An issue that may threaten the existence of thetaobums and all forum sites based in the usa

[Thunder_Gooch]

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/toms-hardware-sopa-Stop-Online-Piracy-Act-PROTECT-IP-Senate,14393.html

 

Here at Tom’s Hardware, you know we don’t typically get political because with the heated debates between AMD vs. Intel who needs Donkeys vs. Elephants?

 

We’ve got no agenda beyond providing the best hardware news and reviews we can dig up. But here at Year’s end, there’s a subject we want to share with you that may come to affect how you experience us and the rest of the internet. It’s called SOPA, or the “Stop Online Piracy Act”, and it is headed through U.S. Congress with its sister bill PROTECT-IP in the Senate. SOPA threatens to fundamentally change the way information is presented online by placing massive restrictions on user-generated content like posts to forums, video uploads, podcasts or images. In a nutshell, here’s what the law would do:

 

 

Assign liability to site owners for everything users post, without consideration for whether or not the user posted without permission. Site owners could face jail time or heavy fines, and DNS blacklisting.

It would require web services like YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter to monitor and aggressively filter everything all users upload.

It would deny site owners due process of law, by initiating a DNS blacklisting based solely on a good faith assertion by an individual copyright or intellectual property owner.

It would give the U.S. government the power to selectively censor the web using techniques similar to those used in China, Malaysia and Iran. The Great Firewall of China is an example of this type of embedded, infrastructural internet censorship.

 

 

As an example, imagine a user posts a video clip to the Tom’s Community of a step-by-step guide on how to set up water cooling on an overclocked i7 CPU. Playing in the background behind the voiceover is “Derezzed” by Daft Punk. The studio representing Daft Punk could issue a complaint, without being required to notify us or request a take-down. Tom’s Hardware would be liable and prosecuted solely on a good faith assertion of the copyright owner, without notification, with the site operators subject to possible jail time for not preventing the video from being posted. In short order, the http://www.tomshardware.com/ domain in the United States would no longer resolve to our servers and visitors attempting to come to Tom’s Hardware would be redirected to a “This site under review for piracy/copyright violations” page.

 

To conform to these new restrictions would mean that Tom’s Hardware would have to switch to a review/approval process for any and all new posts to our forums and articles. Our community team would have to approve every single news comment, every new thread, and every new response before it went live and filter them for potentially infringing material. Even so, we would still possibly be under threat from violations not caught – a user posting a paragraph from “Unix for Dummies” as an example or a snippet of software news from another website in excess of a certain summary threshold. That’s just here on Tom’s. The effect on sites like YouTube, Google, Facebook, Twitter, Reddit and the rest of the internet would be devastating, and progress and innovation would grind to a halt under the cumbersome new restrictions.

 

The intent of the legislation is to stop piracy, which isn’t affected in the least by this approach. The DNS censoring method is circumvented by navigating to the IP directly, and many have already installed Anti-SOPA browser extensions that do this automatically. Unfortunately the legislation in the House and Senate has a wide margin of bi-partisan support and looks likely to pass after the holidays. We strongly oppose the censorship of the internet and strongly encourage you to contact your Congressional Representatives and Senators to voice your opposition. Believe it or not, your Congress-critters do count the number of calls and emails they get on a particular issue, and most of the time only the people in their jurisdiction (read- you) can sway their opinion on something – so your action on this is important.

 

Please take a moment to contact your representative and tell them you oppose the PROTECT IP Act in the Senate and the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) in the House. Here’s a link that can give you more information and provide you with contact info for your elected official. Your action on this matters.

 

https://action.eff.org/o/9042/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=8173

 

Yours,

The Tom’s Hardware Team

Edited December 29, 2011 by More_Pie_Guy

[Thunder_Gooch]

let's say a user here on the tao bums uploads a video and shares it with us of themselves practicing tai chi or meditation or discussing philosophy, in the background copyrighted music is playing. Or a user quotes from a copyrighted book, or shares some other media that is copyrighted.

 

The person holding the copyrights could file a complaint under sopa and have the entire community itself nuked off the internet.

 

This isn't an exaggeration, this most likely will indeed happen.

 

Sopa and protect IP will create a system of censorship for the US internet at least as bad if not worse than China. As a matter of fact this was given as a reason for supporting the bill by the MPAA, and RIAA being that systems like this work in China, and Iran and other oppressive governments and could also work here.

 

Most likely as the DOJ will be in charge of this program, sites that support organizations like operation wall-street and other sites which organize to protest will be pulled offline and their communications halted.

 

The potential for abuse is astronomical.

 

Imagine an internet with no wikipedia, google, youtube, thetaobums, and other forums.

 

Impossible?

 

Think again.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop_Online_Piracy_Act

 

 

 

I urge you to read up on this bill, and call your elected officials stating your concerns if you like large communities like thetaobums.

 

You can find the phone numbers and email your representatives here, email isn't very effective calling is better.

https://action.eff.org/o/9042/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=8173

Edited December 29, 2011 by More_Pie_Guy

[doc benway]

Thanks for posting this.

It is a real threat.

A few years ago I would have chuckled and said, no way!

Now, with the current trend of restriction of freedom in the US, I'm not as confident.

[Thunder_Gooch]

Thanks for posting this.

It is a real threat.

A few years ago I would have chuckled and said, no way!

Now, with the current trend of restriction of freedom in the US, I'm not as confident.

 

 

The opposition for this bill is massive with virtually every online tech community up in arms about it, one of the founders of the internet itself, google, microsoft, the Standford law review declares it blatantly unconstitutional, Sandia national labs says it will be huge setback to internet security as it will outlaw DNSSEC. It is obvious the senators don't actually understand what they are voting on, or what it will do.

 

If it passes and isn't found unconstitutional our internet will be probably more censored than China. And that isn't an exaggeration.

 

 

The problem is normal people are unaware of this bill, or that they are soon to vote on it. It is being rushed to avoid as much opposition as is possible.

Edited December 29, 2011 by More_Pie_Guy

[taooneusa]

I was reading another bill a few weeks ago that enables military personnel to create up to 50 false on line persona -not avatar and ID names but full identities. They would be using these to spy through web sites. This sounded to me like a new policing agency that would be useful support of the NDAA. I opened a proxy from another country side by side with a regular google browser and did a few

searches to see the top results and number of hit totally differ.

It looks to like what they're doing is cordoning off everything into small county wide sized areas that eventually will filter searches per person or web address. A few years back either the CIA or FBI had tried to get rid of mobile home parks saying they're a refuge for criminals. Mobile homes are made of aluminum that dampens air based signal (satellites). Their attempt to start a move to get rid of all mobile home parks was laughed at and compromise made -they now patrol in cars hacking signal at close range. If you think about it a Mobile Park would block over head or satellite signal since ground based horizontal repeaters are deflected in an urban areas by all the homes anyway. So, what kind of satellites would they have used? The internet "social network" that includes all of the "google authorized advertizing partners" ..these partners are being used to divide up the net into small sized manageable sections. The DHS is based in all Police Dispatching centers and has been there for may years now -Monitoring Signals..

Fed and local working together to enforce local laws? nope..

 

Do a search for who owns the band width formerly divided among all the older search engines and what those companies and band width have been turned into..

Edited December 29, 2011 by taooneusa

[Thunder_Gooch]

Not to get too off topic but the latest NDAA passed in 2011 allows them to arrest, and indefinitely detain US citizens on US soil, no access to an attorney, no contact with friends and family, if accused of being a terrorist or connected to terrorists, just the accusation alone is enough to shred all freedoms guaranteed in the constitution and bill of rights.

 

You have to boil frogs slowly, otherwise they jump out of the pot. When martial law arrives the transition will have been so gradual no one really will have noticed.

 

I was reading another bill a few weeks ago that enables military personnel to create up to 50 false on line persona -not avatar and ID names but full identities. They would be using these to spy through web sites. This sounded to me like a new policing agency that would be useful support of the NDAA. I opened a proxy from another country side by side with a regular google browser and did a few

searches to see the top results and number of hit totally differ.

It looks to like what they're doing is cordoning off everything into small county wide sized areas that eventually will filter searches per person or web address. A few years back either the CIA or FBI had tried to get rid of mobile home parks saying they're a refuge for criminals. Mobile homes are made of aluminum that dampens air based signal (satellites). Their attempt to start a move to get rid of all mobile home parks was laughed at and compromise made -they now patrol in cars hacking signal at close range. If you think about it a Mobile Park would block over head or satellite signal since ground based horizontal repeaters are deflected in an urban areas by all the homes anyway. So, what kind of satellites would they have used? The internet "social network" that includes all of the "google authorized advertizing partners" ..these partners are being used to divide up the net into small sized manageable sections. The DHS is based in all Police Dispatching centers and has been there for may years now -Monitoring Signals..

Fed and local working together to enforce local laws? nope..

 

Do a search for who owns the band width formerly divided among all the older search engines and what those companies and band width have been turned into..

Edited December 30, 2011 by More_Pie_Guy

[taooneusa]

I don't feel it's off topic because it shows the policing agencies are already in place that support the bills and actions.

They must have Bills and laws to enforce, but only after the policing agents are in place.

 

A concern I feel about electronically signing anything that counters laws intended to end terrorism is being

electronically labeled a terrorist, Hm ..see there I did it again! just use a red flag word and increase my public

File haha!!

[kundalini]

-

Edited December 29, 2011 by kundalini

[taooneusa]

http://www.tomshardw...OTECT-IP-Senate,14393.html

 

 

Here at Tom’s Hardware, you know we don’t typically get political because with the heated debates between AMD vs. Intel who needs Donkeys vs. Elephants?

 

We’ve got no agenda beyond providing the best hardware news and reviews we can dig up. But here at Year’s end, there’s a subject we want to share with you that may come to affect how you experience us and the rest of the internet. It’s called SOPA, or the “Stop Online Piracy Act”, and it is headed through U.S. Congress with its sister bill PROTECT-IP in the Senate. SOPA threatens to fundamentally change the way information is presented online by placing massive restrictions on user-generated content like posts to forums, video uploads, podcasts or images. In a nutshell, here’s what the law would do:

 

 

Assign liability to site owners for everything users post, without consideration for whether or not the user posted without permission. Site owners could face jail time or heavy fines, and DNS blacklisting.

It would require web services like YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter to monitor and aggressively filter everything all users upload.

It would deny site owners due process of law, by initiating a DNS blacklisting based solely on a good faith assertion by an individual copyright or intellectual property owner.

It would give the U.S. government the power to selectively censor the web using techniques similar to those used in China, Malaysia and Iran. The Great Firewall of China is an example of this type of embedded, infrastructural internet censorship.

 

 

As an example, imagine a user posts a video clip to the Tom’s Community of a step-by-step guide on how to set up water cooling on an overclocked i7 CPU. Playing in the background behind the voiceover is “Derezzed” by Daft Punk. The studio representing Daft Punk could issue a complaint, without being required to notify us or request a take-down. Tom’s Hardware would be liable and prosecuted solely on a good faith assertion of the copyright owner, without notification, with the site operators subject to possible jail time for not preventing the video from being posted. In short order, the http://www.tomshardware.com/ domain in the United States would no longer resolve to our servers and visitors attempting to come to Tom’s Hardware would be redirected to a “This site under review for piracy/copyright violations” page.

 

To conform to these new restrictions would mean that Tom’s Hardware would have to switch to a review/approval process for any and all new posts to our forums and articles. Our community team would have to approve every single news comment, every new thread, and every new response before it went live and filter them for potentially infringing material. Even so, we would still possibly be under threat from violations not caught – a user posting a paragraph from “Unix for Dummies” as an example or a snippet of software news from another website in excess of a certain summary threshold. That’s just here on Tom’s. The effect on sites like YouTube, Google, Facebook, Twitter, Reddit and the rest of the internet would be devastating, and progress and innovation would grind to a halt under the cumbersome new restrictions.

 

The intent of the legislation is to stop piracy, which isn’t affected in the least by this approach. The DNS censoring method is circumvented by navigating to the IP directly, and many have already installed Anti-SOPA browser extensions that do this automatically. Unfortunately the legislation in the House and Senate has a wide margin of bi-partisan support and looks likely to pass after the holidays. We strongly oppose the censorship of the internet and strongly encourage you to contact your Congressional Representatives and Senators to voice your opposition. Believe it or not, your Congress-critters do count the number of calls and emails they get on a particular issue, and most of the time only the people in their jurisdiction (read- you) can sway their opinion on something – so your action on this is important.

 

Please take a moment to contact your representative and tell them you oppose the PROTECT IP Act in the Senate and the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) in the House. Here’s a link that can give you more information and provide you with contact info for your elected official. Your action on this matters.

 

https://action.eff.o...action_KEY=8173

 

Yours,

The Tom’s Hardware Team

Edited December 29, 2011 by taooneusa

[Birch]

Er, it seems to me that it's highly recommended to talk politics. It's like that old church/science divide. The divisions are only diversions.

 

----opinion alert----

 

Anyway, my name for SOPA is "Stop Online People Acting".

 

What will happen to Facebook (gasps)?

[Thunder_Gooch]

More than likely it will be selectively enforced based on how much money you can use to bribe your way out of being closed down. It will definitely be a great way to shut anyone up that they thinks needs to be shut up.

 

 

Er, it seems to me that it's highly recommended to talk politics. It's like that old church/science divide. The divisions are only diversions.

 

----opinion alert----

 

Anyway, my name for SOPA is "Stop Online People Acting".

 

What will happen to Facebook (gasps)?

[Birch]

More than likely it will be selectively enforced based on how much money you can use to bribe your way out of being closed down. It will definitely be a great way to shut anyone up that they thinks needs to be shut up.

 

Ok, but the Chinese (and others) still seem to manage.

 

What a stupid waste of intelligence this SOPA thing

 

 

-----opinion alert-----

[NeiChuan]

Ok, but the Chinese (and others) still seem to manage.

 

What a stupid waste of intelligence this SOPA thing

 

 

-----opinion alert-----

 

Hahah, what's with the opinion alert?

 

Also one thing that seems to have been left out. Businesses are exempt, meaning pretty much only people like us who create sites ect. Or sites for friends can be brought down. Aswell as foreign run sites I believe.

[skydog]

-

 

Just to be a massive dick, I think "kundalini" is one of those scammers the OP was talking about.

 

Also for some reason this doesnt bother me, I dont feel like theres actually anything anyone can do about it, most people dont seem to care or know about,oh and if you wanted to you could change your IP, I think someone wrote a post once about doing something like that.

Edited December 29, 2011 by sinansencer

[Birch]

Hahah, what's with the opinion alert?

 

Also one thing that seems to have been left out. Businesses are exempt, meaning pretty much only people like us who create sites ect. Or sites for friends can be brought down. Aswell as foreign run sites I believe.

 

The opinion alert is a new #tag I came up with so people would be sure I was only talking from a personal POV :-)

 

Thing is, "businesses" are also created by "people like us". It's just a structure for being in a very particular environment. I don't agree with everything that structure implies, but if I'm going to do other than rant I have to (presently) use whatever form is available without letting that form take over what I really ought to be doing. It is tricky though.

 

If the stupid online parcimonious act gets passed stateside then there are still workabouts. Besides, IMO internet is already somewhat inflitrated with BS:-) y'know, signals, noise :-). I'm not so sure that measures to ensure its commercial viability will utlimately work to companies' nor countries' benefit.

[Thunder_Gooch]

Hahah, what's with the opinion alert?

 

Also one thing that seems to have been left out. Businesses are exempt, meaning pretty much only people like us who create sites ect. Or sites for friends can be brought down. Aswell as foreign run sites I believe.

 

No one is exempt, not even businesses that think they are immune. More than likely this will be abused to shut down competition.

 

For example.

 

Megaupload recently released a song they made with artists which support them, the MPAA filed a false DMCA take down request to have it pulled off the internet even thought they did not own copyrights to it. Just because they could, sort of like a slap in the face.

 

This type of abuse is very common to snuff out competition.

 

Basically it will be harder to apply to a larger company with more money to fight, and bribe it's way out, but no one is immune.

Edited December 31, 2011 by More_Pie_Guy

[Thunder_Gooch]

Just to be a massive dick, I think "kundalini" is one of those scammers the OP was talking about.

 

Also for some reason this doesnt bother me, I dont feel like theres actually anything anyone can do about it, most people dont seem to care or know about,oh and if you wanted to you could change your IP, I think someone wrote a post once about doing something like that.

 

 

fairly sure he is as well, he took up for the scammer in several threads then deleted the posts. He says he knows who he is and also lives in Australia, and posted screenshots which show him trying to use some anonymous search engine, which further leads me to think he is trying to cover his tracks online. The scammer doesn't seem to smart to be honest, just very determined.

Edited December 30, 2011 by More_Pie_Guy

[spiraltao]

I have moderated other forums:ninja: and we had to follow protocol, like no sources and it was a much smaller collective than what we have here.

 

 

 

The men in black will sure shut ya down, if they deem fit, logical reason withstanding. heh

[kundalini]

-

[joeblast]

Any rushed vote is being rushed for a reason, and its usually nefarious.

[thelerner]

You look through hits on SOPA and they're almost all (and rightly) negative. I can understand that some special interests would push for it. Thankfully it looks like it would be political suicide to pass it. I don't think it'll pass or go anywhere. In the unlikely event it did pass, it'd be back in courts immediately, tied up for years and probably over ruled.

 

Wholesale ripoffs hurt artists and creative industries, but this was way too heavy handed a solution.

[Aaron]

This reminds me of the Child Online Protection Act of 1998, which essentially aimed to do the same thing, allow government to control what people could post or access. That law was struck down and I think this one will be too. In fact I wouldn't be surprised if the Attorney General or some other federal department is the first to respond to it. It's just so unconstitutional and broad, that it just doesn't seem like it could possibly hold up in court. Plus when people start feeling the crunch you got to expect a backlash that will lead them to either revise it or get rid of it completely. It is, sadly, a sign of the times.

 

 

Aaron

[gendao]

I was reading another bill a few weeks ago that enables military personnel to create up to 50 false on line persona -not avatar and ID names but full identities. They would be using these to spy through web sites. This sounded to me like a new policing agency that would be useful support of the NDAA.

Straight up folks - the NW0 is now desperately trying to regain control of the free flow of information on the internet and turn it back into a 1-way propaganda outlet like lamestream TV.

 

Because grass-roots forums (like this one), blogs and open comment sections are slowly waking people up and turning the tide against them through unfiltered and uncensored, independently-sourced information.

 

So, SOPA would effectively prevent and shut down all private dissent. All any G-man tool would have to do then is register for a forum exposing too much dirt and post some copyrighted material to get it sued and taken offline. Ultimately, all user feedback would simply be banned and the internet would just be turned back into TV PROGRAMMING with more channels. Yea, like we need yet MORE Kardashians and robotic teleprompt readers!

 

This is why I keep railing against Baby Boomers here who still believe that the Left is the "Progressive" answer (and not also part of the problem) - when they are simply the left hand of the same Devil.

 

The NEW paradigm is now the Independents vs the Left/Right Mainstream Party. These Mainstreamers are mainly ALL just a bunch of puppets who exploit swing voters on low-priority, emotional wedge issues and then come in to execute the NW0 agenda with surgical precision once they actually take office. That's why they all march in lockstep on key issues like SOPA & NDAA - as OPPOSED to the few Independents like RON PAUL - who is still fighting for OUR rights and OUR future!

Ron Paul slams SOPA as government overreach

[Aetherous]

Well, if it came down to it, I think Sean could make the forum completely private. Then they couldn't really do anything...because there is nothing to see.

 

And Ron Paul is the only trustworthy presidential candidate.

[taooneusa]

Unedited Fox debate Ron Paul

 

 

Ron Paul Warns us of Social Unrest and Martial Law to com

 

http://www.youtube.c...h?v=bqz3HBF_deE

 

Ron Paul not Mentioned Again!.Rigged election machine (CBS).12/18/2011

http://www.youtube.c...h?v=8uuOgc0j01Y

 

Hilary impressed by Ron Paul:

 

 

Remember the stolen ballot boxes that countered a mass last minute

voter turn out and got george elected?

 

NZ food bill to make growing food a government privilege rather than a human right

The central most issue facing us is Food Distribution. In Thailand New laws were passed they simply killed everyone who said no to using altered seeds and fertilizer. I have been watching food prices between Competetive grocery stores. One carries retail name brand and non conglomerate products with very steady price increases the past year and the other and same products under same label at low and not increasing prices. It is very import at this time to stop supporting as much as possible any product that may be linked to Manzano. Food distribution is their greatest weapon against the people.

 

""

The God-given human right to freely cultivate food is under attack in New Zealand (NZ) as special interest groups and others are currently attempting to push a “food security” bill through the nation’s parliament that will strip individuals of their right to grow food, save seeds, and even share the fruits of their labor with friends and family members.

 

In accordance with the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) Codex Alimentarius scheme for global food control, the NZ Food Bill, if passed, will essentially transfer primary control of food from individuals to corporations under the guise of food safety. And unless massive public outcry and awakened consciences within the NZ government are able to put a stop to it, the bill could become law very soon.

 

According toNZ Food Security, a group working to protect the food freedom of New Zealanders, the bill will turn growing and sharing food into a government-granted privilege rather than a human right. It will also make it illegal to distribute any type of food based on the bill’s language. This includes seeds, nutrients, natural medicines, minerals, and even water — without expressed government permission.

 

You see, agribusiness giants like Monsanto want full control of the food supply, which means putting an end to small-scale agriculture systems that operate “off the grid,” so to speak. This is why they have worked so hard in places like the US to convert conventional, staple crop systems to genetically-modified (GM) ones that are continually reliant upon new seeds and chemical interventions.

 

As far as enforcement, the NZ bill also authorizes private companies to deploy “Food Safety Officers” that can raid private property without warrant. Not only will these “Food Safety Officers” be permitted to draw weapons against those they are pursuing, but they will also be immune from criminal and civil prosecution for their illegal actions.

 

You can read a full summary of what the NZ Food Bill entails here:

http://nzfoodsecurity.org/2011/07/1… ......................

 

 

 

 

A National Response to Two FDA Armed Raids on Rawesome

 

 

The two SWAT team raids ordered by the FDA on Rawesome, an organic food coop in LA, represent “food safety” come home to roost, in all its vulture reality. First time, they used armed FBI; the second time, having faced such still resistance from non-resisting people, they multiplied their attack using armed LA police, Ventura County Sheriffs, the California Department of Ag and several other agencies.

 

 

Edited December 31, 2011 by taooneusa