Google rips Senate's online piracy bill: 'This is what is wrong with Washington'

http://thehill.com/blogs/hillicon-valley/technology/196385-google-piracy-bill-a-trial-lawyers-dream

by cwan • 15 years ago

161 45 15 years ago

“When Google and other piracy apologists start talking about free speech, it’s completely disingenuous,” Harbinson said. “These guys don’t give a crap about free speech.”

Maybe they don't, but at least they are trying to stop this bill, while the others are pushing for it, clearly not giving a crap about free speech either, as it seems all they care about is the ability to stop piracy - at all cost.

roc• 15 years ago

> "while the others are pushing for it, clearly not giving a crap about free speech either"

This, I think, is the problem in American politics. The best the citizenry can hope for, given the amount of corruption that unfettered political donation has brought, is for a corporate champion whose own economic interests just happen to align with our liberty on this issue.

Because the legislators supporting this don't care about piracy any more than Google cares about free speech. They care about protecting their share of political donations by the industries whose economic interests are aligned with pushing crap like SOPA.

CWuestefeld5• 15 years ago

the amount of corruption that unfettered political donation has brought

That's one side of the issue, and it's not inaccurate. But I'd ask you to consider the other side as well.

Why do you think that businesses find it worthwhile to dump so much money into political contributions? I submit that the reason is because, as the government has assumed increasing amounts of power, it acquires the ability to confer significant advantages upon those favored by the law. So it's necessary for business to take extreme steps to ensure that they are, in fact, favored thusly.

In these terms, I think that a more constructive strategy for solving the problem isn't to attack political contributions (which is bound to get into thorny First Amendment questions), but to strike at the root by limiting the power that the government has to decide who is going to win and who is going to lose.

If we take away the government's power, then there's nothing for corporations to buy. If we give the government more power (to regulate the corporations' contributions and other matters), then there is an even greater incentive for the corporations to influence the goverenment -- which is exactly what we're trying to get away from.

kevinalexbrown• 15 years ago

It's not just piracy, unfortunately. Suppose SOPA passes - there are all these tools available to stop Google/other services from interacting with "rogue" websites.

But what about other things that are as bad as or worse than piracy -- if we use those tools to stop piracy, why not use SOPA-like tools to stop them? (This isn't a slippery-slope argument, it's more of an "equivalent-harms" one.) Similar to how terrorism-inspired tools are used all the time for non-terrorism law enforcement.

firefoxman12• 15 years ago

Yeah Google obviously isn't trying to protect free speech; they have their own business interest in mind. But really, who cares what their motivation is, as long as someone is fighting the dark side.

This bill has turned into a fight between old Big Business vs. new Big Business. There would be no reason for congressmen to just randomly decide to create a bill like this. It was obviously the result of heavy lobbying from the dying record industry, the overpriced and overpaid film industry, and older tech companies like Microsoft. It's just nice to see newer big companies like Facebook and Google fight on the opposing side, even if it's just because this bill could possibly kill their companies.

I've read the bill myself and it's pretty unsettling. Check section 1.4 for some real-world "1984" thinking.

numeromancer2• 15 years ago

"But really, who cares what their motivation is, as long as someone is fighting the dark side."

If you must make any agreements with firefoxman, make sure you get it in writing, notarized, with witnesses.

ddw• 15 years ago

> "This will protect Americans’ intellectual property rights, which in turn boosts our economy and promotes American jobs,” Leahy said in a statement.

Besides lawyers, is there really any evidence behind this?

rayiner• 15 years ago

There is way more money in catering to companies like Google that build markets than there is in helping the RIAA keep grandma and cousin Timmy from illegally downloading music.

I don't think there is any real money in SOPA for anyone involved. It just seems to be a dying industry spitefully flailing about as it takes its last gasps of breath.

click170• 15 years ago

> “All players in the Internet chain who profess to care about copyright protections should come forward with meaningful solutions — not simply throw up unfounded charges and suggest they will ignore the will of Congress anyway," said Recording Industry Association of American senior vice president for communications Jonathan Lamy.

1) maybe they don't see a need for additional solutions like you do.

2) the will of congress? You mean your will, care of your lobbyists, care congress, right?

redthrowaway• 15 years ago

Those comments are downright depressing.

tomp• 15 years ago

It seems that the main argument of the supporters of the bill is that piracy is bad for the economy, since it causes job loss.

In reality, at least the way I see it, things could not be further from the truth. Yes, there is a slight loss to the American economy when foreign consumers are not paying for the movies and music (although mostly American companies are to blame here - I cannot buy music anywhere on the internet even if I want to, so TPB is my only source of 24/7 entertainment). However, when it is the American customers that are "stealing", this is not really bad for the economy, as no money is actually lost, it is simply redistributed when the consumers use the money they saved when downloading to buy other stuff - probably coming from the industries that make much less profit than the entertainment industry.

Also, the entertainment industry seems unable or unwilling to face the fact - the consumers aren't buying not because they can download for free, but because the products are crap, not worth the money. Avatar was the most commercially successful movie of all times, in the period of most piracy of all times.

Natsu• 15 years ago

> It seems that the main argument of the supporters of the bill is that piracy is bad for the economy, since it causes job loss.

The average politician sees IP related matters in purely economic terms. So the most effective line of argument is to compare the economic cost of new regulations to their benefit.

I suggest keeping that in mind when writing your representatives on this issue.

biot• 15 years ago

This makes me wonder what it'd be like if Google ever goes bad: "Kill this legislation or we release the entire search history of you and your family. Then we'll see who the pirates (and worse) really are."

DanielBMarkham• 15 years ago

Protect IP and its House counterpart, the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), are strongly supported by the entertainment industry, organized labor and business groups like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

Well there you go. If you made a list of the top ten groups that give money to Congressmen these guys would definitely be in it. And because they support both parties, guess what? It's biparisan! Something to vote on so you can say that Washington really works. It's just not all gridlock. Hey, look at me! I'm reaching across the aisle to get things done.

If you were some uneducated Congressperson, probably a lawyer/political hack who came up through the ranks, this looks on the outside like just the kind of vote to take home to the voters. I'm your man. I'm stopping internet pirates, protecting the innocent. Think of the children!

I have to laugh, but in reality it's a sad mess we're in. These pressure groups are going to keep at it until something like this passes, whether it's this year or ten years from now. We are well and truly fucked.

I'm glad Google is speaking up on this. I only wish more folks would listen. If you haven't contacted both your House and your Senate guys, now is the time to do it.

tomkarlo5• 15 years ago

"If you made a list of the top ten groups that give money to Congressmen these guys would definitely be in it."

Not sure that's true, esp. in reference to organized labor.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lobbying_in_the_United_States#L... http://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/top.php?indexType=s

nickpinkston2• 15 years ago

The dollar values may show this, and these numbers show you're right. However, influence wise, unions have massive sway because of the breath / consistency of their voter block - which provides a higher ROI on their lobbying money.

dudeguy999• 15 years ago

What's the difference between that list and this one? http://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/list.php?order=A

This list makes it look like unions dominate elections.

firefoxman12• 15 years ago

"Creating jobs" is just the post-2008 buzzword that is applied to just about every political argument. Just because a company makes more money doesn't mean they'll hire more people. There are clearly enough people employed by record companies because the records are getting produced.

If the company is able to accomplish their goal (create content and make $$$ off of it) with the number of employees they have now, why would they hire more just because they have more money? (Assuming, of course, that they will actually make more money by "stopping piracy")

BSousa2• 15 years ago

Ok, I'll admit I don't know much about the laws about US donations/lobbying on the political trail, but I'm assuming you can run for a slot for Congress using your own money for whatever is needed right?

Why not get Bill Gates, Larry Page, Sergey, Mark Zuckenberg (sorry about spellings) and most all other internet billionaires to threaten to run for congress if Congress keeps doing stupid shit like this? This would probably scare Congressmen more than anything else as I doubt, anyone running against these guys wouldn't have a chance of winning, and thats all they care about.

Because apart form threatening with force (a.k.a. as shooting them), only way I see the people get their power back is if some of these billionaires stand up and make it really hard for some people to be re-ellected again.

suivix• 15 years ago

I think they have more important business to take care of than squabbling with Congressmen all day.

orangecat• 15 years ago

True. What if they selected a member of their staff to be the actual officeholder?

noonespecial• 15 years ago

Bill Gates can make more change for good before breakfast than congress can in an entire session. Locking him up in there with those cretins would be a crime against humanity.

o2sd• 15 years ago

I think this Bill will be good for the world. By the 'world', I mean anywhere that is not the United States of America.

The US has outsourced it's manufacturing, rationalized retail into behemoth monopolies and completely destroyed it's capital markets with rampant corruption and incompetence.

The ONLY area in which the US still is a leader and an innovator is in the internet/web, and now the US government is planning to destroy that as well.

Soon the rest of the world will be providing all kinds of services to US citizens behind the silicon curtain, to allow them to illicitly access information without fear of censorship or imprisonment.

Alternative DNS, proxies, darknets will spring up in the free world, giving the disenfranchised and repressed USians a voice and access to otherwise subversive websites that have forums with comments.

Google rips Senate's online piracy bill: 'This is what is wrong with Washington'

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