occupyallstreets:

Obama And ISP’s To Launch Largest Digital Spying Scheme In History (Must Read)

If you download potentially copyrighted software, videos or music, your Internet service provider (ISP) has been watching, and they’re coming for you.

Specifically, they’re coming for you on Thursday, July 1.

That’s the date when the nation’s largest ISPs will all voluntarily implement a new anti-piracy plan that will engage network operators in the largest digital spying scheme in history, and see some users’ bandwidth completely cut off until they sign an agreement saying they will not download copyrighted materials.

Word of the start date has been largely kept secret since ISPs announced their plans last June. The deal was brokered by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), and coordinated by the Obama Administration. The same groups have weighed in heavily on controversial Internet policies around the world, with similar facilitation by the Obama’s Administration’s State Department.

The July 1 date was revealed by the RIAA’s CEO and top lobbyist, Cary Sherman, during a publishers’ conference on Wednesday in New York, according to technology publication CNet.

The content industries calls this scheme a “graduated response” plan, which will see

-Time Warner Cable

-Cablevision

-Comcast

-Verizon

-AT&T

and others spying on users’ Internet activities and watching for potential copyright infringement. Users who are “caught” infringing on a creator’s protected work can then be interrupted with a notice that piracy is forbidden by law and carries penalties of up to $150,000 per infringement, requiring the user to click through saying they understand the consequences before bandwidth is restored, and they could still be subject to copyright infringement lawsuits.

Read More

Response: This is much worse than SOPA/PIPA and ACTA. It doesn’t necessarily censor the internet but it spys on everything you do. Your ENTIRE web history will be watched and recorded and might even assist the government. This was coordinated by Obama and his administration with the help of the MPAA and RIAA.

What is so dangerous about this is that this is not a law it is a policy adopted by several companies. That means this will not be debated in Congress and you will agree to be spied on by signing a contract with the company.

Internet censorship is becoming a reality and now the corporate elite will legally be able to spy on you. If we spread this and cause an uproar like what we did with SOPA, maybe they will back down. Either way people NEED to know about this.

apriki:

I think it’s amazing, tbqh. I think that Anonymous embodies everything the power of the internet can be and turns it into a weapon for defending free speech, which is, at the end of the day, censorship of anything on the web is aiming to destroy.

Consider this: we are the first generation to truly have been raised in a digital world. For most of us, there is nothing scary or confusing or uncomfortable about sitting down in front of a computer and googling something or just making our way around the internet. Our view and our impact aren’t limited to our local community or area - thanks to the internet, our social circles and our perspective is worldwide. Have you ever spoken to someone you’ve never met, who lives half a world away? That’s the power of the internet: a global communication system that lets you connect instantly to people whose experiences and lives are drastically different to yours.

In the 1450’s, the Gutenberg press was created, and it changed the world because for the first time ever, widespread populations were learning to read and to understand, and began interpreting the Bible for themselves instead of listening to the church. This lead to schisms in Christianity that are still fought over today - all because the masses, for the first time, had the change to become informed for themselves. Do you know what the Internet gives us? It gives us knowledge, and that will get you further than anything else in the world. God, how could you not want to know? How could you not want to be on the web everyday, learning and understanding? Everything is accesible to you at the click of a button, and that’s not only revolutionary, it’s neccessary. 

People should not be censored by their governments. They should be given the choice and the opportunity to educate themselves, and the internet gives them that chance. People should be able to choose what media they’re going to consume, and when, and how; and not feel ostracised because of their geographic location, because the internet eliminates that factor. Internet users know this. File sharing sites know this. For some reason, governments and corporate businesses seem to have missed the message.

The fact remains that the entertainment industry is centered on the United States, and the rest of the world is secondary to that. In most countries there is no Netflix or direct streaming of television shows (and where they are present the shows usually have a delay by one or two seasons from when they air in America), and the shows that air are a limited and controlled sampling of the full scope. There is no fast, cheap and reliable way to download or stream these shows from websites or programs (attempting to stream from sites like ABC or Hulu outside of the US ends with a “this video is not available in your country” notice) - if you are not in the US, there is basically nothing for you. Unless, of course, you torrent or download - the companies who own television shows don’t think they’re going to make a profit in your country, so you’d probably never get to see them otherwise.

Basically, the entertainment industry is constantly and repeatedly telling me that my worth as a consumer is less than an American because I am not as geographically desirable. Even on the internet - which transcends national boundaries - I am not allowed to view things because I am not an American. Do you know what I think about that? I think it’s bullshit. 

I think that everyone, everywhere is an equal consumer. I think that we should all be given the choice to engage with media, to educate ourselves, to learn and experience what the world has to offer us. I think that the government won’t let me do that, and corporate industry doesn’t want me to do that, and that the internet is quite possibly one of the only places in the world where free speech is given free reign, and that’s beautiful.

We don’t vote in entertainment companies or business CEO’s, and yet they decide what we hear, what we see, what’s good for us and what isn’t. We don’t decide what ads we see or how people are represented in them; we aren’t given a say in the fact that the make up industries of the world make a profit out of attempting to keep women in a state of shame over their own bodies, or that people of color and non-heterosexuals and those who do not adhere to the gender binary are barely represented at all in any media. I think that all these groups - that all groups, everywhere - have an opportunity to gather and connect and learn on the internet. And I think the fact that governments and industries want to stamp that out so they can keep the public in a state of ignorance and isolation is despicable.

Anonymous stands for people who have gotten used to free speech, and who don’t want to give it up. And when you think about it, it is all of us - do you know anyone who is a member on an online forum? Who uses wikipedia, who reads news sites or who googles words when they don’t know how to spell them properly? It’s the entire world - the whole goddamn world! - right at your fingertips, and the scariest thing about that is that our generation is going to be the first generation of informed, mobilised global citizens, who know that we are powerful, and that we’re not alone. That is what Anonymous is. The hackers and activists who take down sites and protest are people who have grown up on the internet, too, and most likely learned their skills through it: they are weapons of free speech. Now there’s something to think on.

I’ll sum this up real simple: the internet is our Library of Alexandria. And if there was some way, any way, that I could help stop the Romans from burning that fucker down? Well then you’d better throw a Guy Fawkes mask over this way and call me anonymous too.

a-raccoon:

pockytardis:

hungarysovaries:

chicksdigthephoenix:

thinkmexican:

Say NO to ACTA

ACTA, the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, makes SOPA look like child’s play. It would establish an independent multi-national governing body focused solely on enforcing the intellectual property rights of major corporations. Learn more at the video above.

oh

yeah

acta’s worse than sopa, saw another vid earlier in spanish explaining this

all of us need to spread the word about this

GOD DAMMIT US.

YOU NEED TO FUCKING STOP.

why do they feel the impending absolute need to fuck with the internet because they can’t fix anything else actually important in the world

are you serious

If the US were a man, I would dedicate this to him:

thedailywhat:

And The Other Shoe Drops of the Day: Shortly after news broke that the PIPA test vote scheduled for Tuesday was being postponed indefinitely, Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) took to Twitter to announce that voting on the bill’s congressional sibling SOPA was also being postponed.

[@darrellissa.]