The RIAA is butthurt as hell.
Remember all that talk of how the supporters of SOPA/PIPA were “humbled” by the protests of January 18th, and how they had learned their lessons about trying to push through a bill without actually involving the stakeholders? Remember the talk of how they hoped a new tone could be found in the debate? Yeah. Apparently someone forgot to send that memo to RIAA boss Cary Sherman, who has taken to the pages of the NY Times to lash out at those who fought against SOPA/PIPA, chalking the whole thing up to a massive “misinformation” campaign by Google and Wikipedia. The whole thing is chock full of ridiculous claims, so we might as well go through it bit by bit.
THE digital tsunami that swept over the Capitol last month, forcing Congress to set aside legislation to combat the online piracy of American music, movies, books and other creative works, raised questions about how the democratic process functions in the digital age.Why yes, it did raise questions about the process by which the RIAA and MPAA write bills to regulate other industries without even letting those the bill would regulate have a seat at the table. It also raised questions about the way the RIAA and MPAA have successfully expanded copyright law in their own favor sixteen times in the last 35 years, by playing the moral panic game over and over again… and keeping any hint of reality out of the debate. What it showed was that the tools of communication finally allow the public speak up and that the users of the internet simply won’t accept the RIAA and MPAA’s version of protectionism and crony capitalism any more. But somehow, I don’t think that’s what Sherman meant…Policy makers had recognized a constitutional (and economic) imperative to protect American property from theft, to shield consumers from counterfeit products and fraud, and to combat foreign criminals who exploit technology to steal American ingenuity and jobs.Oh gosh. So much pure crap in a single sentence it’s difficult to know where to start. First of all, copyright is not property. It’s a government granted monopoly privilege over information. That’s very different. Also, it’s not theft when someone infringes… it’s infringement. Using such bogus language has been the way that the RIAA has induced moral panics for years, but part of the point of the protests was that the public simply isn’t buying it any more. Repeating the same tropes over again is just sad.
Next, there is no “constitutional imperative” to pin secondary liability on innocent parties, to massively expand the nature of copyright law and the nature of enforcement. The only constitutional issue is that Congress has the right — but not the requirement, to create copyright and patent law if (and only if) it promotes the progress (of science and the useful arts). That’s got absolutely nothing to do with SOPA and PIPA, and it’s ridiculous and obnoxious to suggest otherwise.
Conflating copyright infringement with counterfeiting, as he does right after that, is a cheap trick that we’ve discussed countless times. Counterfeiting is a very different issue from copyright infringement. If Congress wants to address “shielding consumers from counterfeit products and fraud,” then they should debate a bill that’s narrowly focused on that particular issue. But that’s not what they did here. SOPA and PIPA were much more focused on issues that had nothing whatsoever to do with protecting consumers.
(Source: anticapitalist)
