Yes, “we” temporarily killed SOPA. But now that the state has offed one of SOPA’s opponents, Aaron Swartz, maybe they can resume the march to ratchet up IP protections at the behest of Hollywood and the music industry. SOPA is just a drop in the bucket; see my previous post Death by Copyright-IP Fascist Police State Acronym, where I mentioned, inter alia (no offense, engineers) the looming ACTA (Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement) and TPP (Trans-Pacific Partnership), the latter of which is being pushed by the entertainment industry “to get SOPA-like laws introduced around the globe.” And just SOPA is just another incarnation or variation of related acts, like the PRO-IP Act of 2008; the corresponding Senate bill, the PROTECT IP Act (PIPA); and others like the Online Protection and Enforcement of Digital Trade Act (OPEN), so the TPP is morphing into the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (see Obama Bid for Europe Trade Pact Stirs Hope on Both Sides). Like NAFTA, which pretended to be a free trade agreement (when you could do this in a paragraph instead of thousands of pages), the TTIP will doubtless attempt to strongarm other countries into ratcheting up patent and copyright protection, as the US has done successfully for over a century now (IP Imperialism).
It’s confusing, I know. But if they’re for it, I’m a’gin it.
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