Dark.

Hello there. You might have heard or read about Wikipedia's blackout because of SOPA/PIPA because it's a pretty damn huge issue. So huge that so few people (including the US citizens) know about this. Their media (Fox, NBC) actually ignored the entire issue in their evening news broadcasts until last week, because they are a part of the group that wants SOPA/PIPA to be implemented. There's some serious shit going on here because majority of the US citizens didn't know of these bills which is about to be passed in their own country and I think I need to do my part in sharing the shit. So everyone can fucking get up and call bullshit on SOPA/PIPA.

Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and Protect Intellectual Property Act (PIPA) are very similar acts that are supposedly trying to stop online piracy (as stated) and protect everyone's property from being distributed illegally through rogue websites in the Internet such as Isohunt, Mediafire, 4shared and Pirate Bay. Sounds pretty dignified right? Oh, man. Wait until you hear about the things these acts can do to you. I'll try to keep this short because I don't want people to stop reading because it's too long. So, one thing about SOPA/PIPA is that it allows huge corporate companies (I'm gonna call them apple mints from now onwards) like Universal Music, Sony, EMI, etc to take down any material that are in violation of their copyrighted material. Without any debate or paperwork. So yeah, imagine this. You decide to do a cover of a song you really love and you post it on Youtube. And out of no where, Sony Music comes along and decides, "Hey, this dude is singing a song that belongs to me. I want it back." and gets Youtube to pull down your video. Okay, you might think that it's perfectly okay for this to happen. But wait just a minute. Youtube is a website full of videos like that. Youtube will be shut down. And because people just love linking videos on Facebook, Facebook will also have to be shut down. Because both Youtube and Facebook are hosting pirated materials. If you embed a video on your website, your website will be forced to shut down. If you link gifs from Tumblr, pictures from Google, videos from Youtube and articles from Wikipedia to anywhere else, that site will be shut down. Basically, that just means that the whole Internet will be destroyed because the Internet is made of websites that are constantly linking to other websites.

Oh shit, I'm a pirate!

That's not all, folks. It's not just about eradicating rogue sites. If you post something that doesn't make the apple mints happy, they can make the website or you to take it down, accusing that you have violated their copyrights. When in fact, you didn't. See, this act doesn't require the apple mints to justify their accusations. You could be spreading awareness about SOPA/PIPA and the apple mints can simply snap their fingers and block the post or video. Because they fucking can. That's already in violation of freedom of speech and expression. You are robbed from expressing your views regarding a certain matter. You are forced to shut up. And that's not very nice.This has actually happened when Universal Music wanted a video of famous artistes (P. Diddy, Kanye West, Chris Brown, etc) supporting Megaupload to be taken down from Youtube, claiming that they violated their copyrights when they didn't. In fact, they actually didn't need the rights of a song or video to take down videos because "UMG (Universal Music Group) is now claiming that it has a private, automated censorship right--supported by a secret process that can take down any YouTube video with immunity from the DMCA--and there is nothing that this Court could do about it". Well, now. That sounds like a really bad thing, right?

Second thing about this is with these acts, you're actually giving those apple mints the chance to control your Internet. When they are given the right to block or request sites to take down any material that are accused of violation in copyrights, it's just like having these (******) as a substitute for profanities. They are basically censoring your Internet. They are deciding on what you can or cannot hear. They are deciding on what you can or cannot read. They are deciding on what you can or cannot know. That's pretty fucked up, y'know? You are forced to live in darkness and ignorance just so these apple mints can protect their models and importance. And that's exactly how Malaysia is like, if I can make it relatable to people of my region, our mainstream mass media censoring and hiding dirty issues regarding the Government. With SOPA/PIPA, they can request search engines like Google to block the sites that they do not want you to go sneaking around by not showing that site in the results, crying and stomping their foots claiming these sites could potentially allow piracy and copyright infringement. See where this is going now? They have no argument and they don't need an argument to win. They will just win. And if you decide to sue them, you can spend all that money, running in and out of court, proving that the apple mints are wrong and you will still end up in the losing boat because you have exhausted all your savings while they earn billions annually. You should be shitting in your pants right now from all the fear. Because this is a fucking nightmare.

I hope you can see how easily these bills can be abused by not only apple mints, but basically any-fucking-one. Whatever I saying now is just the tip of the iceberg because there is more shit behind this. And I'm trying to keep this short. Trying oh-so-hard. But what I'm trying to say is that SOPA/PIPA is a violation of human rights in general. If you need to know, SOPA/PIPA is supported (and sponsored) by apple mints because they are claiming that pirates are stealing money from them and jobs from the people who doesn't want to be unemployed by distributing illegally. Well, first of all, they are apple mints. When have apple mints ever cared about the people's well-being? They are money making giant corporates that are finding ways to get more money. (I've learnt enough Economics to know that it's always about the money.) They are not fighting the war with the Government for the same purpose. They are fighting to have the power to control our Internet and information. They are fighting to have the power to control our lives. This is not the fight against piracy. This is a disguise of the fight for power. They don't care if we lose our basic human rights. All they want is to contain and dictate us the way they want.

Also, the people debating about the bills are old people. They are 50-70 year olds, telling us, the young, IT savvy generation how to use the Internet when they have no clue what the Internet is. They have no idea to exactly what they are debating about. The people who were like, "Well, I think we should bring in some experts to help us with this bill because it sounds complicated and we don't want to y'know, destroy the Internet" are in the minority. In the fucking minority. As though majority of these old guys know exactly what they're talking about. Who knows, these guys could actually imagine that they are really at war with men on wooden ships with parrots on their shoulders. Are we really gonna let these people determine how our Internet should be like? I'm sorry but I don't think I want that to happen. I'm perfectly happy with my Internet right now.

If you're not a US citizen and you're like, "Meh, this won't affect me because it's only in the US", sorry to ruin your adorable dream but you should remember that most of the websites we use are from the US. You will not have an Internet. I repeat, you will not have an Internet. Our children will have to start playing outside again. If SOPA/PIPA is implemented, we will feel the effects. It's a fucking butterfly effect, okay? The whole world will feel it.

And if you need more reasons, hey, here's another. The Internet is coming out to oppose the bills that are supposedly trying to save and make the Internet a better place. Wikipedia, Twitter, Mozilla Firefox, Google, Yahoo, Reddit, etc. O the irony.

So this is where I can be shut down for linking useful stuff to you. A video of a guy who does a better job explaining (and terrifying the sense into your head) about SOPA/PIPA.

Sign a petition here. You know what, I demand you to sign the bloody petition.

Articles you should read to educate yourself and also, spread to educate others : Here, here, here and here.

Also, you may hear about SOPA being a complete FAIL because it didn't manage to pass through the House but PIPA is being debated by the Senate, which is filled with older people (and thus, more clueless people) and this is fucking dangerous because it just means that PIPA has a higher probability of getting passed. Because there isn't younger old (uhm, yeah) people there to debate and oppose it. Although SOPA is the much more radical act, you must not overlook PIPA because PIPA has almost the content as SOPA. It can still destroy the Internet.

And if you totally skipped the entire post, well here's the gist of it. I fucking oppose SOPA/PIPA and you should too because I am telling you to or you won't see this blog anymore. Or your Cracked website. Or your 9gag. Or your porn sites.

I managed to frightened you a little, huh?