Column (LATE)

The free flow of information as we know it is at risk.

Recently, a bill called the “Stop Online Piracy Act”, better known as SOPA, was introduced to Congress. This bill, as the name suggests, aims to stop the rampancy of piracy, the illegal free downloading of music, movies, games and numerous other applications. While this may seem like a noble cause at first, the specifics of the bill are anything but.

The bill gives the U.S. Department of Justice the right to blacklist any sites that are deemed to promote copyright infringement, literally taking it off the face of the internet. This applies to all sites on the internet, not just ones based on American soil. There would still be a process of having to get a court order, but the option being available at all is an example of censorship through and through.

The idea of the internet as it stands today is the free exchange of information, any measure taken to reduce this and give power to a select few is an affront to our rights to knowledge. Even if the point of the bill is to stop piracy, would it really end there? I don’t believe a group of people who would suggest such a bill possess the responsibility to draw the line here and call it quits.

If anything, all this bill would do is create a paranoid group of middle-aged men that would try and blacklist any site they think isn’t in line with the business interests of corporations. And between you and me, I doubt piracy is the only reason this bill was suggested. Control is a tough thing to have these days and if there was only ever one way to get it, it would be through the internet.

A weak grip is still a grip. While no one can ever own the internet, people can be tricked into believing so. Taking a stand before citizens come to accept that the “government knows best” is an important duty of an American. If I’m not mistaken, I believe that’s a big part of the job description.

And to top it all off, an official study coming from the government of Switzerland contradicts some of the common arguments in support of SOPA. This study found that piracy not only doesn't harm the industry as much as is claimed, it might even help it. How's that for ironic?