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An Open Letter From Internet Engineers to the U.S. Congress
An Open Letter From Internet Engineers to the U.S. Congress
- zotz 15y ago> ... a group of 83 prominent Internet inventors and engineers This topic is probably the first thing they've all ever agreed on.
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- logn 15y agoThey need to include $2,000,000 checks to each member of congress. That's about how much the media companies are paying everyone who supports this.
- darkmethod 15y agoI'm curious as to where you found this information. Thanks.
- sehugg 15y agohttp://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/industries.php?cycle=Career&cid=N00009918&type=I http://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/industries.php?cycle=...
- CamperBob 15y agoThat's the true horror of the situation. Not only are our representatives for sale, they're for sale cheap. If the media companies were bribing these clowns with billions of dollars, that would be one thing... but some of the people who signed that open letter probably spend more than $2,000,000 on lunch.
- cpeterso 15y agoPlus, those monies are simply campaign contributions. How much grift to career politicians actually pocket?
- Lost_BiomedE 15y agoMostly, they don't pocket it but use it. A congressman is always campaigning and using those funds to live well doing it. They get the rest a bit less openly and from fun loop holes like trading insider info.
- jmcqk6 15y agoThat would be an interesting tactic. Could a company like google very publically donate a large sum of money to a PAC and get the results they want? I would imagine if they do it publicly, it could possibly restart the debate on campaign finance.
- lincolnwebs 15y agoConspicuously absent: Berners-Lee and Bray.
- balloot 15y agoBerners-Lee is British. He has been working with the British government on internet issues. I know this is crazy, but they actually listen to him.
- recoil 15y agoAnd Bray is Canadian.
- sudoscientist 15y agoAnd Pouzin is French. So what's your point?
- samstokes 15y agothey actually listen to him Unfortunately, not so. e.g. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/internet/8030467/Internet-disconnection-like-being-imprisoned-says-Sir-Tim-Berners-Lee.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/internet/8030467/Inter... The Digital Economy Act he is complaining about in that article - which, like SOPA, included provisions for national censorship in the name of copyright - passed by a large majority. Most MPs were not present for the debate, but simply voted according to their party line.
- rmc 15y agoMost MPs were not present for the debate, but simply voted according to their party line. That's the case in UK politics. The 'party whip' is used, and only in uncommon cases is a 'free vote' allowed.
- _bbs 15y agoI can't find much on Berners-Lee's stance on SOPA. Do you have any information as to why he wouldn't sign this letter? EDIT: Just realized he is British (thanks to the other reply). Do you believe his silence (if any, again I can't find much on his stance) relates to his citizenship?
- spiritplumber 15y agoI think it's the wrong approach. How about: "Dear Congresscritters, we made the internet. It is now everywhere. If you pit the full force of the law against it -- the law will lose. Do not make yourselves irrelevant."
- eykanal 15y agoI'm sure you're joking, but unfortunately, not only is that approach wrong, the statement is wrong also. If anyone will lose, it's probably not going to be the law.
- snth 15y agoNot to mention that insulting them is sure to have the opposite effect.
- spiritplumber 15y agoIf you make a significant % of the population into criminals, the population's respect for the law suffers and subsequent legislation is more likely to be ignored or bypassed by the population. (I wonder how many legislators learn at least a little bit of game theory)
- frisco 15y agoI actually don't think so here. You're basically up against the laws of physics. Information is fundamentally unlike other types of assets, in that there's no cost associated with copying it and it can be very quickly and easily be disseminated far and wide. Let's say they manage to totally destroy DNS, or whatever mechanism they're using to enforce this: the internet isn't one network, of course, and will detect this as damage and route around it, even if that means moving to a totally new networking stack. This is a losing battle on the part of the IP rights holders. In many ways, that's depressing. But even if they said, "pirate movies and we'll kill you," it still wouldn't stop the signal. All of these laws and treaties are bandaid hacks to stem the tide. Ultimately they won't win, though it may be messy along the way if they try to govern without understanding this.
- snowmaker 15y agoI noticed Vint Cerf specified "signing as private citizen". Does anyone know why Google tied his hands?
- tlear 15y agoAs huge corporation Google has to be ready to lose this fight and in that situation it would be beneficial for them to be on the good side of the victors.
- mdwrigh2 15y agoExcept their co-founder signed as the co-founder of the company. I would assume he's signing as a private citizen to say he's signing because he, and not the company he works for, sees it as a detriment.
- nas 15y agoI doubt they did, I expect it was his choice.
- moultano 15y agohttps://plus.google.com/104233435224873922474/posts/AsjeBDMbA2L https://plus.google.com/104233435224873922474/posts/AsjeBDMb... I don't think they did (or would.)
- throw_away 15y agoit seems like everyone on the list who works for a well-known company (twitter, juniper, RIPE) all signed that way.
- obtu 15y agoBecause this one is the letter from internet engineers. Google had to enter the lobbying game, but the view point of individuals should be more important to a society than the “money as free speech” of corporations.
- anamax 15y ago> Does anyone know why Google tied his hands? Cerf isn't a google officer, board member, or spokesperson. Those are the folks who "speak for Google".
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- Joakal 15y agoThey should have made a request to not only demand such bills to cease, but to demand bills that reverse parts of current laws controlling the Internet. Otherwise politicians will reduce some of the bill, but the bill will still implement more and more Internet controls [0]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Door-in-the-face_technique https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Door-in-the-face_technique
- davvid 15y agoOne solution is for everyone to simply refuse to implement whatever stupid law is passed. Closes #666 (WONTFIX)
- cookiecaper 15y agoThe problem with this solution is that the government has guns and prisons and they will use these to compel individuals to do as they say. If every ISP refused to comply, the feds would make a big show of raiding some significant-but-not-huge regional ISPs and scare the rest into compliance. Of course, some of this country's largest ISPs probably like SOPA and similar legislation because they see it as strengthening their larger source of revenue: cable television.
- driverdan 15y agoI'm curious where this list of people came from. Some are much more notable than others. Are they part of a group, have common investors, or what?
- tlrobinson 15y agoThis question isn't specific to the letter, but I've been wondering... Wouldn't SOPA's effects on DNS be negated by simply hosting your sites' DNS and setting your machines' DNS servers outside the US? Of course this would have major negative impact on DNS performance.
- ericflo 15y agoI think the bill makes it illegal for a US entity to do that.
- rmc 15y agoThat's what I've been thinking. And I think that's something that should be promoted more. Laws like this, aren't going to break the internet per se, but they might break it in the USA. Politicos should learn that laws like this threaten the USA tech sector. Might as well move your servers & companies off shore.
- barkingllama 15y agoWhat? Unintended consequences? Those are never something to worry about.
- naico 15y agohmm
- swordswinger12 15y agoThis is apropos of nothing, but it's nice to see L. Jean Camp represent my alma mater.