Tomorow is stop SOPA day.
If the plugin does what it is supposed to do you’ll find this website
replaced by one page contain something like the story below:
So why am I joining in with this protest.
How could American law hurt a tiny website written by someone living in the
Netherlands.
Well, I’m no legal expert.
But as I understand it, this law could be used to black out any website
anywhere in the world. That means that this kind of law can be used to
blackmail sites out of existent.
Having the ability to send a take down notice without having to prove to a
judge that a site is infringing on your copyright or even that you own the
copyright. Means that any American can use this law to make money.
Nowadays there are already little companies who earn their money as copyright trolls.
If this bill comes into law, domain trolls will send thousands of take down
notices to every .com .net and .org domain owner on the planet demanding to
pay for copyright infringement or else they will shutdown your site.
Even if the domain owner can prove that he isn’t infringing on someones
copyright his domain still could be shut down.
And off course, as is always the case with black mail, there is no limit to
the amount of take down notices one domain owner could get.
I could get thousand of take down notices a year.
In the worst case I could of course register henkterheide.nl (actually I
have, just in case).
But having a Dutch domain isn’t the same as having an .com domain.
I like to write in English and I like the thought that people all over the
world read my words.
Dutch domains are expected to be in Dutch. And although there are people out
side the Netherlands that can read Dutch.
They don’t visit Dutch sites.
I can only share my stories with the whole world if the American Government
is prevented from creating this kinds of laws.
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