Google opposes SOPA

Google, Facebook and Twitter have come out against the controversial new copyright proposal called Stop Online Piracy Act, or SOPA.

Supported by Hollywood and other large content holders, SOPA is intended to remove copyright-infringing websites from the Internet. The Senate version is called the PROTECT IP Act.

“[The Protect IP Act seeks] to give the U.S. Department of Justice the power to seek a court order against an allegedly infringing Web site, and then serve that order on search engines, certain Domain Name System (DNS) providers, and Internet advertising firms. Those organizations, in turn, would be required to make the target site effectively ‘invisible’ to Web users.”
— Declan McCullagh, CNET (source).

The forces for and against are impressive:

For:

• Motion Picture Association of America
• National Music Publishers’ Association
• American Federation of Musicians
• Directors Guild of America
• International Brotherhood of Teamsters
• Screen Actors Guild
• U.S. Chamber of Commerce
• AFL-CIO
• Pfizer
• Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas), House Judiciary Chairman
• Rep. Howard Berman (D-Calif.)

“[The measure will] stop the flow of revenue to rogue Web sites and ensures that the profits from American innovations go to American innovators.”
— Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas), House Judiciary Chairman (source).

Against:

• Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF)
• Computer and Communications Industry Association (CCIA)
• Public Knowledge advocacy group
• Google
• Facebook
• Twitter
• Zynga
• eBay
• Mozilla
• Yahoo
• AOL
• LinkedIn
• Justin Bieber
• Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.)
• Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.)

“Big Media is doing its best to accomplish in Washington what it couldn’t in court.”
— Corynne McSherry, intellectual property director at the Electronic Frontier Foundation (source).

“.. PROTECT-IP [and] SOPA would require service providers to ‘disappear’ certain websites, endangering Internet security and sending a troubling message to the world.”
— Corynne McSherry, intellectual property director at the Electronic Frontier Foundation (source).

Source: Declan McCullagh at CNET, also Declan McCullagh at CNET Oct 26. Also see: Text of SOPA; Wikipedia entry for SOPA; Wikipedia entry for PROTECT IP.