Irish SOPA and ACTA Discussion

BogMonkey · 19-01-2012 5:29am #1

So the PIPA and SOPA are two bills that, if passed in the US, will result in worldwide censorship of the internet. I heard conspiracy theorists talking about this years ago but I never thought they could actually do something like this. What can Irish people do to help prevent this from happening? I've been signing petitions and writing emails to companies allegedly supporting the bills but how can we have a more direct effect? Fair play to wikipedia for this blackout, I have seen other sites informing people about the PIPA and SOPA but this wikipedia blackout will have an enormous effect and help inform millions of people who, would have ordinarily been unaware of what PIPA and SOPA even are. I'm a chemistry student but I find the lecture material insufficient to gain a deep understanding of the concepts so I rely on the internet for more than 70% of my learning. Not to mention all the other things I use the internet to learn. If we all start writing to the political representatives in this country and express our opposition to this global infringement of human rights, we can help ensure that the Irish government never supports something like this.

Sofiztikated · 19-01-2012 10:38am

The Irish government already support SOPA, they are pushing through their own version, at the behalf of the IRMA.

deckybarr · 21-01-2012 1:43pm

What can we do to prevent SOPA, PIPA and the Irish equivalent?

Wikipedia suggests that non-US citizens contact their government's minister for foreign affairs, which for us is Tanaiste Eamon Gilmore. Who do we contact in protest against the Irish equivalent?

Here is the link to contact Eamon Gilmore

http://www.dfa.ie/home/index.aspx?id=82777

I might start a thread where people could cut and paste a generic complaint about SOPA and PIPA and send it through the above link.

Wikipedia suggests:
"Tell them you oppose SOPA and PIPA, and any similar legislation. SOPA and PIPA will affect websites outside of the United States, and even sites inside the United States (like Wikipedia) that also affect non-American readers -- like you"

What is the name of the Irish legislation?

The complaint could look like this:
"I am opposed to the SOPA and PIPA bills that are being brought to the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate. SOPA and PIPA will affect websites outside of the United States, and even sites inside the United States (like Wikipedia and *) that also affect Irish readers....."

* more examples could be placed here such as twitter facebook etc

Wikipedia also explains how the bills would affect free expression and harm the internet and these could also be put into the complaint. Please add to the above and try and make it better then we can agree on a common complaint and use that on the thread.

Here is a link to the wikipedia page:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:SOPA_initiative/Learn_more

Here is the The Electronic Frontier Foundation which they reference on that page, they explain the flaws in those bills.
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/01/how-pipa-and-sopa-violate-white-house-principles-supporting-free-speech

I don't have the time to work on this myself so please help and please get the message out there that the Irish can do something to prevent this whether it be posting the Gilmore link on Twitter, Facebook, Youtube etc or emailing it to everyone you know. Plus, we need to oppose the Irish equivalent.

deckybarr · 21-01-2012 3:00pm

Here is a link to Reddit:

http://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/oplxh/americans_we_helped_you_and_spread_awareness/

"in La Quadrature du Net:
ACTA is one more offensive against the sharing of culture on the Internet. ACTA (Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement) is an agreement secretly negotiated by a small "club" of like-minded countries (39 countries, including the 27 of the European Union, the United States, Japan, etc). Negotiated instead of being democratically debated, ACTA bypasses parliaments and international organizations to dictate a repressive logic dictated by the entertainment industries.
ACTA would impose new criminal sanctions forcing Internet actors to monitor and censor online communications. It is thus a major threat to freedom of expression online and creates legal uncertainty for Internet companies. In the name of trademarks and patents, it would also hamper access to generic medicines in poor countries.
The European Parliament now has an ultimate opportunity to reject ACTA.
Please, when the time comes, we need your help..."

deckybarr · 21-01-2012 3:06pm

http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/01/20/y-combinator-goes-on-the-offensive-against-hollywood/

Tom Young · 21-01-2012 9:09pm

Sofiztikated wrote: »

The Irish government already support SOPA, they are pushing through their own version, at the behalf of the IRMA.

That's not correct. Have you read SOPA and PIPA?

evercloserunion · 22-01-2012 5:14pm

small "club" of like-minded countries (39 countries, including the 27 of the European Union, the United States, Japan, etc).

Lol'd at this.

But in general I agree that ACTA is dangerous. It's a credit to the EU and its democratic structure that it hasn't been pushed through yet. Interestingly, Neelie Kroes, the EU commissioner for the digital agenda (and a major fan of an open internet) has recently expressed her opposition to SOPA. But I can't find any recent comments from her on ACTA.

deckybarr · 23-01-2012 1:08pm

Ok guys **** SOPA and PIPA, we have only a few days to try to stop our government from passing the legislation here in Ireland.

http://www.tjmcintyre.com/2012/01/adrian-weckler-confims-that-irelands.html?m=1

If you think it won't affect you it will. It could cut off youtube, facebook and twitter.

You can contact Shaun Sherlock at http://www.labour.ie/seansherlock

deckybarr · 24-01-2012 2:22pm

Nerakai · 24-01-2012 8:25pm

our government is going to try pass an Irish version of SOPA
AND WE DON'T GET TO VOTE ON IT!!!!
if you know what SOPA is and want to help stop it here is the petition against it
http://stopsopaireland.com/

if you don't know what SOPA is then heres a brief explanation:
Basically what will happen if it passes is it will give the High Court the power to order any Internet Service Provider to Ban Entire Domains if they have ANY copyright material on them. this means that websites such as Youtube, facebook, wikipedia and huge amount more will be affected if this is passed

Jev/N · 24-01-2012 10:21pm

Already a number of threads on this, in this forum alone

Nerakai · 24-01-2012 10:52pm

i seen that but i didn't see anything about the petition and the threads

Jev/N · 25-01-2012 1:46am

Best thing is to add the post to a current thread, keeps things together on the same topic and that's all I'll say before I get reprimanded for back-seat modding :pac:

deckybarr · 25-01-2012 4:49pm

Sean sherlock the guy trying to pass this legislation has copyrighted material on his own website. He has youtube footage and a microsoft icon. He is a hypocrite. Sign the petition, get the word out and contact your TD's.

expectationlost · 25-01-2012 6:47pm

acta is being signed tomorrow! http://t.co/2irwmTHt by the irish gov, it still has ratfied by the the eu parliament here is details on the fight against it there http://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/ow1v5/acta_note_from_marietje_schaake_member_of_the/

its very hard to combat these things when the gov don't make statements about them, its like playing handball off a haybale, last mention of ACTA in dail was 2010

waterdale35 · 26-01-2012 11:46pm

Would we be able to use torrent websites will it be safe

CptSternn · 27-01-2012 11:15am

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/finance/2012/0127/1224310799439.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=p0AurDVrIgw#!

deckybarr · 27-01-2012 12:59pm

ACTA was signed today by Ireland. However, t still needs to be ratified.

winston82 · 27-01-2012 8:22pm

Close Facebook?

Meh

BogMonkey · 28-01-2012 8:52am

What the hell, I didn't know about this until today when I saw the boards.ie blackout page. Is it too late for me to do anything about this? This is ridiculous, they didn't give people any time to respond at all. I would be crippled without wikipedia. I have an idea. We could send a powerful message to Hollywood by organising a boycott of cinemas. If every Irish person suddenly refused to go to the cinema, there would be an abrupt and significant drop in their profits. They would quickly learn what the source of this drop in profits is. Everyone Irish person stands to lose a great deal if they sit by and let all this happen. Every Irish person can be convinced to get involved. The only people who support this kind of thing are idiots and the filthy rich who a vested interest in it. Times like this I wish I was a law student instead of a chemistry student. I don't have the time to heavily inform myself about all this stuff.

deckybarr · 28-01-2012 11:12am

http://black-march.com/

Calling for a worldwide boycott of CD's, DVD's, Video games, Music downloads and cinema releases, either legal or illegal downloads, during the month of march.

CptSternn · 28-01-2012 11:26pm

423292_10150498484521841_567511840_9058231_1971391536_n.jpg

403122_10150498339256841_567511840_9057943_769741534_n.jpg

ACTAvism

BogMonkey · 29-01-2012 8:29am

deckybarr wrote: »

http://black-march.com/

Calling for a worldwide boycott of CD's, DVD's, Video games, Music downloads and cinema releases, either legal or illegal downloads, during the month of march.

You can count me in. I'm going to get everyone I know involved in this. The internet as we know it is at stake.

deckybarr · 05-02-2012 1:01pm

http://falkvinge.net/2011/09/05/cable-reveals-extent-of-lapdoggery-from-swedish-govt-on-copyright-monopoly/

Maybe they are doing the same to Ireland?

Procrastastudy · 05-02-2012 8:50pm

Am I missing the joke of the boy/girl holding the fu ck AC TA sign? fuacckta nope still not getting it...

BogMonkey · 12-02-2012 8:51pm

double post

BogMonkey · 12-02-2012 9:18pm

I've been telling people I know about ACTA and surprisingly, less than 40% of them had even heard of it. Its a real pain in the arse having to put my time into this when I have loads of other things I need to be doing but we can't just let these **** impose laws on us which nobody (besides the soulless, money/power corrupted scumbags with an agenda that involves exploiting the masses) wants. I accidentally signed a pledge to meet with my local TD (I thought it was just a petition, shoulda read it before signing lol) so I suppose I'd better just do it. I'm not the best at verbal communication so theres no point in meeting with a TD if I can't influence them though. Has anyone here signed that pledge?

EDIT: I retract what I said there. I can influence a TD. I don't have the social skills but all I need to do is tell them the truth. By supporting the Irish SOPA and ACTA, they have not only lost my vote, the whole political system has lost whatever remnants of faith I had left in it. Time and time again they tell us they have our interest in mind, but time and time again their actions say otherwise. I no longer trust the words of politicians. From now on, I will only listen to their actions. The only way they will influence my opinion is through their actions. I'm stretching the truth a bit there because in reality, I lost all faith in the political systems of the world over 10 years ago and would sooner trust the antichrist himself than a politician but what I said applies for many of the less disillusioned Irish citizens. This seems to be a unique time in history. The corrupt scum in power usually divide us before attempting to conquer us. Anyone with mental capabilities greater than a plank of wood can see that SOPA and ACTA directly impacts them and everyone around them in an insidiously negative way so I can't really see how anyone can be duped into unwittingly supporting the agenda on this one. Times are changing. If they go through with ACTA, the massive protests and growing anti government sentiment in Poland is a small taste of whats to come on a global scale.

CptSternn · 12-02-2012 9:28pm

Germany is going to be the ones who save us from ACTA.

http://news.yahoo.com/acta-bombshell-germany-refuses-sign-anti-piracy-treaty-153027648.html

In a potentially fatal blow to the Anti-Counterfeit Trade Agreement (ACTA), Germany’s Foreign Office announced today that it will not sign the contentious treaty as protests heat up in 200 cities across Europe. Germany, which has the largest economy in the European Union, follows in the footsteps of Latvia, Poland and the Czech Republic, which signed ACTA, but later said they would block ratification of the treaty.

If ratified by the European Parliament, ACTA would set strict international standards for intellectual property law, and create a new governing body to oversee the enforcement of those laws, which would target counterfeit goods, generic medicine, and copyright-protected digital goods, like music, film and television shows. Without Germany’s support, the ratification of ACTA becomes far less likely.

Germany isn't saving us out of the goodness of their hearts. They are actually standing up for their own nations sovereignty. We are just lucky that some country has half a brain and the spine to do this.

BogMonkey · 12-02-2012 9:45pm

CptSternn wrote: »

Germany isn't saving us out of the goodness of their hearts. They are actually standing up for their own nations sovereignty. We are just lucky that some country has half a brain and the spine to do this.

Whatever their motivation, fair play to the German government for opposing the people behind ACTA. It won't end with ACTA though, they will come up with new laws to impose their agenda on us and they will learn from their mistakes with SOPA (and hopefully ACTA will also be a mistake for them) and repackage the laws in such a way that the people won't resist it. I remember a historical quote from one of the Rothschilds which was something to this effect "give me control on a countries money and I care not who makes its laws". I now understand what they meant by that. He who has the money, makes the laws. They can only do it if we let them though. Are we gonna continue to bend over and let them have their way with our rectal orifices? I'd say its about time we made it official that we will never again be arseraped by scumbags who sold their soul for some money and power. This scene from Fight Club sums up the situation:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWVxI6XZAuE
Ultimately, we're the ones calling the shots. We just need to work together and coordinate our efforts in such a way that renders all attempts to divide us futile. To do that, we need to communicate. For this, the internet is our most powerful tool.

CptSternn · 12-02-2012 11:37pm

Germany is fighting the US for control of the EU. We are trading one master for another in reality. Germany already owns our country financially and otherwise. They are making sure the US recognizes this fact.

BogMonkey · 13-02-2012 8:20pm

Better Germany than the US. I would rather North Korea running the EU than the US or UK. Although I know very little about the country and politics, Germany seems to be a relatively advanced country to me.

Irish SOPA and ACTA Discussion

Comments