The bill has been held already after two SOPA opponents-turned-cosponsors of this bill withdrew under fire, led by Ernesto Falcon of Public Knowledge and much of the activist anti-SOPA crowd. Total time since word first broke: ~2 days. These things /can/ move quickly, which is why I'm paying attention to it for the startup community.<p>We're engaging with Rep. Issa and Chaffetz's office to express our continued concerns.<p>Contact Troy Stock at Rep. Chaffetz's office $firstname.$lastname@mail.house.gov<p>I don't have a staff contact yet for Rep. Issa's office, but I'll update when I do.<p>I'll note that the startup community fucked up.<p>We had a decent opportunity to knock out Smith in the primary. We failed to engage. We lost $350k, left it on the table, when a PAC approached local organizers, offered the money if we had been able to identify 15,000 potential Lamar Smith opponents in the district. Campaigning 101.<p>We were raising money for ads, and failed to do this basic foundational work, meaning we failed to get the money, which knocked off at least one major incumbent in Texas that day (Silvestre Reyes).<p>As it is, know how much SOPA was worth? Five percentage points, with Lamar going from 83% in '10 to 77% in '12 during the primary.<p>EDIT: Look for an update today from TechDirt, assuming Masnick can confirm on the record our reports that the bill has been held from further action at this time.<p>EDIT2: Also, the IP Attache bill is apparently near-copies of pages 70-78 of SOPA, though I haven't verified this.
WOW if we protected people health and wellbeing as well as we protect digital media then the World would be full of healthier people. Kind of messed up realy.<p>I'd dare say more TAXable income thru avoidance is lost in a single day than is lost through piracy in a single year. That would realy put things into perspective.<p>[EDIT ADD] Just did a quick thumb in the air statistical google for the UK <a href="http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/the-staggers/2011/11/tax-avoidance-justice-network" rel="nofollow">http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/the-staggers/2011/11/tax-a...</a> gives us £69.9 billion a year lost thru TAX avoidance (esitmated) and for piracy the net effect is <a href="http://www.itproportal.com/2011/11/11/video-game-piracy-uk-costs/" rel="nofollow">http://www.itproportal.com/2011/11/11/video-game-piracy-uk-c...</a> for games and for movies <a href="http://www.metro.co.uk/news/817878-illegal-downloading-cost-1-4bn" rel="nofollow">http://www.metro.co.uk/news/817878-illegal-downloading-cost-...</a><p>So alot less and yet the effort/publicity for the later and laws compared to combating the former TAX fraud/avoidance do seem somewhat out of kilt.<p>Need I say anything else beyond messed up priorities.
As a resident of Texas, I apologize for the continuation of Lamar Smith's complete:<p>1) Lack of social and moral awareness<p>OR<p>2) Complete corruption by large monied forces.<p>I swear we all aren't dumb rednecks down here. Most of us are pretty cool. Mr. Smith on the other hand, is a tool.
Isn't "architect" given Rep. Smith a bit too much credence? It's pretty clear at this point that Smith isn't actually writing these things, and may not even have conceived of the strategy to get them in play. He's just doing what some lobbyists have convinced him to do.
Dear United States of America,<p>Please stop trying to impose your ridiculous and restrictive policies and law on us. There a simple reason we don't have the same legislation you do: WE DON'T WANT IT.<p>Sincerely,
The rest of the world
This may be slightly off-topic but wondering what the obviously-continental-European power plugs (those that aren't USB plugs in the protest image) are doing in an ad advertising protesting SOPA. Are the French and Germans supposed to go off-line to protest American legislation?<p>As for the bill, isn't it pretty obviously a copyright maximalist position internationally? I wonder what this has to do with the USTR's reversal on that recently.
make no mistake:<p>"imaginary property" != "real property"<p>importanceof("real property") > importanceof("imaginary property")<p>mistakenly equating the two, as most politicians do -- because "well, why should the internet be any different?" -- erodes real property rights (and civil rights, ...). yes, really: distributor (excuse me... creator) imaginary property rights absolutely come second to my real physical property and privacy rights. i don't care how many revenue forecasts aren't met. ROI is not a right, it's a market risk. you don't like the returns? buy a farm and be glad the imaginary property advocates haven't lobbied the right to lock your door away from you yet. you could be infringing my copyright (not to mention commiting thoughtcrimes, or storing encrypted-looking data) behind that closed door.<p>y2k12wtf!