Thanks Internet – Time to Speak Up and Kill SOPA

Google, along with the rest of Silicon Valley took out a full page ad in the New York Times speaking out against the SOPA legislation which is percolating in the US Congress at the moment.  I hope they don’t mind that we re-posted it below, because under SOPA, if it passes, they could ask search engines, ISPs, payment processors, etc. to shut down our site with no judicial oversight or due process…just the accusation of posting copyrighted material.

The tides may be turning though.  Even the proponents of the legislation in congress are starting to mutter that maybe some parts of the bill (like the ones that totally break the Internet) might merit a closer look.  Here is Kathrine Oyama’s (Google’s policy counsel) testimony at the recent hearing.

There are a couple of efforts to convince our representatives not to be asleep at the switch and let this debacle happen.  Please educate yourselves on SOPA and if so inclined let your elected representatives know at americansensorship.org.

I just pulled this out of our “YIKES” file from politico.com (please don’t shut us down…we’ll gladly comply with a DMCA takedown notice…funny, the DMCA doesn’t seem so bad now).  This shows the huge disparity between money spent on lobbying by the entertainment industry versus technology firms.  This amount of money could dig a lot of fresh water wells in Africa or do something else useful with itself at inner city schools.  I agree with CNET’s Molly Wood (see video below…I don’ think she likes this either)…I’m pretty sure Google has some more cash lying around.  Maybe they should buy a few of their own congresspeople to even out the odds here.

For a very entertaining, and (sadly) completely accurate take on what’s going on with SOPA this week, check out Molly Wood’s Buzz Report from this week.  Molly’s our hero.

And finally, since print is dead and many of you may not have read the full page ad, here it is (again please don’t take us down…DMCA takedown notices always welcome).