SOPA: Explanation by Example

Now that the SOPA / PIPA debate has expanded beyond Washington, Silicon Valley, and Hollywood, more than a few people have asked me to explain the issue and how it affects them.

There are a good many sources out there that do a excellent job of explaining the technical issues and the opponents on each side.  However, I’ve found this simple example seems to illustrate my stance quite well.

So lets say that I decide to go to Mexico, and start a company selling illegal copies of Family Guy. What would you do about it?

If your answer is, "Ban the address of my store from every phonebook, and charge YellowBook for the pleasure of enforcement", then you are a SOPA supporter.

However if you're me, or someone like me, you'd realize that won't solve the problem. My store is still there, my store is still selling: I'm happy. However, no one else is, because:

1. Shadowy businessmen in the US now have an easy way to eliminate competition, whether it's legitimate or not.

2. Yellowbook has to quadruple it's staff, or be shut down for violating the law, and

3. No one trusts the phonebook anymore, because who knows who has banned who recently.

There are laws, such as DMCA, and technologies, such as Youtube Content ID, already in place that address these issues.  Enacting such blunt and overreaching legislation is damaging and also, coincidentally, won't work.

So why has this spilled over to the front pages of Google, Reddit, and Wikipedia? Because we’ve fought the good fight for almost a year, but despite our best efforts, this destructive legislation still has steam.  So now, at this critical juncture, we believe this issue to be so important that it’s necessary to widen the debate to the public at large.  

People like me are passionate about building a new world based on this technology, and we believe that so far, it’s changed humanity for the better.   Help us defend the internet by opposing these bills, so we can go back to work.