First what is SOPA anyways? Hit the link to learn more about it if you don't already know. Perhaps a more important question, what does it have to do with someone living outside US? After all, they should bear the consequences of letting a bunch of Hollywood studios control their congress. But that's not the entire issue here; we are talking about a country that more or less is still in control of significant part of Internet infrastructure and their (stupid) actions can affect everyone else.
In Australia, we had this blacklisting and Internet censorship issue too. Fortunately, due to significant opposition (yeah, surprisingly even from US government!) it has gone away for a while and now late to the bandwagon is US congress. Going back to the topic, we all know Hollywood is stuck to the business model of ripping off people and they try everything to force people to fill up their pockets but what interests me most is the support of Business Software Alliance. Here is the list of its members:
It is very sad to see many big software company behind SOPA. If you live is US, get involve and do something about it. For the rest of us, consider not to purchase software or hardware from these companies to let them now it takes more than quality products (I'm referring to Intel here, I'm no Apple fan) to gain customers.
Links:
SOPA Wikipedia Page
In Australia, we had this blacklisting and Internet censorship issue too. Fortunately, due to significant opposition (yeah, surprisingly even from US government!) it has gone away for a while and now late to the bandwagon is US congress. Going back to the topic, we all know Hollywood is stuck to the business model of ripping off people and they try everything to force people to fill up their pockets but what interests me most is the support of Business Software Alliance. Here is the list of its members:
- Adobe
- Apple
- Autodesk
- AVEVA
- AVG
- Bentley Systems
- CA
- Cadence Design Systems
- CNC Software - Mastercam
- Compuware
- Corel
- Dassault Systèmes SolidWorks Corporation
- Dell
- Intel
- Intuit
- Kaspersky
- McAfee
- Microsoft
- Minitab
- Progress Software
- PTC
- Quark
- Quest
- Rosetta Stone
- Siemens PLM Software, Inc.
- Sybase
- Symantec
- TechSmith
- The MathWorks
Links:
SOPA Wikipedia Page
Most of these firms sell pricey software that is spread through torrents. No wonder they're pro-SOPA.
ReplyDeleteIt's worth noting that while the BSA may be advocating for SOPA, some of its members may individually against the legislation, or hold no stance. This happens in large lobbying organizations. A well-known example of this is the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. When it threw its support behind some draconian anti-climate legislation, some members were so upset, they actually quit the organization. Apple and Nike were two who left. USCoC had done other anti-climate lobbying in the past (they're one of the worst offenders) but this pushed these two companies to abandon ship.
ReplyDeleteSo really the only way to know if one of these companies is pre- or con- SOPA, is to ask them directly. Of course, they should *all* know better. But money and power corrupt.
@briandigital Your point about BSA and similar lobbying groups is very true. I just want to add that in such controversial cases these companies can strongly (and cowardly) advocate for SOPA as BSA while individually taking no side only to keep their public image unaltered.
ReplyDelete