Tag Archives: sopa

Predicting the present in Cory Doctorow’s “Pirate Cinema”

posted on 4 February, 2013 also tagged , , , ,

Cory Doctorow is coming through town again, this time on his tour for Homeland, the sequel to his excellent young adult novel Little Brother. Cory likes to talk about how his fiction “predicts the present”: taking the bits of future that are already here, just not yet evenly distributed, and applying them more widely. It’s […]

IP above all else

posted on 24 May, 2012 also tagged , ,

It can be hard to point a finger at exactly what is so offensive about the way the copyright lobby pushes its agenda. The rhetoric is sometimes charged, but I don’t think the problem lies in the moral foundation of intellectual monopolies (although some people certainly object to them on ethical grounds). I also don’t […]

Will last week’s blackouts reframe the conversation on copyright policy?

posted on 22 January, 2012 also tagged , ,

This online blackouts last week were not only the largest in recent history, but in a narrow sense, they might be the most effective ever. Imagine: online protests and the resulting media coverage and legislator calls led to the shelving of two “sure thing” bills over the course of two days. But the protests shouldn’t […]

What’s bothering John Lilly about the SOPA discussion

posted on 7 January, 2012 also tagged ,

Over on his blog, John Lilly provides the best sort of analysis of the SOPA conversation — reasonable and measured. The problem with the “dialogue” so far, he says, is that (1) it has basically consisted of each side calling the other names, (2) which isn’t going to help now, and (3) will set a […]

SOPA, figuratively speaking

posted on 29 November, 2011 with tags

I’ve been impressed with the quality of language used to describe the Stop Online Piracy Act. The bill is a disaster for the internet, and its opponents are devising some pretty creative ways of expressing that. Two of my favorites: From Alexandra Petri on the Washington Post ComPost blog: This isn’t even throwing the baby […]