We’re fairly critical of the Stop Online Piracy Act around here, the impossibly stupid bill Tumblr is going all-in to stop, mostly because it won’t stop online piracy, but will instead hand corporations and the government the right to shut off any website they feel like, for any reason they feel like, any time they feel like doing so. It would pretty much destroy the Internet: for example, a troll could post a link to a movie torrent in a website’s comments section, and that website could be shut down.
Yes, it’s truly that awful. No exaggeration.
If all else fails, there’s no way it’s going to pass the First Amendment sniff test with the Supreme Court. As conservative as this SCOTUS may be, we’ve seen repeatedly that when it comes to free speech, they’re very insistent that the government stay hands off (see for example the controversial Citizens United decision, or the fact that they’ve repeatedly sent video game obscenity laws packing). Fortunately, it may not come to that.
Member of Congress, including Ron Paul and Nancy Pelosi, are starting to speak out against the bill, and Darrell Issa, head of the House Oversight Committee, has flatly stated the bill is too extreme to pass the floor.
Still, we can’t emphasize this enough: write your representative and tell them you don’t want this horrible bill.