SOPA and PIPA (2 Viewers)

[inJust]

It's the media that portrays them as weedsmoking hippies who protest for the sake of protesting. Because remember, it's mostly the corporations that pay the salary for those in the media.
There's heaps of online interviews where people would ask them why they're protesting and they seem like they know what they're complaining about to me.

 

[Lolsmith]

yeah no they don't

the very root of the movement and its name is fundamentally wrong

wall street didn't fuck you over

your government fucked you over

 

[Lolsmith]

although Americans do have the right idea about protesting against corporatism it's just they were protesting about the wrong thing and blaming capitalism and all this nonsense

 

[inJust]

I don't blame the system, I blame the abuse of the system. Of course the government is to blame. Bailing the firms and banks out, yet they just gave their managers and CEO raises.

But the banks are to blame as well, especially firms like the Lehman brothers who caused the market to crash in the first place.

Both are to blame, and I think ows is right. They fundamentally don't blame capitalism. They blame it's exploitation.

 

[Lolsmith]

so the government encouraging/forcing banks and financial institutions to give out high risk loans had nothing to do with it and thereafter guaranteeing they would cover their debt had nothing to do with it

yeah but they do actually blame capitalism

 

[inJust]

I told you, both are to blame. You can't say it's "solely" the government's fault isn't fair.

 

[Lolsmith]

But how can you blame the banks when they are being *forced* to do something?

 

[abbeyroad]

don't forget to blame all the aspies who push for the efficient market hypothesis, the financial engineers who, based on the presumed validity of the emh, used the stochastic method to create a bunch of complex shit that nobody really understood and finally all the traders, executives, and analysts who were willing to bet their money (and others' money too) on exotic derivatives that they didn't fully understand. the government, the finance sector and the academics are all responsible.

wonder what would have happened had they bothered to really stress test their models.

 

[zombies]

This page is worth a read: http://maddox.xmission.com/

 

[inJust]

They seemed "forced" but they gained huge amounts of profit from it as well so their was a profit motive. They weren't forced, but more like they made a mutual agreement at the coersion of the government.

The banks have enough influence over the government to do what it likes. 99 percent of the GOP are bought as well as most of the democrats! So if they threatened to stop "contributing" to the politicians, I think they wouldn't be able to "force"the banks.
But yeah, this would be type of stuff you can write about on www.subjectivemonkey.com

 

[Lolsmith]

yeah that is a fair point

I am writing something about SOPA and PIPA and why it is bad for everyone and even if law makers are pulling out, it's important not to lose sight of what's important

 

[Aliyas]

Two interesting articles if anyone wants something to read:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/insertc...lackout-causes-18-senators-to-flee-from-pipa/

Tl;dr - 18 senators pulled support from PIPA after the blackout.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap...05l2sA?docId=c93737704b504930a11fc307d67b674d

Tl;dr - Megaupload was shut down. THE WAR IS BEGINNING. =P

 

[Azure]

http://techcrunch.com/2012/01/19/sopa-opponents-supporters/

"SOPA Protests Sway Congress: 31 Opponents Yesterday, 122 Now"

Still would pass though.

 

[Lentern]

yeah that is a fair point

I am writing something about SOPA and PIPA and why it is bad for everyone and even if law makers are pulling out, it's important not to lose sight of what's important

Show us when you finish? I could use a condensed version of what it actually means.

 

[Lolsmith]

It is fairly shitty but I make no apologies for it and I might have ~made things up~ about WikiLeak

 

[funkshen]

the same style of censorship china utilises on its own citizens, much like fluoridation is the same style of water sanitation china utilises on its own citizens

ipso facto fluoridation is bad

 

[Lolsmith]

you know full well what I meant by that and I think it's a valid point

 

[Lolsmith]

but are there any other criticisms/tips you can offer funkshen?

 

[funkshen]

the 'business interest' rhetoric is a bit off. this isn't about business, this is about copyright holders (businesses just so happen to hold a lot of copyrights). it will empower small and big copyright holders alike.

you might also mention how this issue has been framed ('theft of intellectual property' - piracy etc is not theft it is conversion, an infringement of property rights)

you might also mention the acronyms. Stop Online Piracy Act - it won't stop online piracy considering it doesn't punish pirates, and won't work : 1) linking to pirated material etc will just move to foreign sites, and 2) foreign sites can only be DNS blacklisted, which can be circumvented with minimal effort. if you want pirated material you can still get it.

you might mention louis c.k.'s success (though it has limited application to the wider issue) in low cost, accessible original content.

you might also question the values of the scumbags who are trying to push this through, like chris "i promise i won't be a lobbyist after i resign from congress" dodd (now head of Motion Picture Association of America)

the wikileaks example is a bit of a non-issue. determined web denizens will still access the site, and you are wrong in saying that the US can 'shut the site down'

to be quite honest a lot of the arguments about economic growth and being a content provider or crowd-based site like reddit are shit. "SOPA would make running Reddit near impossible" is another way of saying your business model is based on infringing copyrights. its like saying i can't run my restaurant without cockroaches and rats everywhere

you might also mention how fluoridation is one big conspiracy and therefore SOPA and PIPA are bad

 

[Lolsmith]

I have no issue with any of those things

learning experiences yeeeee