On Wednesday 18 January the English Wikipedia, among thousands of other websites, went dark. This was part of a massive wave of protest against two US bills, the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the Protect IP Act (PIPA), which in theory aim to stop copyright infringement, but in practice will infringe freedom of speech, and damage the internet as a free and open medium.
Twenty-five Greenpeace websites also went dark on Wednesday. The organisation’s International Executive Director Kumi Naidoo gave an interesting example: Exxon/Esso had actually taken Greenpeace to court over alleged copyright infringement, because the organisation had spoofed the company’s logo as part of its campaign against corporate abuse of the environment. “We said it was free speech,” argues Kumi Naidoo. “The court agreed with us [...] But had that decision been left to Exxon/Esso, we would have been shut down.”
Dan Gillmor talks about the creation of “an information monoculture where regimes work with corporations to control more than what we can read, hear and watch, because they will control how we can speak beyond the room we’re in at the moment”. After the protest on Wednesday SOPA and PIPA are in retreat, but as Wikipedia put it, they “are waiting in the shadows.” Although the threat is still there, the protest has changed the agenda: the need to protect freedom of speech, and the will to sustain a free and open internet, are the new terms of reference. And this may prove to be not only the greatest success of the protest, but the key moment in the struggle against censorship.
Dan Gillmor was very much to the point when he argued in The Guardian that the issue is set in the form of a false binary: a choice between absolute state and corporate control over the internet, and piracy. In other words, if we do not accept that the state and private corporations will have the power to blacklist and block websites simply on the basis of allegations and without due process, we are supposedly endorsing piracy. This binary is misleading because what is actually at stake here is our democratic rights and liberties; and the real binary is in the form of a choice between freedom of speech, and its infringement.
Twenty-five Greenpeace websites also went dark on Wednesday. The organisation’s International Executive Director Kumi Naidoo gave an interesting example: Exxon/Esso had actually taken Greenpeace to court over alleged copyright infringement, because the organisation had spoofed the company’s logo as part of its campaign against corporate abuse of the environment. “We said it was free speech,” argues Kumi Naidoo. “The court agreed with us [...] But had that decision been left to Exxon/Esso, we would have been shut down.”
Dan Gillmor talks about the creation of “an information monoculture where regimes work with corporations to control more than what we can read, hear and watch, because they will control how we can speak beyond the room we’re in at the moment”. After the protest on Wednesday SOPA and PIPA are in retreat, but as Wikipedia put it, they “are waiting in the shadows.” Although the threat is still there, the protest has changed the agenda: the need to protect freedom of speech, and the will to sustain a free and open internet, are the new terms of reference. And this may prove to be not only the greatest success of the protest, but the key moment in the struggle against censorship.
SOPA and PIPA would put the burden on website owners to police user-contributed material and call for the unnecessary blocking of entire sites. Small sites won’t have sufficient resources to defend themselves. Big media companies may seek to cut off funding sources for their foreign competitors, even if copyright isn’t being infringed. Some foreign sites would be prevented from showing up in major search engines. And, SOPA and PIPA build a framework for future restrictions and suppression.
For years, the US has condemned countries like China and Iran for their clampdown on Internet use. But now, the impact of these new censorship laws could be far worse -- effectively blocking sites to every Internet user across the globe.
Last year, a similar Internet censorship bill was killed before reaching the US Senate floor, but it’s now back in a different form. Copyright laws already exist and are enforced by courts. But this new law goes much further -- granting the US government and big corporations enormous powers to force service providers and search engines to block websites based just on allegations of violations -- without a trial or being found guilty of any crime!
How PIPA and SOPA Violate White House Principles Supporting
Free Speech and Innovation, Electronic Frontier Foundation
Stop the Great Firewall of America, Rebecca MacKinnon, The New York Times
Free Speech and Innovation, Electronic Frontier Foundation
Stop the Great Firewall of America, Rebecca MacKinnon, The New York Times
The Great Firewall of America, James Allworth,
Harvard Business Review Blog Network
Why We’ve Censored Wired.com, Evan Hansen, Wired
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