TH3L4UGH1NGM4N Posted November 18, 2011 Share Posted November 18, 2011 So where does Apple stand on the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA)? A report from TNW gives the impression Apple is in support of the bill via their association with the Business Software Alliance, who made their stance clear by commending the introduction of the bill in a recent bulletin. However, while Apple�s stance isn�t official, they do support SOPA by proxy, and haven�t made an effort to distance themselves from it with an official statement. The BSA is also associated with Microsoft, Adobe, Dell, and 20+ other large tech companies. According to Apple�s website, �Apple works closely with the Business Software Alliance (BSA) and the Software Information Industry Association (SIIA) to combat software piracy worldwide.� They also provide links to report piracy through the BSA and provide the following statement on copyright law and piracy on their Piracy Prevention page: The illegal copying of software programs is a crime! In the United States and many other countries, copyright law provides for severe civil and criminal penalties for the unauthorized reproduction or distribution of copyrighted material. Copyrighted material includes, but is not limited to, computer programs and accompanying sounds, images and text. Under U.S. law, infringement may result in civil damages of up to $150,000 and/or criminal penalties of up to five years imprisonment and/or a $250,000 fine� It is important to manage software well, just as you would any other valuable company asset, in order to avoid serious problems. Apple aggressively enforces our company�s proprietary rights under the U.S. copyright laws, but we know that poor software asset management often keeps people from complying with the law. If you�re unfamiliar with SOPA, legislation that aims to tackle foreign �rogue� websites that host copyrighted content illegally, you might be interested in knowing Google, Facebook, AOL, Mozilla, Twitter, Yahoo, eBay, LinkedIn, and Zynga issued a letter on Wednesday to congress expressing their opposition to the bill. In the letter (via BoingBoing), they wrote: ��the bill as drafted would expose law-abiding U.S. Internet and technology companies to new and uncertain liabilities, private rights of action, and technology mandates that would require monitoring of websites. We are concerned that these measures pose a serious risk to our industry�s continued track record of innovation and job creation, as well as to our nation�s cybersecurity.� The Electronic Frontier Foundation, Mozilla, Creative Commons and a group of other tech companies are banding together at AmericanCensorship.org to voice their frustrations with the bill and organize protests and petitions. They also created this infographic to explain their view of the legislation. Many are hoping Apple takes similar action to make their position clear. We�ve reached out to Apple for their official stance on SOPA and will update this post if we hear back. Source: 9to5mac Click here to view the article 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
XLR Posted November 18, 2011 Share Posted November 18, 2011 Aw, how cute. Hello 1984. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cartri Posted November 19, 2011 Share Posted November 19, 2011 Will this "crescendo" ever stop? I wonder what will happen when they finish signing laws, and start authorized repression. Here in Rio de Janeiro, Microsoft pays for "raids" over buildings and street-vendors. Once a client of mine, a small company in City's Center was victim of one of these raids. The policeman came together with PRIVATE Microsoft's fiscal, who did offer to legalize 7 Windows 2000 licenses for R$200 (About 100U$). Here, repression was corrupt from intention until application... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
3.14r2 Posted November 19, 2011 Share Posted November 19, 2011 A VERY BIG $ vs not so big $. Guess who will win... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TOS 1.04 Posted November 22, 2011 Share Posted November 22, 2011 This news is kind of a coincidence ... seeing as i just tried to visit Insanely Mac only to find that the ISP British Telecom is blocking insanelymac.com (yes i know BT suck and i'm stuck with them). I'm currently accessing the site over an ssh proxy. I find it odd how newzbin makes the headlines as BT blocks them but not other sites? i guess Apple has more power over media than i thought. ... Time to start up some more VPN providers on the moon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TH3L4UGH1NGM4N Posted November 22, 2011 Author Share Posted November 22, 2011 @TOS 1.04 So long as I'm able to hide my face behind a proxy like I normally do things will be fine for me. For the rest, the Internet is about to get a little more restricted... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alessandro17 Posted November 24, 2011 Share Posted November 24, 2011 This news is kind of a coincidence ... seeing as i just tried to visit Insanely Mac only to find that the ISP British Telecom is blocking insanelymac.com (yes i know BT suck and i'm stuck with them). Whaaat? I am very disappointed. Back in the early nineties I was with BT, but starting with the late nineties I was always with NTL (till 2005, when I came back to Italy). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LowRidinCrew Posted November 27, 2011 Share Posted November 27, 2011 You do know, some stuff could be censored from this site right? I wonder if they would block us from hosting downloads to like Drivers demos etc and stuff like that, that we dont own technically. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alaskantraveler Posted December 22, 2011 Share Posted December 22, 2011 A lot of stuff is going to be censored, and not just software. A lot of publications are not going to be available anymore. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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