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Gyasti Averia
Professor Foster
Communication 001
6 April 2015
SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act):
A Piracy Policy that Pirates the Internet
SOPA is a United States bill that regulates the ability to post copyrighted contents and
trafficked goods on the Internet. This act also dilates the law enforcements of United States
range of courses of action to take if any websites, search engines, or Internet service providers
post, direct, or serve Internet service against any SOPAs policies. Back in 2012, SOPA bill was
brought to congress to be turned into a law. The act that originally intended to protect the
copyrighted contents from being copied illegally and to increase revenues for the owner of the
copyrighted contents was countered by huge amount of websites and big companies, such as
Google and other 115,000 websites. The protests that resulted in wide website blackouts and how
some aspects of the bill concerned the congress members made the bill to be were not available
to be voted until some markup could be done and agreement could be reached. But not long after
the bill was announced dead, in late 2014, MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America)
teamed up with the state officials to try reviving the SOPA. This group act consisting of MPAA
and six production studios Universal, Sony, Fox, Paramount, Warner Bros., and Disney that
happened due to the hacking of Sony Entertainment targeted Google for displaying and linking
search results to the copyrighted pirated contents. Although, the act of reviving SOPA rested on a
good intention of stopping piracy on the web, the aftermath and collateral effects of SOPA would

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kill aspects of the Internet that made it what it is, because SOPA would put more power onto
justice departments and limit the freedom of speech and innovations on the Internet.
The SOPA intention to put censorship across the web of pirated copyrighted contents
would plausibly violate the First Amendment, which rules the freedom of speech in United
States. The freedom of speech is crucial to the people in United States, especially in the Internet
era everyone is entitled to the freedom of speech. If SOPA bill passed, it would allow The
Department of Justice to shut down any website with infringement content, even though the
majority of the website content nothing such. Sandra Smitchz from University of Luxemburg
wrote in The US SOPA and PIPA a European perspective (2013), that, the new set of bills
targets offending websites by restricting access to entire sites or portions thereof as well as
cutting off funding of these websites. Fierce opposition came from content creators such us the
Wikipedia community, free speech organizations such as the Electronic Frontier Federation, free
software authors, and other web companies as well as the public (218). This affirms that not
only SOPA would plausibly violate the freedom of speech; it also would create a great injustice
situation on the Web, where the neutrality is its prominent feature.
If SOPA bill passed, it will put immoderate power onto the Department of Justice to shut
down any website at will anytime without having to go to court. The bill proposed to allow
Department of Justice and Attorney General to shut down any website with alleged infringing
content without first judged by the court. SOPA would immediately order Internet providers to
no longer recognize the website. For instance, the government would be able to plausibly shut
down any website that contains vilifying articles about their agents, such as Hufftington Post,
simply because that website contains links to copyrighted properties of other websites, such as
CNN (Broes). The SOPA not only will create a law to put more power onto the governments

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hands, it also plausibly violated the Fourth Amendment of United States, which protects the U.S.
citizen from unreasonable searches and seizure. SOPA would create surveillance on the Web that
will let peoples personal information exposed to the government without consent. Cory
Rossman wrote in his website How Does S.O.P.A. effects Americans Right, that According
to Ron Pauls government website, SOPA would turn internet companies into involuntary tools
for Big Brother government, further eroding our Constitutional rights. (Stop Internet
Censorship) The passing of SOPA would allow the government to watch users every move and
collect data from them at anytime, which would be a huge invasion of privacy. This is why SOPA
would be a violation of the Fourth Amendment (Rossman).
With freedom of speech taken from the Internet and the big probability of getting shut
down due to just one unfortunate alleged infringement, SOPA would kill peoples chance to be
innovative and therefore destroy opportunities for new companies and artists to bloom. As
mentioned above, the plausible violation of the First Amendment could also resulted in
regression of online innovation that is due because over-censorship and unreasonable
surveillance. Trevor Timm, an American journalist and one of the key members of Freedom of
The Press Foundation, stated in his Web article How PIPA and SOPA Violate White House
Principles Supporting Free Speech and Innovation, that In addition to going after websites
allegedly directly involved in copyright infringement, a proposal in SOPA will allow the
government to target sites that simply provide information that could help users get around the
bills censorship mechanisms. Such a provision would not only amount to an unconstitutional
prior restraint against protected speech, but would severely damage online innovation. The
effect of ruined innovation will also reflect on online business, where the freedom and neutrality
act as key components.

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MPAA, the association that claims to promote and defend the first amendment of artists
and their right to be express freely, acts contrary to their claim and intended to censor the Internet
using SOPA. It would be immature to presume that artists successes do not have anything to do
with the exposure on the Web. The MPAAs action of secretly censoring the Web will cause the
decreased exposures of artists in the Internet. Pamela Samuelson, a law professor from UC
Berkeley, wrote on Legally Speaking Can Online Piracy Be Stopped by Law? (2012), that An
odd thing about the entertainment industry is its deeply skewed views about piracy. In movies
such as Pirates of the Caribbean, the industry glamorizes brigands who attack ships by depicting
them as romantic heroes who have great adventures and engage in swashbuckling fun. Yet, it
demonizes fans who download music and movies as pernicious evildoers who are, in its view,
destroying this vital part of the U.S. economy (27). This affirms that MPAAs act of supporting
SOPA to an extent would be hypocrite.
In sum, although the act of reviving SOPA was based on MPAA and the six production
studios concern about motion picture piracy, the collateral damages that would be caused by the
policy would more likely to put limit on the Internet, as if putting it in a cage. SOPA would
plausibly violate the freedom of speech and neutrality of the Internet. Therefore, have the
probability of killing young innovations and start up businesses online. SOPA would put more
power for the government in the one place where everyone is supposed to have freedom.
Although, SOPA lays on a good intention of protecting the copyrighted contents from being
copied illegally, the bill itself is a flawed regulation. As Samuelson stated, Because SOPA was a
flawed piece of legislation, the collapse was a good thing. It would, however, be a mistake to
think the battle over Internet intermediary liability for infringing acts of users has been won for
good (27).

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Works Cited
Broes, Derek. "Why Should You Fear SOPA and PIPA?" Forbes. Forbes Magazine, 20 Jan.
2012. Web. 12 Mar. 2015.
Samuelson, Pamela. "Can Online Piracy Be Stopped By Laws?." Communications Of The ACM
55.7 (2012): 25-27. Business Source Elite. Web. 12 Mar. 2015.
Rossman, Cory. "Issues with SOPA - How Does S.O.P.A. Effect Americans' Rights?" Issues
with SOPA - How Does S.O.P.A. Effect Americans' Rights? Weebly.com, n.d. Web. 12
Mar. 2015.
Schmitz, Sandra. "The US SOPA And PIPA A European Perspective." International Review
Of Law, Computers & Technology 27.1/2 (2013): 213-229. Academic Search Premier.
Web. 12 Mar. 2015.
Timm, Trevor. "How PIPA and SOPA Violate White House Principles Supporting Free Speech
and Innovation." Electronic Frontier Foundation. Electronic Frontier Foundation, 16 Jan.
2012. Web. 12 Mar. 2015.