by Jackie Roe, TW Social Director
Hi gang! Those of you in the States—how was your Thanksgiving? Tell us how you spent the holiday. (With family? Watching tennis (or football)? Eating yourselves into a tryptophan-induced stupor?)
And how about today? Did anyone brave the Black Friday crowds? I’m a wimp and holding out for Cyber Monday.
This is the time of year when we reflect on what it is we’re thankful for, and for me, this exercise isn't complete without an acknowledgment of everyone here at TENNIS.com and TennisWorld. Though I’m not around as much as I’d like to be, I still think so fondly of this community and have an endless appreciation of all that this website offers to tennis fans. Thus, I feel compelled to bring something to your attention that could affect our experience here (and elsewhere on the Web). This is a departure from the usual Deuce Club fodder, but its relevance to us is transparent, so I couldn't help but give it some air time. Read on . . .
A proposed new bill called SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act), intended to combat online piracy, may actually create a system for Internet censorship, crippling businesses and free expression on the Web. Here’s how it works:
If a website is accused of committing copyright infringement—which, under SOPA, is a felony—the site’s domain name and IP address could be blocked. Search engines wouldn’t be able to link to the website and if you linked to it yourself, you could be accused of abetting a copyright infringer. The allegation would be sufficient to stop advertisers, ISPs, and payment processors from continuing to fund the alleged infringers or risk liability for aiding the infringing website. The website being accused of copyright infringement could explain in a letter that no such offense was committed, but if the accuser deemed the letter insufficient, the website would have to prove its innocence in court in order to re-establish its online presence and unfreeze its accounts with payment processors. All in all, an arduous process.
But what constitutes copyright infringement, and how does this relate to us? According to the current language in the bill, a website could be punished for hosting anything considered "unauthorized" copyrighted material, including streams, video, music, images, and text. So, for us, that means posting a link to a tennis stream could result in the entire website being taken down. Ditto if someone here in the Deuce Club posted a link to a YouTube video that’s “piracy-friendly”—e.g., a music video, a film clip, even just a home movie with a copyrighted tune playing in the background. Think of our YouTube series . . . we would be compromising the website if we continued those posts. Or those RG karaoke clips? Linking to those could create a huge problem, too. Basically, so much of what we take for granted in our communication online could have the unintentional effect of endangering the very platform that allows us to connect with one another.
Tech giants like Google, Yahoo, AOL, and Facebook have already criticized SOPA, and just this week the Business Software Alliance, which represents Apple and Microsoft, did an about-face and pulled its support of the bill. Ron Paul and Nancy Pelosi (strange bedfellows) also oppose the legislation. Yet it still has steam thanks to lobbyists associated with MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America) and RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America), as well as a list of congressmen and women. Moreover, the recent SOPA congressional hearing wasn't promising, with five people speaking in favor of it and only one against. The House will vote for SOPA on December 15, and as President Obama has not spoken out against the bill, it’s not clear he will veto it. We've still got a ways to go. At the end of the day, no one wants copyright infringement to occur, but we need a better approach to the problem.
So what can we do? If you feel as strongly about this as I do, considering its potential impact, I encourage you to get the word out, write to your congressperson, sign a petition, or simply click on the links below and learn more about the issue. Every little bit helps!
(More info here, here, and here. Petition you can sign here.)
Thanks for hearing me out, and you're welcome to share your thoughts about this in the comments. If this isn't your cuppa tea, feel free to continue chatting about this weekend’s WTF action. I don't know about you guys, but I can't wait!
Have a wonderful weekend, TWibe.