[dclowd9901]

Businesses run the government. Money controls business.

This happened to be one of those issues where it was very easy to clearly show the company that their particular actions would not be tolerated. Not only that, but the difficulty of moving your support away from them was tremendously easy as well.

Because of limitations, not all industries enjoy this sort of free market-esque lateral movement. Comm companies, for instance, enjoy the benefits of an established infrastructure to keep other players out, and to keep you contracted with them, even under anti-consumer behaviors.

This was just a case of all the pieces lining up just right, and the market actually aligning with consumer demand.

[markbao]

Huh, you're absolutely right. So people were able to make GoDaddy change their mind by impacting their bottom line.

Instead of going through businesses to try to tell the government what the citizens think, and besides writing or calling politicians, what can we do?

[dclowd9901]

I think the mature thing to do, as cynical as this might sound, is to realize that the government is obscenely out of touch with its constituency, and stop going to them for help. Instead, influence the influencers.

At the end of the day, all companies have is customers. If the customers stop utilizing their services, the companies are forced to stop pushing their anti-consumer agendas into legislation. Part of this is utilizing the Internet, as it now is, to circumvent the old ways of doing things.

Essentially, while it is free, startups should be focusing on helping consumers circumvent traditional industries.

We all hate banks as they are. Let's reinvent them.

We all hate telecoms. Let's try to create startups that can compete with them.

We all hate loan institutions. Let's disrupt the loan structure, allow people to privately invest in one another on a micro scale. Hell, it's already being done for 3rd world nations.

We have a real opportunity to change things and make them better. Get out from under the institutionalized world we grew up in. Why not?

[bigtech]

I'm calling false dichotomy on this. Continue to lobby the government AND influence the influencers.

[mcherm]

I love the idea of disrupting the loan structure. I think using things like Prosper or Lending Club is great. But I live in Pennsylvania where they are against the law.

We cannot ignore the ways in which government is broken.

[marquis]

>where they are against the law

Is there a reason for that? To stop loan sharks, for example? (Which is a highly valid reason).

[dlss]

I don't think GP was saying that the law had no reason for existing, just that its existence had an unfortunate unanticipated effect on microloans.

(If you wanted to outlaw loan sharking, you pass something like the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, not an "only banks can loan money" law)

[wacsix]

Agree that "the government is obscenely out of touch with its constituency." Also agree that it makes sense to stop going to them for help, and the influencing the influencers is prudent. But there is another lever: get rid of the government system that would be so easily influenced by money over and above policy. Turn 'em out. Withdraw consent of the governed.

[corford]

Amen to all of that!

As far as loan institutions go and trying to create something that lets people invest in one another, the UK already has something along those lines: http://uk.zopa.com

I think the idea is great and wish Zopa got more press than they do.

[kpennell]

Great call to action, well written, thanks.

[paul9290]

So your saying we need to boycott Hollywood ?!?

Have everyone turn off their tvs, stop paying for cable tv, stop listening to popular music, stop going to the movies and such ?

Good luck with that... Definitely need to focus on govt. maybe a OCCUPY Capitol Hill and other SOPA supportErs' premises is what is needed?!??

[uiri]

I don't think it is that unrealistic to expect a shift away from TVs. In fact, number of households with a TV set is starting a downward trend which is accelerating.

http://insidetv.ew.com/2011/11/30/tv-ownership-declines/

It is certainly possible to buy DRM-free tracks, and indeed this should be encouraged. Creative commons music exists too. Movies are another matter, although I don't think discouraging people from movies altogether is too unrealistic, that could just be because I'm not big on movies in general myself.

[paul9290]

yes but i say good luck with that because how big of a dent to the Comcasts of the world is this community?

For Godaddy this community is their market and thus we can force action by canceling our service. The market for Hollywood and the RIAA's products cover all walks of life.

You'd have to get your neighbor, aunt, 3rd cousin, etc to stop patronizing Hollywood and the ilk to hurt their bottom line. Your neighbor and grandma have never heard of SOPA nor do they care they just want to watch wheel of fortune or their favorite show.

Many in this community have canceled cable tv services, but again has your grandmother, father, 3rd cousin or neighbor done so too?

[bilban]

i think i could quite easily boycott hollywood. I would prefer to read a book any day of the week than induldge in that hype machine.

[pstuart]

Occupy!

[freejack]

There's a lot of truth in these comments. The most effective change is productive change. Don't like something? Do something that's better. Look at startups like Square who are turning payment processing on its ear, or our project, Ting.com, promising to turn mobility on its ear. Doing a startup that tries to stick it to the man is probably the most effective means of achieving real positive change.

Occupy The Internet!

[Stormbringer]

The problem though, with bills like SOPA is that if the incumbents don't like what you're doing they can just switch it off.

#define competition illegal

is bad, m'kay?

[mkelley82]

I think some good points are made in this post. People need to start implementing or at least, work toward implementation of changes to the status quo, whatever the industry/sector may be. Unless that happens, it is all moot.

[botker]

That's 1 down, 141 to go. Who's next? http://judiciary.house.gov/issues/Rouge%20Websites/SOPA%20Su...

[jlcx]

There's no good place to say this, but that URL bothers me every time I see it. What the hell are "Rouge Websites?" I think they meant something else. :-P

[nkoren]

I haven't actually read the text of SOPA, but I have this amusing fantasy of Anonymous having planted a congressional staffer to do a global search-and-replace through the entire law. Then, when it passes, the following can occur:

EvilMegaCorp : Remove this rogue domain from your DNS immediately.

DNS : Sorry, we're not going to do that.

EvilMegaCorp : But you are legally required to, per SOPA!

DNS : Actually, SOPA only requires us to de-link rouge websites. The Engrish-branded knockoff Asian cosmetics industry has really been decimated by this.

EvilMegaCorp : << explodes in a fit of pique >>

Sigh. A nerd can dream...

[Zak]

Clearly, they mean websites that are red. Red means communist. We must protect ourselves from the threat of communism.

[Steko]

Make up America!!1 Every year we lose tens of thousands of dollars to counterfeit online cosmetics!

Fight the powder! We need SOAP to unmascara the pirates!

[sequoia]

https://www.graphicartistsguild.org/ !! :) They point to position statements ( https://twitter.com/#!/gaguild/status/150004542073872386 <- written by the copyright alliance) that speak to copyright and say the bill's scope is narrow and specific (I disagree), but I didn't see anything about technical concerns. I think it's fair to say those position statements are a load of horse shit.

"Sure we're giving the gov't the right to indefinitely detain anyone, but they're only going to do it if someone is rilly rilly bad, so don't worry! :)"* <- constitutional and civil liberties protections do not work this way.

*I know SOPA isn't the same, it's just an analogy :)

[kissickas]

I'm getting "The system cannot find the file specified." Anyone have a copy of the pdf or the fixed link?

Edit: Never mind, here is one: http://judiciary.house.gov/issues/Rogue%20Websites/List%20of...

The previous link was about "Rouge websites," not "Rogue websites."

[maxharris]

"Money controls business."

I'm looking at a dollar bill on the table in front of me, and I don't think it controls anything. It's an inanimate object.

I know this isn't what you mean. But it's helpful to point this out, for the sake of clear thinking and accuracy: human beings control money. They choose if, where and how to earn it or spend it. Ultimately, it's not money that controls business, but people, with ideas, lives, dreams, goals, motives (sometimes shortsighted and foolhardy, but also sometimes farsighted and brilliant) etc. There is no good reason to imply that one inanimate object or technology such as money is somehow inherently tainted, even if only to some small degree.

Why not try calling out bad ideas instead? What are they, and why are they bad?