Quote:
Originally Posted by Quentin
Honestly, I'm really not sure.
At this point, while I've read the text of SOPA and quite a bit of analysis of it as well, I haven't really given it as much thought as I will if it passes, and I don't think I have as full an understanding of the penalties and consequences under it as I'd need to answer that question. (Among other things, the Act references a number of other statutes and is limited in some ways by those other statutes, and I haven't gone through the effort of 'connecting all the dots,' so to speak.)
I haven't concerned myself with SOPA too much thus far, simply because it is just a bill at this point and as happens with many bills, its language could change significantly before passing, or it could never even go up for a vote in the first place.
Plus, if SOPA does pass, I think there's very little question that it will be immediately challenged in court, and my hunch is the Court would issue a TRO against its enforcement (or the enforcement of portions of it that are subject to the legal challenge, at least) pending adjudication of that case.
So, in other words... ask me that again if/when this bill actually becomes a law and its verbiage is final, and by then I should have a more satisfying answer. ;-)
Your proposed penalty for false notifications was an easier hypothetical for me; I don't appreciate fraudulent use of federal statutes, so I'm good with fairly severe punishment being applied when people engage in such.
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my point of view is simple
IF the penalty are ok to apply to pirates then they should be equally ok to apply to copyright holders who abuse the law
if pirates are not allowed to simply claim "oops that was i mistake my bad" then copyright holders should not have the right to that exemption either.
The principle of balance makes sure that the law is not drafted with ambiguity that can be abused.
Look at it this way if the process is so flawed that you could "accidentally" blacklist a totally innocent site imagine the damage that could be done if you "deliberately" tried to abuse the system.
Look at the universal vs mega upload problem with this bogus DMCA takedown of the mega upload song.
if the DMCA process required you to
1. verify that infringing content contained your content
2. specify the content that belongs to you that was illegally used withing the infringing content
in addition to the current steps
the only way that Universal would have been able to do what they did, was to deliberately lie.
And if breaking the process had a liability of losing your copyright i don't think universal would have done what they did.
They did what they did because they knew the current penalties are a joke (come over to the united states, spend millions in legal fees to only get back your provable hard losses only)
The only reason the court case is going forward is because mega upload is using it to prove that SOPA is fucked up. If they prove that the current penalty doesn't prevent abuse like universal did, then keeping the penalty the same especially when you raise the penalty so greatly is not only unfair but trade war anti competitive.
If SOPA doesn't put an abuse it and lose it type penalty , you can bet other countries will put a counter suit right on their books. Use SOPA against an
innocent company from that country, and that wronged person will be able to void the copyright for his country, and every citizen of that country will be LEGALLY allowed to use the internet to sell your content to the world.