Many of us know that Jafo adopts occasionally unpopular (with some) stands on IP (Intellectual Property). He insists on the highest of standards to protect artists and their efforts. He does this across the internet and at significant cost to his private life. Fewer, though, know that Island Dog becomes rabid on this topic as well until recently (“Join me in ripping a ripper”), and dedicates significant time to this as well. In this case alone, this same ripper has been back on deviantArt six or seven times (I lose count).
I should express my special thanks to $chix0r (a wonderful artist, btw, as well as dA Admin) at dA for helping every single time. Due notice should be paid to the right panel on her profile page.
So, this little news flash inspired me to express my respect for these two WC Community Members and leaders, and is dedicated to them as well as $chix0r at dA as my “thank you”.
The really great site arstechnica published on the new Bill introduced in the Senate by 11 Senators of very different leanings. This anti-piracy legislation would dramatically increase the government’s legal power to disrupt and shut down websites “dedicated to infringing activities.”
A major feature of the PROTECT IP Act would grant the government the authority to bring lawsuits against these websites, and obtain court orders requiring search engines like Google to stop displaying links to them.
“Both law enforcement and rights holders are currently limited in the remedies available to combat websites dedicated to offering infringing content and products,” said Senator Patrick Leahy, a Vermont Democrat and the bill’s main sponsor.
“The proposal comes to help complete and repair the Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act introduced last year (COICA) which was scrapped by its authors in exchange for the PROTECT IP Act (PIPA) in order to win Senate passage.” – arstechnica
This PIPA is less sweeping in the domains allowed to be seized, but now limits the DNS to American soil only, allowing the sites to continue to be seen outside the USA.
“Either way, though, the legislation amounts to the Holy Grail of intellectual-property enforcement that the recording industry, movie studios and their union and guild workforces have been clamoring for since the George W. Bush administration.” – arstechnica
“The measure does not narrowly define the websites that could be targeted. The bill still defines a site as ‘dedicated to infringing activities’ if it is designed or marketed as ‘enabling or facilitating’ actions that are found to be infringing. In other words, even if the site isn’t itself infringing copyright, if its actions ‘enable or facilitate’ someone else’s infringement, the government can tell ISPs to blacklist your site, and copyright holders can sue to cut your funding.” - Sherwin Siy, deputy legal director of Public Knowledge
So, Spencer and Paul… this one’s for you and all you do to protect WinCustomize and it’s members as well as Stardock from the rippers: “Thank you”, from the doc.
Sources:
1. http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/05/senate-bill-gives-feds-power-to-order-piracy-site-blacklisting.ars from David Kravitz, Wired.com