
Google vows to fight antipiracy bill even if passed - urbannomad
http://news.cnet.com/8301-31001_3-20063963-261.html
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wccrawford
"Google seems to think it's above America's laws."

... No, it seems to think that particular law is unjust, and as responsible
citizens, they are duty-bound to fight it.

~~~
powertower
Things are not that clear.

Do you know what the revenue sources are for a lot of the pirate movie
websites?

Google AdSense.

And for software...

From what I've seen, Google often displays crack sites on the first search
page for software. 1st place result for author, 2nd,3rd,4th,5th,6th,7th result
for crack sites.

In my own testing, I've found that at least 30% of buyers search for crack
1st, and when they can't find it, then they buy.

Google does this for two reasons:

1\. There is significant revenue involved here. 2\. There is significant
relevancy involved here. As people gladly want to use pirated stuff to get out
of paying, and want to see these results.

Google is not fighting for you. They are fighting for themselves.

~~~
smokeyj
Google's revenue from pirated movies and software is virtually non-existent.
Their real interest is Youtube, considering half it's content probably
infringes copyright somewhere.

~~~
powertower
This is not true at all and I would love to see you back it up with a credible
source.

This has been covered over and over again...

A significant portion of those sites would not exist without AdSense revenue
to cover costs and make a profit.

~~~
smokeyj
If the revenue from pirate sites disappeared Google wouldn't even blink. The
pain in the ass is regulatory compliance. Hollywood wants IP enforced on
Google's dime/technology, and Google doesn't want to be their bitch.

~~~
powertower
Just an example...

When I used Google AdWords, 30% of the clicks came from Google "content
partners" which where nothing more than link farms. I'd say that was a
significant source of revenue for Google... So much so that Google even put up
its own parked domain service to further its profits.

If Google was "good", they would have either got rid of this 8 years ago, or
never got into it in the first place.

Don't underestimate the amount of revenue Google generates from fraud.

~~~
electromagnetic
Justify with evidence please. Don't go spouting slanderous statements and have
nothing to back them up with. If it's as obvious as you seem to be claiming
then you shouldn't have any trouble backing up your point.

Google's policy isn't to be "good", it's to "do no evil" and they are very,
very different things. This legislation is dangerous like a bomb. If you
integrate a system that can drop an IP address from _global_ DNS servers at
will, then things are very dire.

Wikileaks got taken down enough as it was, but no one would have heard a peep
if the DNS was dropped in seconds of being noticed.

Next step would be to force search providers to recognize 'infringing text'
and have the DNS immediately taken down to stop the Streisand Effect.

Hello Egypt, Syria, heck the Middle Eastern Despots, you'll all have promising
new positions in the US government very, very soon!

~~~
jussij
> Justify with evidence please.

Just one example, do a search and you'll find many more:

[http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/06_40/b4003001....](http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/06_40/b4003001.htm)

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randomwalker
Today I got to talk to Congresswoman Zoe Lofgren, one of the very few
legislators who is fighting this. Here are my notes:
[http://33bits.org/2011/05/19/fighting-protect-ip-
congresswom...](http://33bits.org/2011/05/19/fighting-protect-ip-
congresswoman-lofgren/) There were some surprises for me. Here is the summary:

 _Appeals to free speech and chilling effects are at best temporary measures
in the fight against Protect IP and domain seizures. Even if we win this time
it will keep coming back in modified form; the only way defeat it for good is
to convince Washington that artists are in fact thriving, that piracy is not
the real problem, and that takedown efforts are not in the interest of
society. We in the tech world know this, but we are doing a poor job of making
ourselves heard in Washington, and this needs to change._

~~~
bluedanieru
Even that's not enough. He's assuming most people in Congress and the Obama
administration give a damn about the effects of piracy on artistic expression,
or indeed what is in the best interests of society. They don't. It's sad to
see someone so naive in that position.

~~~
skrebbel
don't confuse naivety with pr: she's talking on record there.

barring a few nutjobs, i've the idea most politicians are significantly less
naive than they let show.

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MaxGabriel
Ugh.. This article barely mentions the critics of IP. They get mentioned at
the very end of the article as "those who believe in the free flow of
information, and critics of Protect IP." Meanwhile, the article throws around
unsourced 'billions of dollars and thousands of jobs' claims about just how
_awful_ it is that intellectual property is violated.

I don't know what motive Google has for fighting it, but I'm glad they are
nonetheless

~~~
kwantam
The motive for fighting it is that by crossing the line from "robotic indexer
of the web" to "provider of curated search data", Google assumes substantial
responsibility for the content of websites outside their control. This is a
nightmarish slippery slope situation for them.

In my mind, making a person who provides a hyperlink responsible for the
content of that link is just insanely wrongheaded and bespeaks a deep
misunderstanding of the nature of the web.

~~~
jerf
"This is a nightmarish slippery slope situation for them."

Stronger: This is an existential crisis for them. For as rich as they appear
to be and for all the resources they seem to have, the task of curating the
web is still an order of magnitude or two larger at least, and for certain
strict interpretations of the law, this would simply crush them. And there is
no chance that any politician will look at Google and see this, because all
the numbers are above the "1, 2, ..., many" threshold for most humans, and the
idea that the task is too large for Google will be poo-pooed by politicians if
you simply make that engineering argument.

~~~
btilly
That's way overstated. The "curation" that is required here is, "Here is a
list of domains that appear in court orders. Don't send ads to them with
adsense, don't accept ads linking to these domains, drop them from search
rankings." My reading of the law as written doesn't require more drastic
action, such as scrubbing out links to them from blogs.

That is, it isn't Google's responsibility to figure out who is infringing. It
is Google's responsibility to take a list given to them by US courts and
follow a set of directions.

Not a pleasant task, to be sure. But it wouldn't break Google's bank account
to do it.

~~~
palish
And you see nothing inherently wrong with that task? (Otherwise, you'd label
it as more than an "unpleasant task".)

"Memory Hole" comes to mind.

~~~
btilly
I do see something wrong with the task. We are being poor stewards of DNS.
Given past abuses of the legal system by the RIAA, I am sure they will abuse
us further.

I'm also quite uncomfortable with how this will work in practice. The bill has
a number of assurances to protect non-US companies from having it be unfairly
applied to them. I do not trust those assurances. When a US lawyer sends a
subpoena to the DNS provider and the website, and the website (not being in
the USA) doesn't show up, the DNS provider still will. I doubt that they will
put up a vigorous defense. Based on the fact that two sides showed up and the
facts presented were overwhelming, the judge will have little choice about
taking action under the bill. (Even though the real facts about the website
may be overwhelming in the website's favor, the judge has to judge on the
facts presented in court.)

Furthermore I hate the precedent.

But when someone opposes it with ridiculous hyperbole, it is too easy for
supporters of the bill to point out how ridiculous the argument is. So the
fact that the bill is bad won't stop me from pointing out that the argument is
even worse.

~~~
palish
Thank you for the effort you've put into your reply.

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fleitz
They said this crap about warrantless wiretapping. It won't be used against
pirate sites it will be used against sites that express a POV contrary to the
administration. Wikileaks is not a 'pirate' site.

When the government asks for something you should not consider how they want
to use it, you should consider how they want to abuse the power. The case they
trot out is specious and could usually be dealt with via much better ways via
existing law.

If these file sharing sites are conducting criminal activities then they
should be taken to court and tried according to the laws of the country in
which the site operates.

As far as being above America's laws, I think Google's position is clearly
within a plain reading of the constitution.

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iwwr
"Copyright owners have said the legislation has a series of legal checks and
balances built in and would be geared only toward pirate sites."

Any information on what these 'checks and balances' would be?

~~~
skymt
You can read the full text of the bill here:
[http://www.publicknowledge.org/files/docs/Bill-PROTECT-IP-
Ac...](http://www.publicknowledge.org/files/docs/Bill-PROTECT-IP-Act-2011.pdf)

Checks and balances are in section 3 (f), which describes how to file a motion
to "modify, suspend or vacate" an order if the site removes the offending
content or the order turns out to be in error.

~~~
jbri
It's not a proper balance unless it has provisions to dissuade those who
misuse the process. "Lol our bad" and putting it back up, with no compensation
for that downtime or penalty for false accusations doesn't actually do
anything.

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ltamake
Probably a PR stunt, but I'm still happy they're going to fight it.

~~~
Ruudjah
Google does not need that kind of PR.

~~~
iwwr
For hackerdom at least, it's good PR. Consider Sony's case, they might have
shut out a large number of talented people by the way they handled the PS3
hacking affair.

~~~
chris11
The difference is that Sony's pr was negative. And while an absence of a
statement on the legislation might disappoint some people, I doubt it would
actively shut out a lot of talented hackers.

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petar
My take on this:

    
    
      http://popalg.org/schmidt-response

~~~
chris11
While I agree that this legislation will be ineffective in fighting piracy, I
don't think Google is concerned about the effects of piracy. This would
seriously threaten any site that deals with legally questionable material.
Instead of dealing with a DMCA notice, now they are threatening with the loss
of their site. And it's not like you have to try to infringe when dealing with
user submitted content. In the Google vs Viacom lawsuits, the Viacom legal
team brought up videos submitted by Viacom Marketing employees as evidence of
infringement.

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shareme
hint MPAA if people do not have money to pay for it is not lost job in the
millions...it just millions you will never see..ever

