
Even the Business Software Alliance now backpedaling on SOPA support - evo_9
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/11/even-the-business-software-alliance-now-backpedaling-on-sopa-support.ars
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sanderson1
I chalk this up to everyone who called out major technology companies for
indirectly supporting SOPA through their membership in the BSA. Cheers!

It's finally starting to feel like the people who actually get what the
internet is and how it works are being heard. It's about time.

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r00fus
Let's hope SOPA dies a fiery death, but what about the next attempt? Will
Congress and the public accept a watered down next-step towards a Great
Firewall of America?

Take a look at the "fetal personhood movement" (ie, a shady corporate group
looking to drop a legal nuke)... they lost the fight in Mississippi, but are
now looking to 12 other states where they'll attempt to buy a constitutional
amendment... if they succeed, they can now whore themselves out for whatever
industry needs amendments that benefit their bottom line.

The root of the problem is that legislation is for sale and some of those 1%
are interested in buying.

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hvs
What? How does SOPA have _anything_ to do with an anti-abortion movement and
constitutional amendments?

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cabalamat
I think the point that the original poster was making is that corporations
with lots of money behind them can keep trying to get similar laws passed,
again and again, until they finally succeed.

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alexqgb
Which is an extension of the broader problem with Congresspeople having often
very-divided loyalties. On the one hand (usually the weak one) there are
voters. On there other, there's the money. Backing this money up is the threat
that favoring voters will mean someone else getting the money, which they will
be expected to use attacking the person who had the temerity to refuse it.

It's an impossible situation - like depending on an employee whose salary and
benefits are provided by your most direct competitors.

The logic of public election finance holds that all citizens, regardless of
their political views, have a much greater interest in a legislative body
responsive to voters alone than they do in possibly underwriting the campaign
of a particular legislator who they oppose.

Put differently, would you rather (indirectly) fund the campaign of someone
you don't want representing you, along with the campaign of someone you do, or
would you rather have nobody you can trust to represent you on anything?

