7 ms·

ASK PG: Could you make a short video about SOPA?

17 points by blhack 15y ago

Part of the problem with a lot of the anti-SOPA stuff coming out right now is that it's coming from early to mid 20s guys who are web developers and the like. No offense (I am a mid 20s guy who is a web developer), but for the general population, it's really easy to just write those people off. YOU, however, are a respected businessman carrying the title of "Successful Venture Capitalist". A video of you explaining why this is bad is going to carry a LOT more weight than a video of me explaining it. If you have the time, I think the internet would appreciate it a lot.

steventruong 15y ago
I like the general direction of the idea, but unfortunately outside of the tech and startup scene, I doubt many would know of Paul in any way, shape, or form. He'd have as much weight as you. And I say that while personally keeping in mind that I don't think the general public, who aren't into the tech/startup world, would care who he is much like many don't know what an Android is (or care), but know they own a Samsung or HTC something something.
- nitrogen 15y ago
  It'd be pretty easy for pg to quote the numbers, like, "With Y Combinator, we've invested in X separate companies with X*n founders, and those companies have gone on to create a total of Y jobs." Just the big-name YC companies like Reddit might be enough to get noticed.
pg 15y ago
I was going to write something about it. Would that be enough? Essays are more my thing than videos.
- blhack 15y ago
  It's just easy to get people who aren't technical at all to watch a video. If it's "Hey, family members, check out this minute long video", it's something I can show them all over Christmas. Anything would be appreciated, though.
  - Natsu 15y ago
    > It's just easy to get people who aren't technical at all to watch a video. I'm an avid reader myself, but I've seen how some people object even to subtitles. I think you'd get a lot more of an audience if you could put up a video. But I can understand wanting to do an essay, because you're very good at those. Also, I just want to say thanks for opposing SOPA. It's important that Congress hears from the people driving job creation about the impact this would have. Something from you will do a lot to represent the rest of us who merely get form replies from Congress extolling virtues of the bill we just told them we hated.
- jcr 15y ago
  Paul, you're strong with the essay-force, but with essays, you only reach the audience that already knows you and is willing to read your works. I recall your comments about public speaking after the NYC-YC event, so I'm guessing you're hesitant, but for what it's worth, I think you do great at public speaking. An important point to realize is you are one of the rare few people here in the US that is actively "Creating Jobs" and this gives a great deal of weight to your words, both practically and politically. Though I'm twenty years past being a twenty-something, a non-notable nobody like me could not do what you can do.
- pasbesoin 15y ago
  Yes, please. I find your essays quite effective, and I think that to communicate most effectively and compellingly on this, you may be best sticking to the tools you know and have mastered. Hmm... reading others' comments, I'll add the idea of keeping in mind that many of us may try to share the resulting essay with our less/non-tech friends. So if you could make it approachable to them, as well, that might help. And maybe it would introduce a few more people to your writing and engender their interest in looking at more of it. :-) (E.g. the (high) school essay -- please, world, read the school essay.)
- bcjordan 15y ago
  Your Bloomberg interview was the first time I'd seen or heard you speak publicly and you came across as likable and intelligent. Doing an interview about SOPA would be free and easy. But an essay would be better than a presidential-address-style prepared speech. That has the potential to jump the shark and be a time sink.
- RichardBennett 15y ago
  Before you write an essay on SOPA, it would probably be a good idea to get a really solid handle on what it does and doesn't do. The comments of yours I've seen lead me to the conclusion that your understanding of the bill and its likely implications isn't up-to-date. Some of the points you might like to address would be: What does SOPA do that DMCA doesn't do? How do Pro-IP and SOPA differ with respect to Internet domains? Does SOPA apply to .com domains? Is it possible to implement domain blacklisting without affecting DNSSEC? (hint: the answer is "yes" as long as redirection isn't required.) Does SOPA include language protecting DNSSEC? What due process protections does SOPA have for domain blacklisting? Does SOPA apply to US-based sites? How much of a burden does SOPA compliance place in ISPs, ad networks, credit card processors, and search engines? Are Internet firms registered in .com and/or based in the United States that are not in the category above (payments, ads, search, ISPs) have anything to fear from SOPA? Show your work. There's a lot of misinformation floating around the Internet about SOPA, and I think you'll agree it's best not to add to it.
- earbitscom 15y ago
  PG, I suspect that you'll do a better job of explaining why SOPA is bad than some other people, and you have more credibility than most, but taking a stand against SOPA by itself isn't enough. The root cause of SOPA is a culture of piracy and a lack of participation by leaders in technology to develop better enforcement regulations. Laws like SOPA are going to continue to be proposed until a better solution to copyright protection is enacted. If we leave those proposals to be constructed by media companies who don't care as much about the integrity of the internet as they do about their bottom line, you'll just keep getting new laws that overreach and threaten our freedoms. The fact that we're facing SOPA is bad, but it's the direct result of too many people pretending that copyright protection isn't an important issue that deserves better solutions, both by arguing against the rights of creators, and failing to proactively help create a better system of enforcement. If you really want to do something powerful to stop SOPA-like legislation in its various forms, your essay should also aim to remind people that we're facing this legislation because people engage in piracy, and that we need leaders in the tech community to be more proactive about improving the DMCA if they want to have a voice in what shape copyright protection takes. It might seem like SOPA is "the problem" but it's really one party's proposed solution to a very real issue. An argument for why SOPA is bad without proposals about how to meet the needs of the party for whom SOPA is a solution only sends those people back to their misguided drawing board. I respect the stand you've taken against SOPA. I'll be really excited about it if you use this time to push the dialog forward on behalf of tech and content creators.
  - jey 15y ago
    > The root cause of SOPA is a culture of piracy and a lack of participation by leaders in technology to develop better enforcement regulations. There's a tacit assumption in your post that copyright is still a valid notion that should be protected. That's not at all clear, and society should really re-examine the basic assumptions behind copyright. It's possible that copyright just doesn't make sense anymore and the business models that rely on copyright monopolies should just be allowed to die. I'm certainly open to being wrong. What are some valuable things that would be lost without decent replacements if we abolished copyright monopolies?
    - 15y ago
_ud4a 15y ago
here is one i found which is done very nicely. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9oeJgrVrq0&feature=related http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9oeJgrVrq0&feature=relat...
- RichardBennett 15y ago
  It's nicely produced, but seriously inaccurate.

tptacek 15y ago

Books.

jey 15y ago
Empirically doesn't seem to be true, since high-quality fiction and non-fiction is currently produced even when there isn't a profit motive. There's still ways to make money from writing, e.g. by asking people to give donations totalling a certain amount before releasing the next chapter, etc.
- earbitscom 15y ago
  The number of works being written for no financial gain and the number of people who have successfully made those models work for them combine to be a tiny fraction of the regular commercial market for books. If you want real data, survey a couple thousand professional authors at random and ask them if they would still write if they knew they had no copyright protection and may have to put together some innovative new release schedule on a per chapter basis just to have any chance of making some money for their work.
  - jey 15y ago
    This is entirely backwards looking; of course the people who benefit from the current system will want to keep it in place. The real question is whether others would step in if everyone who is currently writing books suddenly just quit. In practice the authors wouldn't have to carry all the load for the business model innovation; there would be third parties that figure it out and play a role analogous to the role currently played by publishers, e.g. there could be a company similar to kickstarter dedicated to helping authors fund their projects. We're in early days right now, so the old models still do have a large market share, but we need to be forward-looking and consider the long-run effects.
    - earbitscom 15y ago
      No, the real question we should be asking is whether the quality of output will be equivalent or better. Replacing authors who were able to make writing their life with a bunch of part time hobbyists isn't the same.
      - jey 15y ago
        It's a strawman to assume that they'd all be hobbyists. (Also in practice, most writers start off doing it on the side, then become full-time.) However, we should zoom out: I don't claim that what I'm proposing is the correct solution. I'm just pointing out that we should ask these questions and weigh the pros/cons, and not just jump straight into figuring out how to preserve the current system.
    - _dps 15y ago
      People certainly get attached to their historical revenues, but let's not forget that businesses like books, movies, and music all have hit-dominated economics under the current model and that this has co-evolved with the kinds of products that are available. Cutting the potential upside of the big hits does disproportionate damage to the overall industry's expected returns. I know you were specifically discussing books where initial production costs are low (in comparison to marketing), but consider what happens to film and television. As you say, under a new regime without copyright as-is, new people may come in to fill the void. However, they may not be real replacements for the old-media dinosaurs. If it becomes impossible to try to make something like "Lost" with any reasonable expectation of a return, then products as complex and expensive as "Lost" simply won't get made. We should be cognizant of this kind of tradeoff as policy evolves. I think the recent story about Louis C.K. points out one possible angle of filling the void; it's comparatively cheap for him to try a stunt like that. Generally, things produced by individuals with relatively little "refinement" (sound, graphics, costumes, marketing, etc.) seem like good candidates for business model innovation. On the other hand, the pilot episode of "Lost" cost millions of dollars just in production (i.e. before they even had any idea if it would be popular and got a marketing budget). If we want a new regime that still allows such projects to be undertaken, Kickstarter-like services and "Please just pay me $5" probably aren't going to cut it (no disrespect to Kickstarter or Louis). I don't know if, in the context of big budget projects, they even represent a meaningful step toward a solution.
      - jey 15y ago
        Sure, maybe huge productions like "Lost" would become comparatively rarer, but is that necessarily bad? More to the point, is it worth the other costs to society to grant these monopolies? I don't claim to have the answers at all, but I'm just pointing out that these questions should be asked. It's important to actually weigh the pros and cons and figure it out rather than assuming that the existing system is definitely the correct one.
        _dps 15y ago
        Completely agree that the questions should be asked honestly and with an eye on social benefits and costs. I'm no fan of the copyright system as-is precisely because I think those tradeoffs are poorly balanced given modern technology. As for whether it is "bad" to lose capacity to do things like "Lost" I think (for my value system) it's clearly very bad even if 9/10 such projects are not of lasting value. These kinds of mega-projects allow us to push the frontier of what is possible as entertainment and human expression. If you don't particularly like "Lost" for artistic reasons (fair enough ;-), then perhaps substitute anything by Pixar; losing society's ability to make "Wall-E" or "Up" means a duller, less inspiring world. Of course, you could similarly disagree with the artistic merits of Pixar films as being a worthwhile tradeoff. But at some point that line of reasoning just becomes "I'm personally happy with art made on the cheap by a small group and no marketing or distribution costs; I'm ok sacrificing everything else."
- RichardBennett 15y ago
  What about movies?

pg 15y ago

What do you feel is missing in existing laws?

earbitscom 15y ago
- Transparency about the level to which companies infringe. - Accountability for mass infringement and repeat violations. - Rigid enforcement against companies who exist almost exclusively to provide access to illegal material. There are two companies that need to be addressed: You have companies whose businesses are primarily built on copyright infringing content that their users upload under DMCA. Often small companies pop up who use this method until they're big enough to be noticed, and then they go back and negotiate retro-active deals. This creates an unfair advantage for them over companies who choose to operate completely within the law. These companies' only responsibility is to take the material down when they get caught, with no steeper penalty for repeat offenses or for building a business around this turnaround time. Grooveshark is an example of an American company that falls into this category. If you could see the number of takedown requests and repeat violations companies receive (I propose they be issued and resolved through a centralized database), it would be clear which companies exist almost exclusively to provide access to copyrighted material, or who do not place high enough priority on preventing copyright infringement. I believe they need to be held accountable without placing the burden of pursuing civil penalties on the backs of individual or small company rights holders for whom a lawsuit is not equitable. There should be severe penalties for companies whose infractions far outweigh the legitimate value they provide. Those penalties should not require a class action lawsuit or the war chest of some large company. Then there are companies who are just outright havens for illegal material, whether hosting it themselves or making user-shared content easy to find and access. Most of these companies are offshore, or they are only providing links and information without providing the content itself, both of which makes it hard to pursue civil penalty. I think there should be a clearly defined and transparent method for measuring the degree to which sites provide little value beyond access to illegal material, and those sites should be held accountable. There has to be actionable recourse and, unfortunately, you can only pursue civil penalties from companies who are domestic (or in a participating country) or who actually profit from their actions. In the case of sites who are not domestic or who do not generate meaningful financial gain for their illegal behavior, your only real option is to shut them down in one way or another. If the criteria for a site being eligible for this type of action is clear, and the infraction history is transparent, I have a hard time justifying not taking action against them. That being said, I do understand that we live in a world where rules are abused and I don't understand everything I need to about how such rules would be enforced. But I don't think the the fact that it's difficult and not foolproof are good enough reasons not to pursue a better system. The DMCA has put the burden of policing copyright on the shoulders of rights holders and that's fine, but penalizing companies who commit massive infringement should not be the job of a bunch of small artists and independent companies. Then there are companies for whom the option of legal recourse is not an option, and those people should be handled in the strictest way possible without putting too much power in the hands of arbitrary organizations.
- RichardBennett 15y ago
  DMCA is also not enforceable against the offshore, dedicated infringers targeted by SOPA and PIPA. The Pirate Bay laughs at DMCA takedown notices, for example.