Facebook Protest PEASE READ

[aWittleNoob]

http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwikimediafoundation.org%2Fwik i%2FEnglish_Wikipedia_anti-SOPA_blackout&h=rAQHQH2Bs

^all music is copyright :O
Anime is copyright
Amv's use copyrighted stuff
Video Content is copyrighted
EVEYTHING IS COPYRIGHTED O.O

[aWittleNoob]

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Anti-SOPA-Blackout-Strike/362432110438212

^ thats the one my bad

[-Annwyn-]

So....you gotta come up with your own material and stop stealing the hard work of others. Where is the grey area here? :/

[malinghi]

Oh right, its Wednesday now! Good reminder. I just put up a notice on the site. I'm not taking MerNetwork offline, but I do want to do something to protest SOPA.

I've already contacted my representatives. If you're opposed to censorship I encourage you to do the same.



So....you gotta come up with your own material and stop stealing the hard work of others. Where is the grey area here? :/

Aela, there's a huge gray area. One of the main reasons this site is on a server I pay money for is because a certain individual was censoring us on the old version of the forum on yuku. It was easy for him to do- he just abused their policy on copyright material and was able to deprive us of free speech. I don't know if you realized how dangerous SOPA is.

[-Annwyn-]

TBH I think it's a lot of media hype. Who is this 'certain individual'? :/

[-Annwyn-]

FYI (before you yell at me): YES - I am totally out of the loop on this SOPA thing. I am also equally out of the loop on MerNetwork drama, so when you make mention of it, I have no idea who you are talking about.

You must remember that most of you are in North America, and seem to have your own North American cliques and dramas. So please, forgive my ignorance.

[Nate Walis]

Is anyone surprised that the approach to copyright enforcement and IP rights on the internet is so clownish when the people making the laws seem to have no knowledge or concern about the true nature of what goes on in the online community save for wanting to serve the whims of those who simply want to dictate what private individuals do in their spare time and in private?

There's a student in my home city, right now, who's fighting extradition to the US to face charges based on the fact that his website featured a link to another site where material was available for illegal purposes. He never posted anything himself or made a profit from the crime, but he's in the dock for it anyway.

Arseholes.

[-Annwyn-]

Nate: I know exactly what you mean. Just because that student was associated with it, he's tarred with the same brush.

[Mermaid Star]

TBH I think it's a lot of media hype. Who is this 'certain individual'? :/

He that shall not be named... Lol. Eric the mertailor used to get negative reviews pulled down left and right based some how on copyright. That was on mer yuku, which is why we are all on this sure now, to promote fairness and free speech. :)

Thank you Malinghi!

[-Annwyn-]

Thanks Star ^.^

I've been nicknaming he-that-shall-not-be-named the "Curtailor" because 'curtail' means: to cut short or restrict. Plus there's 'curt' which means: to rudely cut off.

Judging by his previous dealings, I felt this was apt. Plus, we aren't using THE name. Jeebus forbid anyone uses THE name.

[AniaR]

on my gosh, smart name, lol

I do disagree with copywritten stuff being put on FB though :/ I'll be too busy to be online much today anyway! ;)

[Mermaid Jewel]

Yes I signed the Google petition already. Too many big businesses are dictating things in the government, that's the main reason this is being pushed through at all, to save their butts and not ours. That's exactly why pizza was named a vegetable. Idiots.

[Mermaid Jewel]

Oh and, you know, this could have an international effect too, not just within America. Sites like Google, Facebook, YouTube, Yahoo, they're all U.S. based, and I know Americans aren't the only ones who use them.

[malinghi]

FYI (before you yell at me): YES - I am totally out of the loop on this SOPA thing. I am also equally out of the loop on MerNetwork drama, so when you make mention of it, I have no idea who you are talking about.

You must remember that most of you are in North America, and seem to have your own North American cliques and dramas. So please, forgive my ignorance.


I don't want anyone to yell at you Aela. You're outside the US and it's understandable if you aren't knowledgeable about these acts. And yeah, what happened on mer.yuku.com was that Eric wanted to have material taken down, so he told yuku that the material violated their terms of service. Even though they didn't violate the terms of service, Yuku's legal department deleted the threads, no questions asked. Yuku didn't even tell us. We only realized what had happened when we noticed the threads were gone and that the forum's logs showed that they had been deleted by yuku's legal department.

The content he told them to remove included images of his product, some threads where people complained about bad service, threads on tailmaking that the felt might give his business competition, and most outrageously, a thread where I publicly exposed that he had created a fake profile on the forum to post a fake review praising his tails and declaring that any of his dissatisfied customers were lying. Naturally that thread was pretty embarrassing for him. So he abused yuku's rules that were intended to protecting content ownership as a way to silence us, and it worked perfectly.

Fun fact: did you know that the company I pay to host this website also hosts some pornography sites? Many hosting companies won't host any adult content. I specifically made sure ours will, because I didn't want this site shut down because someone posted an image of a topless mermaid. Free speech is incredibly important.

[Mermaid Jewel]

I did a lot of reading over SOPA today (I decided to write my essay over it). The goal of SOPA is actually targeting offshore sites. Sites to torrent stuff, copyright infringement, the likes. But this power is not bound very well. There is no need for a court junction, just a statement of "good-will" or something like that and then Google has five days to block it from the search engine, PayPal stop taking payments from the site, and the ISP (internet service provider) must block it from being accessed.

And who reports these things? MPAA, music studios, etc. But it can go further than that. These businesses can easily abuse this to shut down competing sites, and create Internet "blacklists". Reported once and they're gone.

Also, posting ways to go around SOPA or even say posting a piracy site or even maybe a YouTube video of copyrighted material is an offense. It's serious...but I only got this information by reading a ton of articles. So I'm not criticizing you Aela or anyone for not knowing because I read a lot about SOPA to understand it.

(Sorry if some of the info is inaccurate, I read a lot but only a few articles)

[malinghi]

Its all explained in this handy animated gif. Cause the kids only understand .gif images these days.

http://s3.amazonaws.com/theoatmeal-img/comics/sopa/sopa.gif

[-Annwyn-]

Malinghi: Ahhh, now it all makes sense! Thanks for clearing things up for me ^.^ And as an artist who appreciates artistic nudity, I thank you for taking the care of choosing an appropriate provider. :)

[Nate Walis]

Nate: I know exactly what you mean. Just because that student was associated with it, he's tarred with the same brush.

It's more sinister than being accused of a crime though, they're broadening the defenition of what constitutes a crime to include the knowledge of where the crime is taking place.

In effect it's the same as me being arrested for taking you out into the street and pointing out a guy who I know is a drug dealer.

I might not have sold you drugs or even tried to, but because I furnished you with the knowledge of how to get them from this guy, no matter what you choose to do with that information, I'm seen as a criminal as well.

Common sense would say that the student in question has committed no crime, but with this kind of creeping change to the very defenition of crime what's going to be next, accusing people of being an accessory if they don't report everything that could be a crime to the police?

To me this all seems like an attempt to scare people away from illegal streaming and downloads as a result of the authorities being unable to actually stop, catch and prosecute the people actually breaking copyright law.

It's like imposing a curfew and shooting people who break it on sight.

[Mermaid Jewel]

Lol I love that GIF, Malinghi!

[ShyMer]

Yay for the Oatmeal! :)

[Mermaid Photine]

When I watched it yesterday, all I saw was the here is a koala/here is a goat part on repeat. Not sure why. I interpreted it as the bill makes no sense. xD

I saw the whole gif this time. I understand a lot more now...