cutesy user name

i can’t really figure out why the problem with SOPA seems to be lost on a lot of people today. not everyone, certainly and probably not the majority but i’ve seen countless whining on livejournal and tumblr and twitter about how hypocritical the TOS of various corners of the social media world are and what that says about them regarding SOPA. i’ve seen people complaining about livejournal shutting down their blog and blahblahblah free speech. no. no, no, no. if livejournal or google or whoever wants to ban you for sharing illegal copies of an adele album then that is their right. you took a risk, you uploaded something illegal and you got smacked on the wrist for it. i don’t like it if youtube deletes your “leverage” fanvideo but that’s a fight between you and youtube. it shouldn’t involve congress. that doesn’t mean that the government has the right to interfere, especially with such a wide and vague law that puts my reblog of a picture of seth rogen on the same scale as piratebay and makes my even linking piratebay as an example actionable. there are anti-piracy laws already. SOPA helps nobody and accomplishes nothing. it hurts us all, including the studios, the labels, the networks, the members of congress fighting so hard for it and all the donors lamar smith is in bed with. clear channel probably needs to remove their website now what with it being so illegal under the proposed act.

note: i don’t think that the point was totally lost on original poster guy (he just had a POV he was interested in), i just think the idea of paul being anti-piracy *and* anti-SOPA is something that seems to have gone missing in a lot of the discussions i’ve seen today. being against SOPA doesn’t mean you want the world to be a free for all and being worried about the government infringing on your freedom of speech doesn’t make you a hypocrite if you get mad at someone for stealing your shit.

paulftompkins:

I am actually late for something because I responded to this nice young man who wanted me to know he’d never stolen from me, but wondered what my policy on stealing from me was.

UPDATE: I am not angry with this particular young man.