Tuesday, January 24, 2012

SOPA - Stop Online Piracy Act

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There are a large number of people who are addicted to social networks and it somehow has seeped into our day-to-day routine. Suddenly there is uproar about online privacy and the Red Tape wants to tighten the laws for accessing the internet.
What is SOPA?
SOPA is Stop Online Piracy Act which was a bill initially laid to help companies to stop online piracy by blocking those domain names which were involved in copyright infringement. In simple language, if SOPA bill is passed it would be difficult to access all the websites at our wish and some of our favourite websites like Google, YouTube and many others would be restricted.
In fact this act could have been a boon to curb the ongoing piracy on the internet but it was ineffective. The blocking of domain names was entirely useless as the sites could still be reached by going to the number-based address. Hence at present this clause is removed from the bill. Moreover another clause in the bill stated that the SOPA bill would allow the owners of websites to cut off the funds allocated to the people who were responsible for piracy. The funds which were received by advertisements and other listings would not be allowed. Now technically speaking this bill means a censorship on piracy. This is actually beneficial to those who have originally been providing data on the internet but the entire power lies in their hands only which could be misused. This would of course be an interpretation from the layman's viewpoint and e would not be happy to be blocked or partially curbed to view our favourite websites like YouTube, Google or for that matter Facebook too, which have become an integral part of our internet browsing.
This bill and its content was of course not so much in the limelight but after Wikipedia declared a blackout for a day everyone has been interested in knowing more about the SOPA and PIPA bills which were existing since the start of the millennium. Time has come to take a stand whether we are in favour of getting the stuff what we desire on the internet or being restricted to some sites. Well a clear knowledge of the bills is required in order to take a stand. Personally, nobody would support piracy but restrictions are not the solution.
The SOPA act would of course ban the people who are involved in piracy but would also restrict layman to access the websites. From how much I understand about the SOPA bill given below are the pros and cons of the bill.
Pros:
  • It would protect the original content which is written intellectually.
  • It would be helpful in enforcing the copyright laws against piracy of written data.
Cons:
  • It would literally destroy the internet by restricting freedom of speech
  • It somehow would be like an inspector, looming largely on the free access of websites
  • It may turn out to people being conscious of using social networks which would decrease the online communication to a large extent.
Hence the decision lies in our hands whether to go ahead and support the bill or support the organisations opposing it, but before that it is necessary to have a clear knowledge about the SOPA bill.

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