SOPA/PIPA

Statler and Waldorf from The Muppet Show
These are not the people who should be writing Internet policy.

Do you like all those awesome pop culture references and movie stills we use around these parts all the time? If you’re in the USA, here are some good links for you to check out today:

Mother Jones’s coverage of the SOPA/PIPA Issue

ProPublica’s tracker of individual congresspeople and where they stand on the issue.

A very no-hassle way to contact your particular congresspeople about the issue.

Sorry, rest of the world! We’ll resume normal activities soon enough.

7 thoughts on “SOPA/PIPA

  1. An excellent link – the Cheezburger network also has a list of direct phone numbers on their site if you like to do it the confrontational way. THANKS FOR SHARING!

  2. Word of advice from a friend who’s a former congressional intern:

    “For those of you thinking of calling your Members of Congress to oppose SOPA/PIPA: Keep your phone calls short and sweet. They’ve already heard any argument you might have; your individual call won’t be determinative. Don’t tie up the line; free it up for others. It’s the numbers that matter.”

  3. What I have also been told is that representatives and senators give substantially more weight to letters they receive sent through their individual Web forms, than those sent by aggregator sites like “act.protectinnovation.com”.

    1. What I have been told is that they really don’t give a fuck and have made up their minds based on how much money they’ve taken in donations, but you’re right – more than one avenue of action is best. I posted the easiest possible way for people.

  4. This Guardian article explains why SOPA and PIPA are really, really, terrifyingly relevant even to people who aren’t U.S. citizens. So, “rest of the world,” not sure we can really promise a return to normal activities, but this post is your business, too.

    1. It’s kind of hard to think how to influence it as a non-US citizen though. The wikipedia blackout guidelines says “Contact your local State Department*, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, or similar branch of government”. I don’t really see Congressmen changing their stance because of pressure from foreign diplomats, in fact if anything that might provoke the opposite response – “Pass SOPA or admit that foreigners have a right to interfere with our internal affairs”

      It’d probably be more effective to simply write to Congressmen pretending to be Americans and saying “If SOPA passes I won’t vote for you”. Technically true, too!

      *Protip: No country other than the USA has a ‘State Department’.

      1. Yes, non-U.S. citizens can contact their Foreign Ministries. Although I think focusing on the presumed futility of such actions is counterproductive, my comment really was more a response to the Captain saying, “Sorry, rest of the world! We’ll resume normal activities soon enough.” I read that as, “Sorry we’re talking about things that aren’t relevant to you,” and I just wanted to point out that this is very relevant for anyone who uses the internet, American or not; therefore, no apologies needed. Whether that spurs people to action is up to them.

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