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Ok, seriously, enough. SOPA isn't going to collapse in on itself if GoDaddy comes out swinging against it. This reminds me of the phrase "security theater" as a

Ok, seriously, enough. SOPA isn't going to collapse in on itself if GoDaddy comes out swinging against it. This reminds me of the phrase "security theater" as applied to the TSA. This is "activism theater" -- it accomplishes nothing but it puts on a show and makes people feel better. Applying this pressure to your congressmen is the only real way to affect change. I've called each of mine and have the vapid "We're studying this closely" response letters to prove it. I agree that action against individual companies can be effective, but there is an extreme focus on GoDaddy like they're the linchpin of this whole thing, some kind of mob boss when they're just another company who has lent their weight to this legislation.

vacri 15y ago
The issue here in this particular article is that GoDaddy lied about an issue that people are passionate enough to vote with their wallets about. It also doesn't accomplish nothing - it's better than a petition, which costs the petitioners nothing and is generally ignored in politics. It's a real demonstration of groundswell sentiment.
- ohashi 15y ago
  It also makes other companies recognize that we don't like to be fucked with and we vote with our wallets too. Today Godaddy, tomorrow your company supporting SOPA?
nc 15y ago
You're right. Though, look at it this way: this is a battle in the war against SOPA and a victory here does help get people who are standing at the bylines get motivated enough to take action.
Lagged2Death 15y ago
Who really stands a better chance of being heard in Congress, me or a corporation that "has been working to help craft revisions to this legislation?"
savrajsingh 15y ago
What are the best apps / sites out there to quickly email your representatives?
- _bbs 15y ago
  This site will connect you to your congressman: http://fightforthefuture.org/ http://fightforthefuture.org/
wheels 15y ago
There was one fellow on IRC that was suggesting a campaign to unlike SOPA supporting companies on Facebook. My response was similar to yours – it'd be utterly useless (as is the majority of "internet activism"). However, once thinking along those lines, I suggested what might not be useless would be using the Reddit-ish sentiment to raise money for an advertising campaign targeted specifically at the home districts of the bill's sponsors (which would be easy on Facebook). I'd suspect it'd be easy to scrape together many thousands of dollars and then to smear the bill's sponsors in their home districts. (I haven't done this because honestly I haven't read a single page of the bill's text, don't even know what its implications are and refuse to protest something on a bandwagon.)
Tichy 15y ago
You really think they'll be studying it closely? I think if their sponsors ask them to change their position it stands a better chance.
scarmig 15y ago
"Applying this pressure to your congressmen is the only real way to affect change" is followed by "I've called each of mine and have the vapid response letters to prove it." Slight disconnect there? =) Don't mean to harp on it, because contacting your congresscritters is a genuinely productive way to enact change. (Just don't put a whole lot of effort writing a heartfelt argument informed with evidence and rigor--its value comes more from indicating to the politician the breadth and energy of opposition to SOPA.) But focusing on GoDaddy isn't a distraction, either. One of the central rules of political organizing is this: you pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it. Victory isn't going to come in one fell swoop: if it comes at all, it will be through a loosely connected series of small victories, looking plausible only in retrospect. GoDaddy is an easy enemy: it has an anti-charismatic founder who has a long history of general shittiness. A victory there doesn't only screw over GoDaddy, which is in the grand scheme of things not even a secondary target--its only actual goal is to make a quick buck from the feds. But what a victory does do is this: for one, it sends an obvious message to Congress and to other companies that the Internet matters: it's providing objective information that, yes, the anti-SOPA forces have some power, and other players might re-evaluate their current strategy to accomodate that new information. But beyond that, and more important than that, is that it builds the movement. A victory sends a signal to people who are anti-SOPA but disenchanted that there is at least the hope of victory, bringing them back into the fold. It generates a bunch of news articles providing valuable anti-SOPA publicity, which is especially valuable since broader public knowledge of SOPA is one of the things we need most now. And it develops commitment and better engagement for the movement via showing how each of us as individuals can contribute to change. It's not an either-or choice: you can both send letters and move your domains from GoDaddy. By the way, if you're reading this and you haven't sent a letter... close out this window immediately, write a letter, and send it.
- palish 15y ago
  Please don't write a letter. It accomplishes nothing. We need to call our congressman and speak to whomever is on the line, with our voices. Not pens or keyboards. When your congressman asks his staff "What have the public been calling about?" (which he asks regularly), then there's a good chance that SOPA will be mentioned. But only if you call your congressman!
mcherm 15y ago
The news story about how GoDaddy is facing a groundswell of anger just might be something that influences congress.
pbreit 15y ago
I get a sense that it's the opposite: your emails to your congresspeople fall on deaf ears while some of these grassroots picking on companies is resonating.
- palish 15y ago
  Please don't write an email or a letter; as you say, it accomplishes nothing. We need to call our congressman and speak to whomever is on the line, with our voices. Not pens or keyboards. When your congressman asks his staff "What have the public been calling about?" (which he asks regularly), then there's a good chance that SOPA will be mentioned. But only if you call your congressman!
megablast 15y ago
Wrong. It clearly has had an effect, even if it hasn't changed go daddy's actual position. There has been a huge backlash against them, it has focused SOPA opposition, and created a lot of news, which is what we need. Suggesting we should only do one thing is foolish.
balloot 15y ago
I completely disagree. Watching a big proponent of SOPA have to scurry away from its position with its tail between its legs very likely gets the attention of people in Washington. As a Democrat, I feel there is way too much Outrage over all kinds of relatively minor things. If you read a site like Daily Kos and see all the action going on there, it would seem that any successful legislator would have to necessarily build a tolerance to negative emails/letters/calls. There are not, however, many issues that cause a large corporate donor to beg for mercy and forgiveness for taking a certain position. I think this action towards GoDaddy matters quite a bit in separating SOPA as something that really, truly angers people.
- sidww2 15y ago
  >> If you read a site like Daily Kos and see all the action going on there, it would seem that any successful legislator would have to necessarily build a tolerance to negative emails/letters/calls. I wonder if calling/sending letters to media outlets like WashPost and NY times might be more effective than doing the same for legislators. Right now, coverage of SOPA/PIPA is completely lacking among big media outlets. Negative coverage of the bills could go a long way towards defeating the bills. The tricky thing is that a lot of the big media outlets are owned by companies who are few of the major supporters of SOPA/PIPA in the first place.

vacri 15y ago

The issue here in this particular article is that GoDaddy lied about an issue that people are passionate enough to vote with their wallets about. It also doesn't accomplish nothing - it's better than a petition, which costs the petitioners nothing and is generally ignored in politics. It's a real demonstration of groundswell sentiment.

ohashi 15y ago
It also makes other companies recognize that we don't like to be fucked with and we vote with our wallets too. Today Godaddy, tomorrow your company supporting SOPA?

nc 15y ago

You're right. Though, look at it this way: this is a battle in the war against SOPA and a victory here does help get people who are standing at the bylines get motivated enough to take action.

Lagged2Death 15y ago

Who really stands a better chance of being heard in Congress, me or a corporation that "has been working to help craft revisions to this legislation?"

savrajsingh 15y ago

What are the best apps / sites out there to quickly email your representatives?

_bbs 15y ago
This site will connect you to your congressman: http://fightforthefuture.org/ http://fightforthefuture.org/

wheels 15y ago

There was one fellow on IRC that was suggesting a campaign to unlike SOPA supporting companies on Facebook. My response was similar to yours – it'd be utterly useless (as is the majority of "internet activism"). However, once thinking along those lines, I suggested what might not be useless would be using the Reddit-ish sentiment to raise money for an advertising campaign targeted specifically at the home districts of the bill's sponsors (which would be easy on Facebook). I'd suspect it'd be easy to scrape together many thousands of dollars and then to smear the bill's sponsors in their home districts. (I haven't done this because honestly I haven't read a single page of the bill's text, don't even know what its implications are and refuse to protest something on a bandwagon.)

Tichy 15y ago

You really think they'll be studying it closely? I think if their sponsors ask them to change their position it stands a better chance.

scarmig 15y ago

"Applying this pressure to your congressmen is the only real way to affect change" is followed by "I've called each of mine and have the vapid response letters to prove it." Slight disconnect there? =) Don't mean to harp on it, because contacting your congresscritters is a genuinely productive way to enact change. (Just don't put a whole lot of effort writing a heartfelt argument informed with evidence and rigor--its value comes more from indicating to the politician the breadth and energy of opposition to SOPA.) But focusing on GoDaddy isn't a distraction, either. One of the central rules of political organizing is this: you pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it. Victory isn't going to come in one fell swoop: if it comes at all, it will be through a loosely connected series of small victories, looking plausible only in retrospect. GoDaddy is an easy enemy: it has an anti-charismatic founder who has a long history of general shittiness. A victory there doesn't only screw over GoDaddy, which is in the grand scheme of things not even a secondary target--its only actual goal is to make a quick buck from the feds. But what a victory does do is this: for one, it sends an obvious message to Congress and to other companies that the Internet matters: it's providing objective information that, yes, the anti-SOPA forces have some power, and other players might re-evaluate their current strategy to accomodate that new information. But beyond that, and more important than that, is that it builds the movement. A victory sends a signal to people who are anti-SOPA but disenchanted that there is at least the hope of victory, bringing them back into the fold. It generates a bunch of news articles providing valuable anti-SOPA publicity, which is especially valuable since broader public knowledge of SOPA is one of the things we need most now. And it develops commitment and better engagement for the movement via showing how each of us as individuals can contribute to change. It's not an either-or choice: you can both send letters and move your domains from GoDaddy. By the way, if you're reading this and you haven't sent a letter... close out this window immediately, write a letter, and send it.

palish 15y ago
Please don't write a letter. It accomplishes nothing. We need to call our congressman and speak to whomever is on the line, with our voices. Not pens or keyboards. When your congressman asks his staff "What have the public been calling about?" (which he asks regularly), then there's a good chance that SOPA will be mentioned. But only if you call your congressman!

mcherm 15y ago

The news story about how GoDaddy is facing a groundswell of anger just might be something that influences congress.

pbreit 15y ago

I get a sense that it's the opposite: your emails to your congresspeople fall on deaf ears while some of these grassroots picking on companies is resonating.

palish 15y ago
Please don't write an email or a letter; as you say, it accomplishes nothing. We need to call our congressman and speak to whomever is on the line, with our voices. Not pens or keyboards. When your congressman asks his staff "What have the public been calling about?" (which he asks regularly), then there's a good chance that SOPA will be mentioned. But only if you call your congressman!

megablast 15y ago

Wrong. It clearly has had an effect, even if it hasn't changed go daddy's actual position. There has been a huge backlash against them, it has focused SOPA opposition, and created a lot of news, which is what we need. Suggesting we should only do one thing is foolish.

balloot 15y ago

I completely disagree. Watching a big proponent of SOPA have to scurry away from its position with its tail between its legs very likely gets the attention of people in Washington. As a Democrat, I feel there is way too much Outrage over all kinds of relatively minor things. If you read a site like Daily Kos and see all the action going on there, it would seem that any successful legislator would have to necessarily build a tolerance to negative emails/letters/calls. There are not, however, many issues that cause a large corporate donor to beg for mercy and forgiveness for taking a certain position. I think this action towards GoDaddy matters quite a bit in separating SOPA as something that really, truly angers people.

sidww2 15y ago
>> If you read a site like Daily Kos and see all the action going on there, it would seem that any successful legislator would have to necessarily build a tolerance to negative emails/letters/calls. I wonder if calling/sending letters to media outlets like WashPost and NY times might be more effective than doing the same for legislators. Right now, coverage of SOPA/PIPA is completely lacking among big media outlets. Negative coverage of the bills could go a long way towards defeating the bills. The tricky thing is that a lot of the big media outlets are owned by companies who are few of the major supporters of SOPA/PIPA in the first place.