{"id":837,"date":"2011-05-25T11:00:57","date_gmt":"2011-05-25T15:00:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www3.law.harvard.edu\/journals\/hlpr\/?p=837"},"modified":"2015-10-02T15:57:05","modified_gmt":"2015-10-02T15:57:05","slug":"pirates-attack","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/2011\/05\/25\/pirates-attack\/","title":{"rendered":"Pirates Attack!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jake Laperruque<\/em><\/p>\n

Disney\u00a0may be pleased with pirates right now<\/a>, but the rest of Hollywood isn\u2019t happy; digital piracy, the unauthorized distribution of copyrighted films and television shows,\u00a0continues to occur en masse<\/a>\u00a0over the Internet.<\/p>\n

Fortunately for the industry, the federal government is stepping up to act, as Judicary Committee Chairman Pat Leahy pushes forward with the\u00a0PROTECT IP Act<\/a>.\u00a0 The bill seeks to combat copyright violations by creating new causes of action that can be used for private suits, and enhancing the government\u2019s power to crack down on violators.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/span>However, the bill has received criticism from prominent sources.\u00a0 Recently, Google CEO Eric Schmidt\u00a0turned heads<\/a>by claiming the bill would violate free speech rights, and committing to fight it because of this.\u00a0 Schmidt\u2019s reaction led Hollywood supporters of the bill \u2013\u00a0perhaps overzealously<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 to attack Schmidt; the MPAA stated, \u201cGoogle seems to think its above America\u2019s laws.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

Though it may be hyperbole to claim that Google is about to engage in vigilantism, others are quite serious about the idea.\u00a0 The infamous hacktivist organization Anonymous declared its intention to\u00a0target and attack<\/a>the U.S. Chamber of Commerce for its support of the PROTECT IP Act.\u00a0 Anonymous is criticizing the bill as a tool that allows government not just to shut down copyright violators, but also anyone antithetical to their interests.\u00a0 Anonymous claims such power would amount to undemocratic Internet censorship on an unprecedented scale.<\/p>\n

The concern has legitimacy, and Anonymous\u00a0isn\u2019t the only one voicing it<\/a>.\u00a0 Given the vagueness of the restrictions, the degree to which the government can close websites as it pleases remains worrisome (for example, would that Surf The Channel link I embedded earlier in this article give the Justice Department the ability to shut down the entire HLPR blog to crack down on \u201cpiracy?\u201d).<\/p>\n

However, Anonymous\u2019s all-or-nothing approach to Internet access is flawed, and exposes us to the same threats of exploitation they purport to fight against.\u00a0 While the government is potentially going too far in some areas of Internet control, it is not doing enough in other areas, most notably\u00a0Net Neutrality<\/a>.\u00a0 In a time of\u00a0unsettling corporate mergers involving service providers<\/a>,\u00a0potential for abuse<\/a>, and\u00a0more unsettling corporate mergers involving service providers<\/a>, a lack of regulation would give private corporations the means to manipulate and restrict our Internet content, just as Anonymous fears the government doing.\u00a0 The truth is that both authority and anarchy have the potential for abuse; if we are to preserve the Internet as a powerful force for democracy and autonomy, we need to use law and government to find a middle ground.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Jake Laperruque Disney\u00a0may be pleased with pirates right now, but the rest of Hollywood isn\u2019t happy; digital piracy, the unauthorized […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-837","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/peZQka-dv","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/837","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=837"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/837\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=837"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=837"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/lpr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=837"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}