
Sal Khan explains SOPA / PIPA - marcia
http://www.khanacademy.org/video/sopa-and-pipa?playlist=American+Civic
======
kamens
Sal showed up at our weekly company picnic/lunch today and said something
like, "All these sites are down cuz of SOPA, but everything I read is still so
hard to understand," so he dove in and made this this morning. Pretty cool.

~~~
swalsh
I am convinced that Sal Khan's contribution to education is so significant his
work will be used in classrooms generations from now... though perhaps in the
form of some kind of technological derivative.

So congrats! You just had lunch with the historical equivalent of Einstein.

~~~
rhizome
The guy really deserves some kind of recognition, but I don't think there's a
Nobel or Pulitzer for education (telling).

~~~
felipemnoa
Peace Prize? It could be argued that a better educated world is more likely to
move towards peace. Allows people to be more critical thinking and thus not
allow themselves to be fooled so easily by politicians.

~~~
bh42222
The Peace Prize has been given for way crazier stuff than what Sal Khan is
doing. If a banker can receive it for giving loans to people, why not Sal Khan
for educating them?

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nextparadigms
Linking is not a crime. If we'll ever make any "Internet Freedom" laws or
Constitutional Amendments, that definitely needs to be in there.

The 1st Amendment should already cover linking as speech, but apparently
MPAA/RIAA and some in Congress disagree.

~~~
mr_luc
It would make sense to have this as a central tenet of internet protection
legislation.

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thelema314
A very nice video, except the particular passage referred to has the clause
"designed for..., has only limited purpose or use other than, or is marketed
for..." violating various laws. I don't think any of his examples would fall
under any of these categories.

~~~
aero142
I find it disturbing that even though I am still against SOPA and the likes,
that the opposition seems to be willfully ignoring this portion. Unless I am
totally misreading it, it would be very difficult for the likes of Youtube or
Facebook to be included.

The language is still dangerous though, because the designed for clause seems
to open things up. I can easily see BitTorrent being brought in to be
"designed for" downloading illegal movies, because judges aren't likely to
think downloading linux distributions is very significant alternative use. The
thing that concerns me is that smaller companies or companies outside of the
mainstream might not get much credit for having other purposes. Imagine if
reddit had r/stealmovies, a judge might not care much about the rest of it if
there are thousands of people using it to talk about infringing.

There is enough wrong with this bill to oppose it without resorting to
hyperbolic threats.

edit: Thinking about it more, youtube might be a great example. Current
youtube won't be brought down with this, but youtube in it's infancy very well
might have been stomped out. Imagine explaining to a Judge, "no, you don't
understand. Right now it might be used for mostly unauthorized music videos,
but showing home videos of cats is going to be HUGE!"

~~~
pkteison
A farmer has successfully been prosecuted under the -Interstate Commerce
Clause- for growing his own wheat on his own land for his own use.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wickard_v._Filburn>

It never left a state, it never left his farm, it was not for sale, it is
definitely not interstate commerce, yet he violated the interstate commerce
clause (reasoning was that if he had not grown his own wheat, he would have
had to buy some, which would affect the market, which would affect interstate
commerce.)

It's because of things like this that cause people to interpret legal language
in the worst possible imaginable light - 'very difficult' has happened many
times.

So I think it's quite reasonable to assume that at some point Youtube and
Facebook will be found to be "...marketed by its operator or another acting in
concert with that operator for use in offering goods or services in a manner
that facilitates [illegal things]"

One ad that says "Post comments without logging in!" would be sufficient to
meet the letter of that language. You really think this is a 'hyperbolic
threat'?

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koops
All the blackout banners should link to this video.

~~~
melvinram
It's a YouTube video. They can just embed it on the page.

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Lewton
Shows how effective khanacademy.org is when, after watching the entire video,
I discovered I wasn't logged in and was disappointed I wouldn't get my points!

~~~
corysama
The Vision of the Gamepocalypse is coming true. :)

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9NzFCfZMBkU&t=2m10s](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9NzFCfZMBkU&t=2m10s)

~~~
stcredzero
Gamepocalypse already happened. Money is just a point system.

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EGreg
Once again Salman Khan explains what needed explaining to many people.

However, SOPA has changed since then and now * specifically only applies to
foreign sites * excludes the DNS cutoff

It is still "flawed", as Darren Issa says, and I think the OPEN act,
deputizing the ITC is actually way better. It would first offer the offending
foreign sites a chance to enter into arbitration before taking any unilateral
action against them by the USA.

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samstave
We need S.O.P.A:

Stop Outrageous Political Assholes.

Did anyone here see the letter from the CEO of the MPAA (who happens to also
be a senator) chriss dodd today, which said that this SOPA blackouts are a
gimmick and that we are corporate pawns for blacking out in protest?

Is it enraging to anyone else that he is allowed to be the CEO of the MPAA AND
a senator at the same time where he can both write and benefit from
legislation in his interests?

~~~
thebigshane

       United States Senator from Connecticut
       In office January 3, 1981 – January 3, 2011
    
       On March 1, 2011, the Motion Picture Association of 
       America announced that Dodd will head that organization
    

He's not a senator anymore and was never senator and MPAA Chairman at the same
time. I know wikipedia is "down" so it's harder to check facts.
[<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Dodd?banner=false>]

~~~
samstave
Thanks!

I have heard his name enough in the media recently, associated with the credit
crisis, as referred to as senator, that I hadn't realized he was out.

Still does not reduce my level of disdain for him.

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dlikhten
Sal, hope you are on HN because I have to say, you f-ing rule. I don't think
anyone could have done a better job explaining it.

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digvan
We are hosting a discussion about #SOPA tonight at TooTchat. Come and join us.
<http://bit.ly/AiomgP>

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omarv
What is the most practical way to send this video to the members of Congress
so they can become better educated on the ramifications of these bills?

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crististm
I thought I knew how creepy SOPA/PIPA are

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niels_olson
Better permalink to Sal Khan's explanation of SOPA

<http://khanacademy.org/video?v=tzqMoOk9NWc>

~~~
spicyj
There's nothing wrong with the original link. (I'm KA intern/part-time and the
submitter is a full-time KA dev.)

~~~
niels_olson
I didn't realize the organization had a plan to shephard quirky links
indefinitely

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crististm
so using ssh would be now illegal?

