SOPA Proposal to Declare Unauthorized Streaming a Felony is Back

Some bad news for Second Life radio. About two years since originally being shot down with SOPA, a proposal to make a felony the streaming of copyrighted works without the expressed permission of those holding the copyright is back. According to the Huffington Post, last week the Department of Commerce's Internet Policy Task Force revived the proposal (pdf link). "Such a provision" the Post stated, "if interpreted broadly could apply to people who upload covers of themselves performing songs to YouTube without permission."

The proposal was originally part of the proposed SOPA legislation two years ago, but the bill was soon shelved after much public protest.

Source: Huffington Post

"Six Strikes" Internet Rule Likely Installed Monday

By Bixyl Shuftan

Internet Privacy activists expressed worry when on Monday February 26, the "Six Strikes" rule was set to go into effect. Devised last year, the rules involve the "Copyright Alert System" set up by the following Internet Service Providers: AT&T, Cablevision, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, and Verizon.

Under the system, copyright owners are supposedly alerted to people downloading their content without permission, and they can alert the ISPs to the people targeted by the system. The first alerts are warnings. After a few warnings come "mitigation alerts" which depending on the ISP results in temporary reductions in Internet speed, a downgrade in the service tier, redirection to a page for a period of time, or other measures. After six alerts, there are no more, but each supposed violation is recorded in case the matter is taken to court.





Critics point out that the system is imperfect, that in wireless Internet "hot spots" that an innocent user could potentially be tagged as illegally downloading even if he/she wasn't as open wi-fi signals allow for their IP address to be used by others. Also, there are methods for determined pirates to avoid the system, such as cyberlockers, streaming sites, offline swapping, and others. Then there are privacy issues. Electronic Frontier Foundation director Corynne McSherry called Six Strikes, "just a great big expensive system to snoop on and intimidate people" whom she felt were mostly behaving themselves. She called it's recording of violations, "a private copyright system, and it doesn't have the protections and balances that the public copyright system has." It has also been noted that the system's software to identify copyright violations was inspected and approved by a former lobbyist of the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).

In early 2012, RIAA was among those trying to get the US Congress to pass the SOPA bill, which alarmed critics who stated it's vague language threatened to shut down the Internet as we know it. It was in the months following it's defeat that the Copyright Alert System and Six Strikes was set up. It was supposedly to be enacted in late 2012, but was delayed by the damage from Hurricane Sandy.

Sources: The Guardian, Torrentfreak.com, Theverge.com

Bixyl Shuftan

In Real Life News: Internet Activist Aaron Swartz Dies

By Bixyl Shuftan

In recent days, two men have made news about what they did on the Internet. One was a football player whom was apparently duped into falling for a made-up girl. The other was Aaron Swartz, programmer and Internet activist.

Swartz is described as having been "immersed" in computers and the Internet from a very young age, programing, and later founding the software company Infogami, which later merged with the social website Reddit. CNN described him as helping to develop RSS coding "which allows websites to send updates to subscribers." "Swartz made some of today's more expansive Internet possible."

But Swartz was better known for contributing and helping to shape the philosophy and culture of the Internet, that information should be free and easily available, "He was a technologist who was committed to open access to information, and committed to bringing about the changes he believed in." At his own expense, he downloaded and made available to the public a fifth of the US Federal court PACER database. Then he founded "Demand Progress," an Internet activist organization. He also helped in the fights against the Internet censorship bills SOPA and PIPA.

Unfortunetly, he was in trouble at this time. Federal prosecutors accused him of using an MIT computer to download over 4 million articles from a library of academic journals. The university refused to press charges, and "urged" the government to let him go. Instead, Swartz was accused of wire fraud, computer fraud, hacking, and other charged that could have resulted in a prison sentence of 35 years. He was indicted in July 2011. With depression possibly a factor, Swartz hanged himself on January 11th. Both family and fellow Internet activists were quick to blame the Federal prosecutors who had went after him, who continue to defend their actions.

Aaron Swartz was 26.

*Update* CNN reports that the "Anonymous" hacker group has threatened the US Department of Justice, saying they may release sensitive files, expressing anger over Swartz's death.

Sources: CNN, Huffington, CBS

Bixyl Shuftan

SL Club Alliance Discusses Reports of ISPs to Police Music Downloads This Month

Earlier this year, the SOPA and CISPA bills in Congress raised fears about Internet censorship and the loss of privacy. In a recent meeting of the FCA (Furry Club Alliance), a group of music clubs in Second Life, some DJs and club staff brought up some other Internet news from earlier this year. A number of Internet Service Providers were set to begin policing downloads on July 1st.

An article on Cnet.com in March discussed about an agreement between several ISPs and RIAA, the Recording Industry Association of America, to adopt policies to discourage illegal music and software downloads last year. The White House was also involved in the deal. "During a panel discussion before a gathering of US publishers here today (March 14)" RIAA's CEO stated most of the ISPs in the program were set to "begin implementing the program by July 1st."

The program has been called "graduated response." Those suspected of illegal downloading will receive one or two notices. If the downloads do not stop, confirmation notices are sent, and "the accused customers will also be informed of the risks they incur if they don't stop pirating material." Further flags for illegal downloads can bring on a list of penalties, or "mitigation measures" as RIAA calls them, such as slowing down the ISP's customer's Internet connection speed, or web access suspended.

The issues with the plan were brought up in a dottech article, such as false accusations, punishing multiple users on a network when only one is downloading questionable material, and privacy concerns, "What gives the entertainment industry of America the right to bypass these basic American rights?" On the plus side, "none of the ISPs have agreed to permanently shutdown subscribers." Plus "there are bound to be services and software that crop up to beat the system, for those that are really bothered by this." Forbes.com listed Apple as having patented a technique to fool trackers.

The people at the FCA meeting talked about the bill, "so basically the government is trying to screw us again, does that sum it up?" Adrianna Aeghin advised calm, "No ISP is going to analyze all the datastreams in use at any one time, EVEN if they're participating, which I think most won't. So they're mostly only going to look at people they have a reason to expect. … I really don't think this is going to be a problem for SL DJs. … Too many people are in a blind panic over this." One DJ at the begining had wondered if she would have to stop playing music in Second Life. But as the discussion went on, she felt more assured.

The group decided to take a wait and see stance, keeping an eye on the news to see if anyone was going after users for downloading music, and not jumping to conclusions over any rumors and whispers.

In other news, two of the men in Washington who helped defeat SOPA, one Democrat, one Republican, spoke out last month, calling for some form of Internet "Bill of Rights."

Sources: cnet.com, dottech.org

Bixyl Shuftan

CISPA Internet Bill Passed in US House

According to Forbes.com, the CISPA Internet bill, which sparked privacy worries among numerous Internet freedom advocates, was passed in Washington. "In an earlier-than-expected vote Thursday evening, the House of Representatives voted 248 to 168 in favor of the bill."

According to writer Andy Greenman, Trevor Timm, a lawyer and activist with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, felt, "the House’s early vote on CISPA as an attempt by its author, representative Mike Rogers, to squeeze the bill through before its opposition grew any stronger." The bill was also amended before passage, "the House voted to amend the bill to actually allow even more types of private sector information to be shared with government agencies, not merely in matters of cybersecurity or national security, but in the investigation of vaguely defined cybersecurity 'crimes,' 'protection of individuals from the danger of death or serious bodily harm,' and cases that involve the protection of minors from exploitation." It was a move that raised further concerns from opponents. Techdirt.com's Leigh Beadon called it "an absolutely terrible change."

"Somehow, incredibly, this was described as limiting CISPA, but it accomplishes the exact opposite," Beadon wrote, "CISPA is now a completely unsupportable bill that rewrites (and effectively eliminates) all privacy laws for any situation that involves a computer. Far from the defense against malevolent foreign entities that the bill was described as by its authors, it is now an explicit attack on the freedoms of every American."

The bill still has to be passed in the Senate before heading to the White House, which has come out against it recently. Timm saw hope it would be beaten, "We’ve seen an explosion of a variety of groups and congressmen coming out against the bill,” he says. “As the Senate debates this, it’s good that privacy and civil liberties will be front and center.”

Sources: Forbes.com, Techdirt.com

Bixyl Shuftan

SOPA Act Two? CISPA to be Decided in US House as Soon as Today

Remember the mess over SOPA in December and January? This proposed law had the potential for becoming "The Great Firewall of America," possibly meaning the end of favorite places online such as Youtube, Facebook, and Second Life. Despite a Congress seemingly poised to approve it, opposition to it and it's sister bill PIPA grew in numbers. The backers of SOPA eventually shelved it from a vote, and the opponents had seemingly won.

However, a new bill, H.R. 3523,  has made it through committee: the "Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act," or CISPA. Intended to "allow the voluntary sharing of attack and threat information between the U.S. government and security cleared technology and manufacturing companies to ensure the security of networks against patterns of attack," the bill "has been criticized by advocates of Internet privacy and neutrality, such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation … because they feel it contains too few limits on how and when the government may monitor private information when it might become collaterally entangled in the process of passing threat information, and too few safeguards with respect to how the data may be used; they fear that such new powers may be used to find and punish file sharers and copyright infringers rather than the stated foreign spies or hackers."

An article in Forbes.com describes opposition to the bill as mounting, "On Monday, a group of more than fifty professors, entrepreneurs and information security professionals published an open letter to Congress calling on lawmakers to oppose CISPA and other overbroad cybersecurity bills like the SECURE IT Act … CISPA has a very different focus from SOPA and PIPA, the much-loathed antipiracy bills killed by a similar groundswell of Internet anger in February. Whereas SOPA and PIPA raised fears of censorship, CISPA’s vague data-sharing statutes are largely seen as a threat to privacy, although some are also interpreting the bill as allowing site blocking. And whereas SOPA pitted Silicon Valley against Hollywood, CISPA seems to have the support of many technology and Web-based companies, including Facebook, Microsoft, Symantec, and IBM."

Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the Web, spoke last week the bill "is threatening the rights of people in America, and effectively rights everywhere." Senator Ron Paul spoke out against the bill, saying it would make "government spies of Facebook and Google." Eighteen House Representatives signed a letter opposing the bill, at least in its current form. The White House has also come out against CISPA. Avaaz.org has a petition against the bill with three-quarters of a million signatures, with the goal of making it a million. Reddit has a number of "anti-CISPA discussions."

CISPA is expected to be voted on in the House of Represenatives today.


Sources: Wikipedia, Forbes.com, Electronic Frontier Foundation, Avaaz.org, Reddit,

Bixyl Shuftan

Reader Submitted: Say No to ACTA by Polish Gothic

I am writing to you due to the current signing ACTA document. I will try to explain it the best that I can with my English skills, I hope you will understand.

ACTA with it actual rules can be highly dangerous for freedom of citizens and for small companies all around the world. As it states, there won't be possibility to produce substitute parts for electronic supplies and planting seeds which are branded just imagine how big disaster can it bring for people and how many will loose their jobs.

As for censoring internet - this way of fighting with piracy is highly wrong. Researchers say that most of people actually buying artistic products as music, movies and so on are the ones who downloaded it from the net before. If they won't have the way to download files automatically sales will fall since we will not now what to buy. You should realize most of such things are over expensive for common citizens, so they will buy only things they like, if they don't know if they like, they won't buy.

If you want to fight with piracy make a way to lower the prices of software, music and all the staff which is downloaded from the net now - as there is carrot and whip method of controlling - you should first try to use the carrot, not the whip. using the whip right now will only cause bigger uproar.

Before voting for ACTA, consider a word from citizens and their rights.

Our residents from Polish Gothic made a protest against ACTA at 23-01-2012, you can watch movie from this protest on: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jmQk-6VhFP4




You can find more information on: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=citzRjwk-sQ

and http://www.stopacta.info/

You can vote on ANTI-ACTA petition here: https://www.accessnow.org/page/s/just-say-no-to-acta

Thank you for hearing out a voice from ordinary citizen. Also I want to tell you from private, if there won't be net on the way it is now, I would not be able to write this message to you because most of my English skills along with knowledge comes from using tool called Internet.

Best regards,

Pandemonium Anton

Podex Exchange Plans ACTA Internet Censorship Protest

By now, most readers have heard about the SOPA and PITA bills in the US Congress. Their sponsors claiming the intent was to stop Internet piracy, the bills were badly written, and would have left the Internet subject to severe censorship. Fortunately what began as scattered protests online soon grew and became too much for the politicians to ignore. So the bills were shelved, at least for now.

Unfortunately, there is more trouble on the horizon, and not just for the United States. A number of countries, including the US, Canada, the European Community, Japan, and others. Described as a response "to the increase in global trade of counterfeit goods and pirated copyright protected works," the agreement also takes aim at at the Internet. Although the entertainment and software industries were in on the negotiations, “citizens and public interest groups have been largely left out.” The agreement targets "legal safeguards that protect Internet Service Providers from liability for the actions of their subscribers," and the result would be severe compromises on Internet freedom, very much like what the SOPA and PIPA bills threaten to do with the United States.

Jacek Shuftan of the Podex Exchange decided to do something about ACTA by joining the protests against it, “I want to announce that Podex joins the international protest movement about government attepts to censor freedom of speech on the Internet.” Today, Monday January 23rd, several pages on the Podex site, plus his new secondmovie.com and second-bay.pl would go dark, replaced with a page denouncing the censorship, “Keep the Internet free!” After 24 hours, the pages would return to normal.

For more information, one can look up the Wikipedia entry on ACTA, as well as what the Electronic Freedom Foundation and Canada’s CIPPIC have too say. Plus there’s also youtubes on the issue, such as the one below, and another from “Anonymous.”



Sources: Wikipedia, Podex

Bixyl Shuftan

Internet Protests Widespread, PIPA Opposition Growing

Wednesday January 18th saw a number of websites protest SOPA and PIPA, by both organizations and individuals. Sopastrike.com billed it as “the largest online protest in history,” claiming ten million signatures had been collected and over three million emails sent in response to the two bills in Congress. They claimed over 115,000 various websites took part, some of which they showed pictures of from Reddit to Wired to BongBong and more. Not all of the protests were on the Internet. People also got on the streets in New York City to voice their opposition.

The most famous website of the protest was most likely Wikipedia’s. After they took down their blackout page, they put up a link to a “Thank you” page:


The Wikipedia blackout is over — and you have spoken. More than 162 million people saw our message asking if you could imagine a world without free knowledge. You said no. You shut down Congress’s switchboards. You melted their servers. Your voice was loud and strong. Millions of people have spoken in defense of a free and open Internet. For us, this is not about money. It’s about knowledge. As a community of authors, editors, photographers, and programmers, we invite everyone to share and build upon our work.Our mission is to empower and engage people to document the sum of all human knowledge, and to make it available to all humanity, in perpetuity. We care passionately about the rights of authors, because we are authors. SOPA and PIPA are not dead: they are waiting in the shadows. What’s happened in the last 24 hours, though, is extraordinary. The Internet has enabled creativity, knowledge, and innovation to shine, and as Wikipedia went dark, you've directed your energy to protecting it.

We’re turning the lights back on. Help us keep them shining brightly.


And the protests had results. Over a dozen Senators publicly announced their opposition to the PIPA bill that day, including five former co-sponsors, bringing the total opposed to nineteen Senators (as of January 17th). Most of the new opponents were Republican. Arstechnica.com suggested this was the result of conservative media such as the Heritage Foundation and redstate.com declaring their opposition to SOPA and PIPA. Redstate.com went as far as to promise to work to defeat supporters of the bills in their reelection bids.


This battle is so important — and is one of those rare fights where the left and right are united against Congress — that I suggest the left and right unite and pledge to defeat in primaries every person named as a sponsor on H.R. 3261, the Stop Online Piracy Act. ... Congress has proven it does not understand the Internet. Perhaps they will understand brute strength against them at the ballot box. If members of Congress do not pull their name from co-sponsorship of SOPA, the left and right should pledge to defeat each and every one of them.


It isn’t just politicians who are facing backlash. Among the supporters of SOPA is the Entertainment Software Association, or ESA. The ESA runs the annual Electronic Entertainment Expo. One company, Red 5 Studios, which makes the popular “Firefall” game, pulled out of the yearly show. They used the money it would have for promotions there to start a new organization, the ”League for Gamers.” Red 5's CEO appeared in a Youtube with other gamers to express their point of view.

The Motion Picture Association of America responded to the blackout by calling the protests “irresponsible” and a “stunt.” Their main supporter in Congress, Senator Chris Dodd, called the blackouts of major websites an “abuse of power,” adding, "It is an irresponsible response and a disservice to people who rely on them for information," calling the protests, “yet another gimmick.”

The debate took another turn on Thursday January 19th when Megaupload, one of the world’s top file-sharing websites, was shut down on charges of copyright violations. Besides rhe debate of whether this was right or wrong, people asked if there were already procedures to take down websites, what was the purpose of SOPA and PIPA?

PIPA is up for a vote in the Senate Tuesday January 24th. The House Judiciary Committee will go over SOPA again in February.

Page Source: Wikipedia

Bixyl Shuftan

SOPA Down But Not Dead, PIPA Still Up in Senate, Internet Companies Protest

With the White House coming down against SOPA a few days ago, it was no surprise that the bill was finally shelved. While some have declared victory, “Ding-dong, SOPA’s dead,” others are more hesitant. As it turns out, SOPA’s co-founder Lamar Alexander plans to bring it back in February, "due to the Republican and Democratic retreats taking place over the next two weeks.” So the bill is still out there.

And it isn’t just SOPA people on the Internet are worried about. Like many other bills in the House, a similar bill was sent to the Senate, the “Protect IP Act” or PIPA. Considered just as big a threat to the Internet and Second Life, it is due for a vote in the Senate this January. Sponsored by Patrick Leahy, the bill is described as having bipartisan support among 40 Senators. Senator Ron Wyden has spoken out against the bill, as has the “Tea Party Patriots” organization.

For these reasons, a number of Internet companies, groups and individuals are protesting in a number of ways. Many, including Wikipedia, blacked out their websites in protest today. Others, including Google , blacked out their logo. Facebook remains up, but a number of people are replacing their profile picture and sometimes gallery images with images symbolizing censorship.

For US readers wanting to contact your legislators to oppose SOPA & PIPA, Click here.

Sources: Electronic Frontier Foundation, Wikipedia, Techdirt, Forbes, Dailytech

Bixyl Shuftan

SOPA on the Defensive, Opponents Plan Blackout Protests Jan 18th.

There’s been still more developments on the SOPA bill. More and more people have been speaking out on the issue. Some of the people haven’t really been known for computer issues before, such as the comic critic “That Guy With the Glasses.” Others are, such as the social media website Reddit by blacking out their site for 12 hours on Wednesday January 18th, some of the people having opinions on the matter short and to the point (image not safe for work). The games Firefall and Minecraft are also planning protests by shutting down their websites that day. Wikipedia “appears to be very close to announcing a blackout or something like it.” Google is supposedly planning some kind of protest other than a blackout.

As the protests mount, the backers of SOPA find themselves on uneasy ground. Senator Lamar Smith, the co-author of the bill, was found to be in violation of SOPA himself. An image on his website failed to give credit to it’s creator, “maybe I could petition the court to take action against texansforlamarsmith.com.” So perhaps it’’s no surprise the other co-author, Patrick Leahy, was willing to remove one segment of the bill.

Also, the White House seems to be finally tilting to the side of the SOPA opponents, at least on the surface. Whitehouse.gov made a lengthy statement, which stated “we will not support legislation that reduces freedom of expression, increases cybersecurity risk, or undermines the dynamic, innovative global Internet.” However, it encouraged all sides involved to work together to pass “sound legislation.” Whether or not this “sound legislation” acceptable would be SOPA with just a piece or two removed or changed is unclear.

So what can Residents do? Click Here for information on how to contact you senators and Congressman on the matter.

Bixyl Shuftan

More on SOPA

Although no one bothered to leave a comment on my article on the SOPA bill in Congress earlier, people had chatted with me about it inworld. One thing that was brought up a few times was "why isn't this on TV/mainstream media?" Finally last night , I saw news briefs on it on CNN, as well as an article on their website when I checked. From what I heard on the TV brief, unlike most other issues in Congress, this isn't a partisan one. Support for the bill was described as roughly 50/50 Democrat and Republican, with at least two candidates for the Presidency (Ron Paul and Michael Bachman) coming out against it).

Time keeps me from writing a larger article, at least for the next few days. Feel free to read this post from Forbes, and this post from New World Notes, the latter concerning the conclusion from the Electronic Frontier Foundation this bill would "jeopardize" Second Life.

Bixyl Shuftan

Opinion: Will SOPA Wash Away the Internet (and Second Life)?

A youtube of a chubby bearded character has been going around a number of friends of mine. Despite his similar looks to left of center figure Michael Moore, this man’s cause is more Libertarian: the SOPA Bill in Congress.

The SOPA Bill in Congress, he charges, threatens to shut down the Internet as well know it by making people liable to a multimillion dollar lawsuit just for *linking* to a song or other material. Ironically enough, some of the top SOPA supporters he charges were distributors of some of the software tools used by downloaders, CBS/VIACOM, ABC/Disney, Microsoft, and others. The purpose: entrapment. He charges the distributors of conspiring to put a chokehold on the Internet in order to control entertainment markets by “taking down Youtube, Twitter, and all other websites and networks you use.”

He certainly sounds over the top and easy to dismiss. That he was previously noted only for his “Epic Fail Toys Funny Videos” doesn’t exactly help his cause. But the more I looked into SOPA, the less I liked.

SOPA is short for “Stop Online Piracy Act.” Checking Wikipedia, the bill would allow copyright holders to sue websites they accuse of “enabling or facilitating copyright infringement.” Actions they could take include Payment sites like Paypal from doing business with targeted websites, baring search engines from linking to them, and requiring Internet Service Providers to take them down. It also would make “unauthorized streaming of copyrighted content a crime” punishable by five years in prison. Debate in the House will continue when Congress returns from winter recess.

Fortunately the “Epic Fail Toys” man isn’t the only one talking about SOPA. There was another video sent to me, made by “The Cynical Brit.” There was also an article on the Forbes website, “How SOPA Could Ruin My Life” by Paul Tassi, a writer, and a small business owner operating from his website, “a movie/tv/video game site that I started with a partner about three years ago.” SOPA, he feels, will cause him and others to close down. The bill, he fears, “reeks of Chinese and Iranian Internet policies that allow the government to simply censor the Internet the way they see fit ... their definition of what piracy is ends up including most of the Internet, including my own site, and the punishments for even minor infringements could be catastrophic and run me out of business completely.”

Also opposing it is David Ulevitvh, the head of the Internet business Open DNS. "The legislation has the potential to create the great firewall of America," he told a CNET reporter. The bill “is written so broadly that it will invite abuses,” and would be bad for businesses like his, which would have to reincorporate as offshore companies.

So why is this bill making any headway in Congress at all? Tassi claimed many of the Representatives who went over it in committee “admitted to not knowing how to use the internet. The consensus among them was merely ‘ piracy sounds bad, therefore we should pass this anti-piracy bill ‘ without any further investigation into its deeper implications. Implications that would in effect, destroy the entire idea behind the Internet.”

Ulevith himself went to Washington to talk with Congressmen. What he saw was not good news, "Everything they were hearing from people who came to their door every day is fervent support (for SOPA) ... There was nobody sitting on the other side of the table opposing it ...The amount of perspective and influence we have in DC is essentially non-existent. it's not serving us well anymore."

Amendments to the bill have been rejected, and Congress is set to debate it sometime “early next year.” How it will affect Second Life is unclear, though as the Grid has been targeted before for copyright infringement, some are predicting a chilling effect as radio streams and roleplay regions shut down out of fear of lawsuits. Among those expressing worry, Nydia Tungsten, whom worried she would have to give a certain announcement:

Because the US goverment has been bought by the recording industry, KVXN will be off the air until further notice. I am sorry to have to do this, but I don't want solders kicking in my doors because i am playing music for others to hear, so until we know how and where this is going....this is KVXN Signing off.....

“KVXN Shutting down forever is a REAL possibility, we need to let those fools in Washington know that WE know this is them lining their pockets again.”

Big Business can be beaten. This week, less than a day after Verizon Wireless announced a fee for paying their bills, a public outcry brought it down. Will this also be the case for SOPA, or will the United States join China in censoring the Internet? Tassi went on to write about a "VETO SOPA" Petition that got over 26,000 signatures in two days (as of when this article was written, it's over 44,000). He wasn't sure what the White House would say, but, "Until then, keep signing. It can’t hurt."

I can’t tell others what to do, but I have sent emails to my Congressman and Senators asking them to oppose this dirty SOPA.

Sources: Youtube, Wikipedia, Forbes, CNET

Bixyl Shuftan