within 5 days.

SOPA requires DNS filtering be enabled on host servers which interferes with the core Internet infrastructure and does little to curb infringement. Most file-sharing networks are IP-based. DNS doesn't work on IP addresses at all, it's the other way around.

SOPA will require site operators at every level to screen it's content and all users on their sites to prevent someone from using even a trademark so as not to get shutdown, financially cut-off and frozen and face 5+ years in prison because someone else did something stupid.

SOPA would effectively chill the voice of every user on the Internet as every site operator would have to become content police over everything on their servers, 24/7.

Worst of all, SOPA allows an alleged rights holder to do all of this without even proof, an example or even to be correct about their allegation in the end. Just alleging a claim would shut down the site, their ad revenue, access to it by outside parties, etc. at the whim of any copyright holder.

This passes, maybe I can mention a certain site may have something of mine that's copyrighted and the way their site is just doesn't allow me to "confirm" the infringement. After all, I'm just guessing and that's all it takes. Nothing bad can happen to the alleging party. ;) Thinking of it, could take all of a week for people to do that and take down every site on the Internet in America. Hmm...
 
All I know is that for 10 years artists have been powerless to stop piracy of their stuff. I know a lot of indie filmmakers and people in Hollywood. Try releasing a movie and watch in horror when droves of leachers steal your movie. There's a whole new generation of people who don't pay for anything. They will sit and wait for it to appear on Pirate Bay, Rapid Share, LetMeWatchThis, etc.On Pirate Bay the top torrents have over 10,000 leachers and over 10,000 seeders at any given moment in time.
 
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