SOPA: Brewing Discord

The world is just a click away. The phrase seems cliché, but no other can sum up so effectively the social, cultural, economic and even political transformations that have been produced by the Internet in two decades. It has been the creation of a new understanding of the world, erasing the terrestrial borders created by states and opening the doors to unlimited awareness for humanity.

It is for this reason that the so-called SOPA law – Stop Online Piracy Act – has produced so many concerns. The law, currently being considered by the United States Congress, seeks to restrict the publication of online content under the pretext of defending authors’ rights and intellectual property. In sum, the act demands that Internet companies block those sites that make available or sell content classified by the FBI as pirated and seeks punishment of those who use or download this content, even if they do so outside of the North American country.

The protests, in which many sites “blacked-out” their services for 24 hours, along with the opposing voices heard in different parts of the world, led to the suspension of the bill’s consideration in Congress, which should have been voted on next Tuesday. The question is whether this decision would imply the closure of the space opened by the Internet, and if this would mean restricting the dynamism that portals like Wikipedia, search engines such as Yahoo and social networks like Facebook have given to people’s communication and daily life. How can the distribution of and access to content be regulated, and how can this regulation be enforced all over the planet?

Among its great revolutions, cyberspace has meant the profound transformation of the idea of intellectual property. For example, the music industry as it was known disappeared in order to make way for a form that allowed universal access, often without need for payment. Another example is Wikipedia, which, offering knowledge to all, has become the most consulted virtual encyclopedia. Its own users keep its information up to date. It is an opportune time to consider the threat implied by placing limits.

Neelie Kroes, European Commission Vice President for the Digital Agenda, summed up the majority position in her Tweets alluding to SOPA: “Speeding is illegal too: but you don’t put speed bumps on the motorway.” Also: “don’t need bad legislation when should be safeguarding benefits of open net.” The Internet seems impossible to stop. Every day, 100,800 domains are registered, 864,000 videos are uploaded to YouTube and 205 billion emails are sent, to give just a few figures.

Responsibility is without a doubt necessary, as are laws to protect intellectual property, but they should be adapted to the new order of communication. Except in totalitarian states such as China or Cuba, access to content by those who need it is the Internet’s great contribution. If the United States adopts censorship as a strategy to defend antiquated concepts of authors’ rights, it will look a great deal like Cuba and China.