I don't think SOPA is as bad as it sounds.

[Bvenged]

Don't get me wrong, I think SOPA [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop_Online_Piracy_Act] is terrible - it shows naivety within the US congress; and should it pass, go on to show the world how not to do democracy. If the majority of people don't want it and experts assess that it's going to do more harm than good, then you're clearly doing it wrong.

Even so, I don't think it's as bad a decision for the rest of the world as it seems. Sure, there will be a horrendous ripple-effect of lost freedom, prosperity and opinion; but I think it'll only last a short period of time.

I am against SOPA almost entirely, it's approaching a tricky situation in the complete wrong way and the internet's becoming more developed, mature and tidy on its own accord so this act needn't exist; but if SOPA passes wouldn't that just drive business away from the US (from ISPs, Google, MSN, MS, Apple, etc.) and into other, non-SOPA countries? Couldn't we be seeing MSN hosted in Mexico, Wikipedia is France and Google in the UK in the near future should SOPA pass, therefore harming the US economy and causing a hard-lesson-learned by the US congress?[footnote]Purely speculative. I have no true idea what exactly will happen for the rest of teh world, but we all know the possible and highly likely negatives SOPA will bring to the US.[/footnote]

I don't wish for this to happen at all, but I have my wonders about a possibly less-dark future for the rest of the modernised world should the evil abomination of SOPA get through.

What do you think would happen if SOPA gets through?

 

[Sirron Kcuch]

Fun fact:
SOPA is soup in Spanish

 

[Sleekgiant]

Fun fact, this site won't exist anymore if SOPA goes through.

All it is is glorified corporate censorship, its a terrible idea and needs to be shot down now. It will also affect the rest of the world as the US supports most of the DNS servers for the internet.

 

[FalloutJack]

What do I think will happen? Pffft...guess. There are HOW MANY internet-goers versus how many government agents? If you intend to fight the world, YOU LOSE. SOPA is not Sparta and our numbers count for EVERYTHING.

 

[BGH122]

ArsTechnia took a similar opinion to you [http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/11/why-sopa-endangers-americas-internet-leadership.ars], but they went further (sadly, not in that article; I can't find the one with the law expert discussing probable outcomes, but you might be able to) and discussed how it could potentially mark the end of the world wide net. Currently, governments don't really have a very strong grasp on what the internet actually is (quelle surprise), but legislations like SOPA will show them that the internet can, at least theoretically, be partitioned along national lines. This could lead to a situation where each nation develops increasingly esoteric laws regarding internet services hosted in their territories, to the effect that the internet itself becomes a fragmented mess with each nation's own 'version' of the internet becoming incompatible with each other nation's.

This is before we even get onto the problem with moving away from secure DNS systems.

 

[Aidinthel]

This could lead to a situation where each nation develops increasingly esoteric laws regarding internet services hosted in their territories, to the effect that the internet itself becomes a fragmented mess with each nation's own 'version' of the internet becoming incompatible with each other nation's.

The end may be closer than you think. At least one former Soviet state has already banned accessing foreign-hosted websites.

 

[BGH122]

This could lead to a situation where each nation develops increasingly esoteric laws regarding internet services hosted in their territories, to the effect that the internet itself becomes a fragmented mess with each nation's own 'version' of the internet becoming incompatible with each other nation's.

The end may be closer than you think. At least one former Soviet state has already banned accessing foreign-hosted websites.

Thank you for linking that article to me. I like TorrentFreak, even though they do tend to take a rather 'tech-lite, opinion-heavy' approach to tech journalism. It's a shame that TF don't venture an opinion as to why the Belarus government has taken this action. We all know the (laughably misguided) intentions behind SOPA, but I wonder what caused Belarus to shoot itself in the foot like this?