It's All in How You View It

The newspaper stories about the Obama administration's opposition to the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the Protect IP Act portray the battle over the bills as a fight between Hollywood and the technology companies. That is rather missing the point. While these bills would have a negative impact on innovation, I suspect that the issues that motivated the administration were assuring cybersecurity and preventing limitations on Internet free speech -- both of which these bills do (see, for example, threats to cybersecurity and risks to free speech ).

The White House decision is not so much about Internet technology folks trumping Hollywood. (Indeed you'll see that while many technology companies opposed SOPA and Protect IP, there were plenty of others on the sidelines. Perhaps these companies were quietly letting legislators know they thought the bills were bad ideas -- but if so, they certainly were not trumpeting their opposition loudly.) The White House decision is about the increasingly important role the Internet plays in our daily lives -- and the need to ensure a secure network.

Last spring the Obama administration issued its International Strategy for Cyberspace, which said, "To realize fully the benefits that networked technology promises the world, these systems must function reliably and securely. People must have confidence that data will travel to its destination without disruption. Assuring the free flow of information, the security and privacy of data, and the integrity of the interconnected networks themselves are all essential to American and global economic prosperity, security, and the promotion of universal rights." Read that again. "People must have confidence that data will travel to its destination without disruption." "Assuring the free flow of information... and the integrity of our interconnected networks themselves are all essential to American and global economic prosperity, security, and the promotion of universal rights."

Those who view SOPA and Protect IP as a battle between Hollywood and Internet technologists, and view round one as going to the Silicon Valley guys are missing the big picture. The public Internet is now firmly embedded in our daily lives. The network's integrity and robustness, free flow of information, and security are fundamentally national-security issues -- not commercial ones (though they are those too). Trying to disrupt Internet infrastructure to protect copyrighted movies and media is to misunderstand the fundamental role the new communications medium plays in society and national security. It is to miss the importance of the role of the Internet in the Arab Spring, the importance of non-governmental sources in providing the U.S. government with information about what is really happening around the world, the importance of free flow of information to U.S. strategic interests.

This is not to say that Hollywood and the media companies don't have legitimate concerns; they do. But there are many ways to see the Internet. One way -- and here Hollywood and the Chinese government share viewpoints -- is as a technology for illegally sharing unlicensed content. Another, which recognizes commercial interests as well as political and national-security ones, is the Internet as a "source of 'infinite' airtime," providing commerce, politics, and national security a new rich way to conduct business. The New Yorker details how YouTube is seeking to market itself as a source of "YouTV," streaming video, professionally produced, and targeted to its audience in the way that Internet content can be.

"Infinite airtime" has many benefits, including providing the movie industry a way out of its current dilemma. Since government is unlikely to support weakening Internet security or frustrating access to information, it might be time for a shift of view for the media industry. That would have benefits all around, not least of all for Hollywood. Solving this problem may require some shifts of view. But any copyright effort that undermines Internet security or free flow of information is unlikely to get governmental support. A solution, after all, will depend on how you view the Internet.

 

Comments

[Nick Cowling]

07:46 AM on 01/20/2012

What I'm most concerned with is the disregard these US laws have for other countries. Considering the internet is an integral piece of every business today, its not appropriate for the US to impose its domestic law across the board to people and businesses that are following the law in their own country.

Secondly, while a large part of the internet's infrastructure resides in the US,I don't think its fair t suggest only US companies have domain over .com .org and .net.

I can somewhat agree with the initial intent of SOPA and PIP, but they need to be re-written - the internet is global by nature and can't be hived off or carved up to regulate. It requires a global resolution that won't destroy the web as we know and what it can become.

[9 nails]

01:49 AM on 01/18/2012

>Assuring the free flow of information, the security and privacy of data, and the integrity of the interconnected networks themselves are all essential to American and global economic prosperity, security, and the promotion of universal rights.
Claims SOPA provides this are unambiguously, factually false and prima facie absurd - it functions by purposely crippling DNSSEC and undermines all of the above.

[ATXNight]

12:08 AM on 01/18/2012

There are already enough ways the government can control public behavior. We don't need to give up our freedoms in exchange for the illusion of increased security.

[Ken Meyering]

08:32 PM on 01/17/2012

I think the President's statement about "voluntary measures" by industry being the alternative to SOPA is *also* troubling. The U.S. government abuses "voluntary measures by industry" to censor.

The Supreme Court ruled that money is speech, and there should be no restrictio­ns on how much money can be donated to a political candidate. Yet, I am not able to exercise this free speech by making a PayPal donation to Wikileaks. I should be able to vote with my wallet to support Wikileaks if I agree with their goals of promoting transparen­cy and accountabi­lity in government­.

So any payment processor can refuse to do business with anybody that the government determines is politicall­y against their interests. They just threaten to embarrass the financial services organizati­on that is providing the financial transactio­n.

So, e-Bay and Amazon may be pro free speech and transparen­cy and accountabi­lity, but Wikileaks publishes some Diplomatic Cables that reveal some classified sources and methods (or the names of informants­, etc.) and that is reason to completely cutoff all their funds from the U.S with a couple of phone calls.

What good is a domain name if the financial services industry and payment processors, particularly large ones like PayPal and Bank of America, can be relied upon to "voluntarily" blacklist an organization that embarrasses government or annoys Hollywood.

It should be a requirement that these services treat all business equally unless otherwise instructed by a court or jury.

[sheila]

03:37 PM on 01/17/2012

I'm much more concerned about the issue Julian Assange raised about our increasing over-dependence on completely mutable information bytes floating in cyberspace without anchors. Data (newspaper articles, scientific journals, public records, etc.) are not universally catalogued in any meaningful way, are completely available for edits, deletions, and false attributions and there is nobody minding the store (and everyone minding the store at the same time). In an age of "no hard copy," how will we determine what is "true" in the future when "facts" are able to be fundamentally revised or deleted by corporations, governments, hackers, politicians, anarchists, terrorists, religions, etc.?

What is needed, he asserted, is a data cataloguing system (basically an advanced library cataloguing system) so that once data is uploaded, it is permanently assigned a location and reference and locked up in time and space. You'd have to ask him how the logistics would work and who would be an appropriate steward of that information, though, because the wrong steward is at least as bad as no steward, right?

That, to me, would secure the freedom, functionality and validity of the internet much more effectively than preventing movie downloads - why aren't they working on that?