Proposed U.S. Laws - SOPA and PIPA

More is being written each day about the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the Protect Intellectual Property Act (PIPA).  In an effort to point you toward helpful information, I am providing the links below.  (I have included a couple of pro-SOPA/PIPA pieces, so you can hear the "other side".)  If you are in the U.S., please use these are a place to start educating yourself.

Why are people opposed to these proposal?  While the bill names (or nicknames) sound like something that would be helpful, each could be used to stifle free speech.  In addition, they would give the government new power and would make it difficult for people (web sites) to share information online. I'm sure there may be other reasons why these bills are "bad", but those are the three that come to my mind. 

If you find yourself opposed to these proposed regulations, check the links under "Protests" and add your voice to one of the protest efforts.

If you have additional information or comments that you would like to share on SOPA and PIPA, please feel free to leave them on this blog post.

Proposed Legislation:

• H.R.3261 -- Stop Online Piracy Act
• S. 968 - Protect IP Act

Additional Information:

• Pinterest, PIPA, Parrot (podcast) - listen to the 1st six minutes for their take on PIPA.
• T is for Training conversation between Maurice Coleman & Jill Hurst-Wahl primarily on SOPA (~60 min. podcast) [added 1/17/2012]
• Obama Administration Responds to We the People Petitions on SOPA and Online Piracy 
• White House Will Not Support SOPA, PIPA
• The Concerned Librarian’s Guide to the 2012 ALA Midwinter Exhibit Hall
• Statement from Copyright Alliance Executive Director Sandra Aistars, RE: Introduction of H.R. 3699, the Research Works Act
• Smith to Remove DNS Blocking from SOPA
• Motion Picture Association of America Inc. (MPAA), Jan. 13 press release

Protests:

• VETO the SOPA bill and any other future bills that threaten to diminish the free flow of information (Petition at WhiteHouse.gov)
• Stop the E-PARASITE Act (Petition at WhiteHouse.gov)
• Fight the Blacklist: A Toolkit for Anti-SOPA Activism
• Boing Boing will go dark on Jan 18 to fight SOPA
• Simple Stop Sopa - A WordPress plug-in that will take your site dark on Jan. 18 so you can join the protest.