Conservatives come out against SOPA
The more people learn about the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), the more everyone seems to hate it. Politico’s Tim Mak reports that bloggers on the left and the right are ferociously opposing the House bill, which would give the copyright industry sweeping new powers to attack sites suspected of piracy — and, potentially, create significant havoc on the Internet in the process. (Here’s our primer on SOPA.)
The most notable development, though, is that the conservative Heritage Foundation has come out against SOPA, with regulatory expert James Gattuso warning that the bill “may have unintended negative consequences for the operation of the Internet and free speech.” More Heritage grumbling here. As Techdirt’s Mike Masnick notes, Heritage usually lines up with the copyright industry. But SOPA’s flaws seem to be too glaring, and the think tank is now urging alternatives, such as this bill from Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.)
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