This law is like outlawing restaurants and bars in DC because Congressmen get bribed in them. DOPA is an example of the 'poison gas' view of the internet cloud - it contains odd legislative language like:
The Congress finds that--
(3)with the explosive growth of trendy chat rooms and social networking websites, it is becoming more and more difficult to monitor and protect minors from those with devious intentions
It then defers definition of 'social network websites', but implies that it could include all blogging platforms, webmail and Wikipedia:
In determining the definition of a social networking website, the Commission shall take into consideration the extent to which a website--
(i) is offered by a commercial entity;
(ii) permits registered users to create an on-line profile that includes detailed personal information;
(iii) permits registered users to create an on-line journal and share such a journal with other users;
(iv) elicits highly-personalized information from users; and
(v) enables communication among users.'
Note that this is using the corrupt Universal Service Fund as a way to circumvent the First Amendment.
More from danah, TechCrunch, ZDNET and Technorati.
Technorati Tags: blogs, digital rights, DOPA, law, net neutrality, politics, rhetoric, USF
No comments:
Post a Comment