Spinning the Online Piracy Debate — Christopher Shea at the Wall Street Journal reports on how a study that examined the effects of P2P downloading on US box office receipts has been spun by some, including Boing Boing’s Cory Doctorow and TorrentFreak, to show no harm from piracy. (I would add Public Knowledge to this list.) This has prompted one of the study’s authors, Joel Waldfogel, to write a blog post in response. “We think our marquee result is the opposite,” said Waldfogel. “We do find evidence that piracy depresses international sales.”
African IP Summit short a development dimension? — The Afro-IP blog presents a comment from law professor Mark Schultz taking NGOs to task for criticism about the first-ever continent wide intellectual property conference in Africa. Well worth a read:
Inventions, creative works, and other fruits of the mind are not solely the product of the Global North. The human mind is the one resource we share in common, and everybody, everywhere has the capacity to create and innovate. Thus, the people of developing countries should not be treated as mere consumers of the products, innovation, and creativity of wealthy countries. IP is not an obstacle to poor people getting what they need from rich people; it can instead be the means by which the poor gain the things they need to flourish by protecting the products of their intellectual labor.
I wish that these assertions represented an attack on strawmen, but they do not. All throughout the Development Agenda discussions, the helplessness of developing countries was the implicit and sometimes explicit premise articulated by IP skeptics. It angered me then while I was sitting in the WIPO assembly hall in Geneva, and still angers me. IP isn’t something that helps only wealthy people. It’s something that could offer empowerment and security to the filmmakers of Nollywood and their aspiring cousins in Sollywood (RSA) and Hillywood (Rwanda); it could keep talented researchers at home and support the development of domestic industries.
Blackout? What Blackout? “The SOPA blackout was about as organic as the masses of North Koreans crying in the streets upon hearing of Kim Jong Il’s deathâ€Â — As more time passes since the online protests against SOPA, more and more people are digging into the driving forces behind it. As a character in one editorial comic puts it: “Ok, something’s up — that was way too easy.” Chris Castle reviews David Rodnitzky’s article (featured in a previous Endnotes) that examines some of these groups and lobbyists and adds additional info and context.
Protecting Content and Promoting Innovation in a Digital World: A Post-SOPA/PIPA Conversation — The Paley Center for Media hosted this interesting panel discussion between NBCUniversal General Counsel Rick Cotton and Union Square Venture’s Fred Wilson, where the two discussed the future of copyright on the internet.
Poll: Americans not with internet lobby on SOPA/PIPA — “There is a big political disconnect between the fact that ~80% of Americans believe online piracy and counterfeit drugs is a problem worthy of stronger laws, while the Internet lobby convinced millions of Americans to oppose a bipartisan proposed solution to this piracy problem – by characterizing the proposed legislation as “censorship†and “breaking the Internet.—
5 Misconceptions Sites/Hosts Have About the DMCA — Jonathan Bailey looks at some of the most common mistakes website hosts make dealing with the DMCA’s safe harbors.
“Protecting Content and Promoting Innovation in a Digital World: A Post-SOPA/PIPA Conversation”
There is something mildly amusing about people wearing expensive suits and eating what looks to be a catered gourmet dinner complaining about not making enough money.
“We must fight this piracy killing our livelihood! Hey Joel, pass the caviar.”
Anyway the debate in that video was awesome as hell. Thanks for posting. 🙂
And regards to the Africa thing, it’s absolutely in any countries best interest to not respect international IP.
Domestic IP is a different story, but once you start respecting the IP of people outside your country, you are effectively training wealth from your own country. Actually the USA for something like the first hundred years of it’s existence did not respect foreign copyrights and patents, and allowed a very vibrant domestic business to arise from important and translating literature from Europe.
Of course there are trade agreements that if you want to be a member of, you have to laws that respect foreign copyright. At you’ll see I think a lot of the developing countries have such laws in place.
But laws is different than enforcement. I’ve recall seeing a video where a street vendor in Nigeria basically says the authorities don’t care if he sells copyright infringing videos as long as the copyright being infringed is not from another Nigerian (eg: Nollywood). So this kind of thing is helpful to their economy because it allows Nollywood to exist and profit, allows street vendors to make a good living selling products people want and keeps less money flowing from their country to others, something a developing/poor country in Africa definitely needs less of.
Domestic IP is a different story, but once you start respecting the IP of people outside your country, you are effectively training wealth from your own country. Actually the USA for something like the first hundred years of it’s existence did not respect foreign copyrights and patents, and allowed a very vibrant domestic business to arise from important and translating literature from Europe.
I’ve written on this subject before: Choosing Between Copyright and Piracy.
Weak protection for nondomestic IP depresses the development of domestic IP producers by effectively subsidizing nondomestic works. This is something the US experienced in its early years.
I see your point. But you can make “foreign IP” more expensive without having money leave your country. For instance by forcing kick-backs to domestic organizations for foreign IP. Maybe the police “fines” the street vendor every now and than and that money goes to bolster the local governments or Nollywood.
Not directly relevant to the week’s posts, but this news report from the UK may be of interest:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2012/feb/17/facebook-hacker-glenn-mangham-jailed
Just to show that online mischief can have real-world consequences, such as jail time. And this guy must have been a fairly sophisticated hacker, but he still got caught.
Terry,
I’m curious why there no mention of this book? HR-2281: And Then the DMCA Didn’t Apply on the Earth (Viacom vs. Google).: Google and YouTube are not Service Providers (nor are the Others)
It argues 17 USC § 512(k)(1)(B) and that’s an opinion that should be heard just as loud, and whether anyone agrees with it or not, that opinion should have a podium to defend itself.
This is the Kindle link that provides most of the first brief for viewing.
http://www.amazon.com/HR-2281-YouTube-Service-Providers-ebook/dp/B006Q2I85A/
The argument is quite bizarre. YouTube (or any other Web 2.0 website) is definitely a “service provider” under the DMCA. Maybe I’m misreading it, but the author is advocating against the ability for search engines and social media to even legally exist (including things like this blog).
It’s scary that people would even consider such things, but it is not surprising to me. Fundamentally this is a battle between people who literately want to destroy the Internet and those who want to protect and preserve it. Make no mistake of it people – it really is that black and white.
LOL
Terry: looks like an important speech here by the UK Labour Party (Opposition) spokesperson on Arts matters:
http://www.labour.org.uk/speech-on-uk-music-industry,2012-02-20
Quite robust on the importance of copyright – more so in fact than the current UK Government.
Scott Cleland is a joke. Why you want to support them when there was a far superior study out that isn’t so heavily biased against Google might do more to help the maximalist argument.
Scott Cleland is a beacon of light in the midst of the dim, brainwashed masses when it comes to how evil Google is. And it scares Google mouthpieces like yourself.
LOL
Keep going Kent. The next thing out of your mouth is that Google was the centerpiece of the SOPA protests since it’s all maximalist’s favorite punching bag.
The Google knows everything that happens on the Internets. You better be careful, lest you be carted off in the middle of the night by Google’s evil henchbots.
Citation?
Click on study.
Polls always perk up my “antenna” for a host or reasons too numerous to mention. Having listened to the “study”, I noted that it was performed in countries outside the US, where I would expect there would be significant differences of opinion for obvious reasons. Frankly, I submit that comparing one poll to the other is more aptly called an apples to oranges comparison given the persons from whom opinions were being solicited.
It was performed in Germany and the US and shows the values of both countries respectively. In looking at Cleland’s he has too many leading questions which make the report very biased against Google and only Google. It’s ridiculous. At least with the Media piracy report, you can see the values of both countries. Further, you see the methodology and the words used when questioning so you have a sense of what people are willing and unwilling to accept.
With Cleland, what you see is what you get.
Cleland wrote an article about a study he read. Insofar as I am aware, he did not have a role in its preparation, execution, and analysis.
But Cleland is paid to attack Google. Obviously, he’s going to get the most loaded and biased poll that will show Google in the worst light.
The poll surveys 1000 people to represent different parts of the US. However here’s some of the questions:
Have you ever downloaded ‘pirated’ music or videos (such as a movie or TV show) from the Internet without paying for it?
In comparing the two studies, you see a mistake where there is no age distinction. So you have no idea what age group the JZ Analytics study was focused on. With the Copy Culture study, you can see that 18-29 year olds pirate more. That should be something that the JZA study should notice.
Search-engine companies such as Google, Bing and Yahoo make money by selling ads on websites. How would
you feel about those companies if they profited from websites that sold counterfeit drugs or illegally “pirated†movies,
videos and music? Which of the following statements comes closest to your opinion? Statement A. I would think
less of that company because it’s profiting from illegal and potentially dangerous activities. Statement B. I would not
think less of that company because it’s ultimately up to the Internet user to decide what’s right or wrong.
These are examples of loaded questions that skew the report. From the third question onward, the interviewer pushed the questions wherever he wanted to go. I believe Cleland’s discussion about this and his report about its accuracy should be taken with a few tons of salt.
It is interesting to note all those in internet-land who seem to believe that their flood of petitions, emails, letters, etc. were somehow the driving force that placed SOPA and PIPA on hold. Then we have the EFF, PK, KEI and other public interest groups likewise waxing poetic about their efforts.
While all of these actions, taken as a whole, certainly had an effect, I am struck by the failure of all of them to generally ignore, if not downplay or outright dismiss, the efforts of “tech” lobbying. Love it or hate it, lobbying is the official language in DC, and it is lobbyists who are adept at speaking the language. They are the ones who weild power because they are the ones who truly understand the pressure points (i.e., people) that hold sway in the legislative process.
To believe this grassroots movement carried the day is naive.
Right… Google didn’t come into the protest until late in the game. Wikipedia was urged to have a blackout day set by the Reddit community, which is the exact one you’re dismissing. And if the blackout wasn’t grassroots activism, then how can you ignore how hard the MPAA, RIAA, USTR, and CoC campaigned to get this through Congress?
Sure, DC knows the language of lobbying. But lobbying had a very minimal effect compared to how much these bills were much vilified by the population that was to be affected.
To think that lobbying did the trick when the lobbyists spent 4x times the amount is a little misleading is it not?
“Google didn’t come into the protest until late in the game.”
More lies from “Jay”.
http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/technology/story/2012-01-23/google-lobbying/52758622/1
Wikipedia was in a very public money begging cycle last fall; then one of the founders of Google gave them a half million dollars. That’s in addition to the 2 million Google gave wikipedia the year before.
How nice of Wikipedia to cooperate when Google needed help in keeping their piracy-friendly business model intact.
Wikipedia is a free culture project. It doesn’t really take anything to compel them to be opposed to something like SOPA.
While Google is your favorite punching bag, all they said was that they stand opposed to this bill.
Meanwhile, you had Reddit attacking Paul Ryan, pushing against GoDaddy, and a number of other tactics. Google increased its lobbying efforts, but that still doesn’t explain how the public was firmly against the bills. If it were about the lobbying dollars, Hollywood had it in the bag.
“still doesn’t explain how the public was firmly against the bills. ”
That’s already been explained numerous times all over the net.
You people lied about the bill.
duh.
Right. Millions of people lied about the bill to come to the conclusion that SOPA was bad. The engineers, artists, film directors, gamers, and people who care about censorship and governmental control were all wrong because Kent says so.
Can that tinfoil hat get any tighter?
When people signed a petition because they thought their Facebook was going to be disappeared, then yeah, you people lied about the bill.
And you’re still here lying about it. Snore.
Kent, that’s your job. Google did that late in the game compared to the grassroots campaigns coming from Reddit.
Your attacks on Google are misleading. Time to wake up that Google isn’t the reason that SOPA failed. But of course, expecting you to come back to reality anytime soon is a bit much.
Google didn’t do anything “late in the game” here. Why are you lying about that? I posted the link, but you’re still spinning.
The evidence is out there; yet you persist in lying about it. Interesting strategy you people are investing in…
Lying!
The funding your blog and Reddit get via Google astroturf groups is already well known. Yet you persist in pretending everyone has their head in the sand. Kinda pyscho.
It’s definitely amusing to see you tilt at windmills and pretend everyone that signed that petition did so after reading the bill, rather than on a carefully designed Bush/Cheney-style fear mongering panic impulse.
It’s also karma to see you waste away your life raging on copyright.
Something that will never be repealed just so giant greedy corporations like Google can leech off of individual creators.
What blog are you talking about? Mine is a free blog. Oh right… You have this ridiculous notion that I’m Mike Masnick because you can’t accept the truth that people can disagree with you. Better yet, you’re only interested in disparaging remarks because you don’t want to admit you lost on legislation that you were paid to support. Awesome to know, Kent.
Now do me a favor: In my article where I point out how the media companies spent four times as much as any technology sector.
So while Google spent $3.76 million on lobbying to bribe the system, your masters spent $94 million. Let’s compare numbers here:
Silicon Valley – $15.1 million
Hollywood – $94 million
Face it. Google was outspent from the start. I could take any one company out of the mix and I’m sure that Hollywood spent more on SOPA than Google ever decided to. It’s all there black and white, clear as crystal. You lose. Good day, sir. 🙂
It’s also karma to see you waste away your life raging on copyright.
Yeah, there’s problems with energy, education, and so many other issues to contend with… Yet, here you are making such comedic statements that make me laugh. You should go on tour.
Something that will never be repealed just so giant greedy corporations like Google can leech off of individual creators.
Keep going. I’m sure those creators are doing just fine despite copyright laws that they tend to ignore to make money anyways.
Apparently, you have not followed the debate concerning SOPA/PIPA/COICA as closely as you and other internet denizens appear to believe. The so-called “tech industry” entered the fray at least as early as 2010.
Moreover, the tech industry is no stranger to the ways of DC. Back in 1998 it lobbied extensively for at least the provision now known as Section 512.
I acknowledged above that the write-in campaign certainly had an effect, but to believe it was a grassroots movement that carried the day demonstrates a naive understanding about how our legislative process actually works.
Tech industry companies plowed the ground, planted seed, added fertilizer and water long before individuals such as yourself came to the fore, and then waited patiently until the time was ripe to launch its no-holds-barred campaign in the Fall of last year.
It was easy for internet users to jump on the bandwagon as they did, but it does help to reflect for a bit on when it was that the bandwagon was built and by who.
Not to mention that the sitting president has had Google executives IN HIS CABINET!! If that’s not backdoor influence.. i dunno what is……
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/07/23/googleburton/
“Google’s former chief lobbyist turned Obama’s “Deputy CTO  “
http://money.cnn.com/2009/10/21/technology/obama_google.fortune/
“Google managers and employees were some of the strongest supporters of candidate Obama, donating around…”
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/05/29/googles-top-policy-exec-to-join-obama-administration/
“Andrew McLaughlin, Google’s head of global public policy, is leaving the company to join the Obama administration”
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/02/17/obama_hosts_tech_titan_meeting/
“President Obama will sit down with a pack of Silicon Valley tech titans on Thursday… “
What is the “tech industry”? It’s a huge industry that employes a lot of people that happen to be ideologically opposed to the content industry’s vision for copyright enforcement.
We live in a world with technology that allows a single person to share something with millions of people. Where a person can hold all the world’s content in their hand.
Technology changed what is possible and we need to really accept that. Instead of fighting the technology, the content industry should be figuring out modern laws that leverage the current technological landscape. We need laws that will allow all the world’s knowledge and culture to be made available to everyone with no limitations at all.
What is the “tech industry� It’s a huge industry that employes a lot of people that happen to be ideologically opposed to the content industry’s vision for copyright enforcement.
I daresay only a very few in the “tech industry” actually share the ideology you proffer. After all, “tech” is far, far more expansive than just the recent spate of social networks. Most in “tech” actually design, develop, manufacture and sell goods, and the law that is constantly being derided by those who share your ideology actually provides these other “tech” companies with substantive benefits that facilitate the orderly conduct of domestic and international commerce.
That’s true. The tech industry is not a borg. But I think if you would survey members of the tech industry they’d overall have more liberal opinions of copyright enforcement than the content industry. Some tech companies rely on copyright more than others, but I don’t any rely at it quite as much as the music/movie industry does.
Unlike the content industry, the tech industry as a whole realizes what the future holds. Even companies who invest a great deal in the concept of artificial scarcity as a business model (eg. Microsoft) are maneuvering themselves to be relevant in a future where a company like Google would thrive.
The point is trying to fight technological progress is backfiring.
It is your responsibility to figure out a business model around this technology, not trying to make the technology fit your business model. Making a business out of scarcity is being more and more old fashioned, and the content industry is starting to see thus otherwise “unlimited providers” like Spotify and Netflix wouldn’t exist.
I’ll repeat this again because it’s such a core point: we have the technology that give all the world’s knowledge and culture to all the world’s people. Every book ever written, every movie ever directed, ever song ever sung that was recorded in a fixed form – all that could be made available to everyone in the world no matter how rich or poor they are. A student in Africa could have access to a library of content bigger than what we have at Harvard. This is amazing, huge, a real breakthrough for the progress of mankind.
This is not future technology. We can do this today. Right now. The only thing blocking this from happening is a law that was written before this technology was even imagined.
“I think if you would survey members of the tech industry they’d overall have more liberal opinions of copyright enforcement than the content industry.”
No shit, Sherlock.
Web 2.0 is doomed to failure because it didn’t produce anything other than intelligent people temporarily giving up their privacy.
Fads are not a sustainable business model.
If you’re wondering where this is going to end up, just look at MySpace or the comments section on any random YouTube video. Right there are your empirical results.
“Unlike the content industry, the tech industry as a whole realizes what the future holds.”
Oh please. Minus the “content industry”, much of the web would be a glorified email utility.
You people are not fooling *anyone*. The sooner you realize that, the better.
we have the technology that give all the world’s knowledge and culture to all the world’s people. Every book ever written, every movie ever directed, ever song ever sung that was recorded in a fixed form – all that could be made available to everyone in the world no matter how rich or poor they are.
But do we have the technology to give all your money to all the people in the world without your permission?
No?
No wonder you’re not complaining about being able to take other people’s things without asking.
You want what I create for free.
I want a sandwich right now, Go make one for me.
Neither one of us has a right to either. Except you seem to take your request seriously.
And you wonder why people mock you.
Kent,
I would gladly allow you to make a copy of my sandwich!
Moreover, the tech industry is no stranger to the ways of DC. Back in 1998 it lobbied extensively for at least the provision now known as Section 512.
I remember very clearly that Verizon was the main supporter of 512 back in the day.
I acknowledged above that the write-in campaign certainly had an effect, but to believe it was a grassroots movement that carried the day demonstrates a naive understanding about how our legislative process actually works.
No, that seems to ignore everything that having the entire world against the bills actually means. You had engineers, activists, gamers, normal people, along with the technology industry against these bills as everyone read the thing. And they all coalesced more or less against the bills:
It’s also true that many blogs, including the crusading TechDirt, drummed up opposition to the bills. But the criticism from Dodd and Murdoch ignores the efforts of many groups not directly tied to big tech firms, participants in the protest said.
The characterization of the protests as a top-down effort is wrong, said Mark Stanley, new media coordinator at the Center for Democracy and Technology, a digital rights group that helped organize the protest. “That’s just such a mischaracterization of what happened,†he said. “This was definitely the Internet community at large.â€
Also, James, you’re wrong. Saying that Google had special influence then ignoring other member that have been in the ear of Obama for 3 years now?
By the same token, I’m sure that Joe Biden, Victoria Espinel, Neil McBride, Ian Gershengorn, Tom Perrelli and Don Verrilli had some influence in the Obama administration, hopefully, pushing for SOPA to pass. And yes, Obama would have signed the damn thing. SOPA overreached when they got the engineers involved. And when Paul Vixie has to explain why 16 years of programming had to be thrown away because two industries can’t adapt to the digital age, it was time to hang it up.
Jay, is this a joke? Are you really dim enough to try and rebuke the claim that Google was integral to the SOPA protest by quoting someone at a 501(c)(3) group (CTD) that not only receives substantial funding from Google but is also a Google Policy fellow?
I mean really, up your game, man. This is cringe-worthy.
All of Masnick’s BS is cringe-worthy. But it’s up to us to point it out.
It’s our duty to keep us from devolving into this corporate attempt at profitable idiocracy.
Google certainly helped the protest. But they didn’t really initiate it. As I recall, nobody was even sure if Google was going to participate until the last minute.
Google’s interests don’t rarely align with with all the other anti-SOPA protestors, some of them are largely serious competitors (Facebook/Twitter/Amazon). This was a strange sitution where the mostly the entire tech industry and Internet communities was united against something, most of the time they are fighting and suing each other.
So I think is kind of inaccurate to say “Google was behind it all”. They aren’t that powerful to randomly start a movement unless that movement was already very popular and they are just riding on it.
That’s funny, I hear all of this buzz and a lot of pointed fingers…
But when a ton of people are saying that Google wasn’t at the center of the protests…
Making 87,000 calls in a day to Senators…
Showing how Mel Watt is indeed an idiot…
Showing how Lamar Smith isn’t hearing any arguments…
Showing how a ton of people were going to be affected by this legislation…
All I hear is that buzz of people who can’t get it through their head that, like M said, Google wasn’t even a part of the main movement against SOPA.
Denial must be a great defense mechanism for those that can’t accept the truth…
You Google apologists are dull to listen to.
M:
Google tripled their lobbying spending in order to stop the anti-piracy bill. That isn’t opinion. It’s a documented fact. Google makes an obscene amount of money off of piracy, and since they only care about becoming even wealthier, they spent extra dollars to lobby for more lawbreaking. That’s just the way they roll. They’re evil like that.
This BS about them just strolling by and going “oh look, let’s support this protest”, is just more of the frightening dishonesty they engage in.
That is when they’re not spying on you…
Masnick:
Google’s strategy was simple: scare people and they’ll do what you ask them to do. They use the stooges they can rely on, like yourself, to lie and spread fear, and then people start protesting something they knew nothing about.
No amount of spin is going to change the facts about what happened. That wasn’t “millions” of people protesting something they understood. It was “millions” of people that had been hoodwinked by Google.
That’s just wrong. The whole free culture movement predates Google. It’s an movement born of the information age, a world where virtually all knowledge and culture that can put into a fixed form can be made available to the whole world. You can deny it all you want, but we live in this world, where even you Kent would have a library collection that just 20 years ago no single person could ever accumulate no matter how rich they were.
That’s what you don’t seem to understand. Google is just an company built on the Internet, built of the information age.
And SOPA was bad for companies built on the Internet. Your rage could have been directed Yahoo! instead if they were bigger (also anti-SOPA, maybe Google secretly owns them).
Wow Kent, that’s a lot of denial given that I’ve shown how Hollywood outspent all of the tech industry combined. Yet you still insist on this Google issue. Okay, let’s play here:
Google spent $80,000 in Q3
Google $3.76 Million in Q4 2011
There’s your triple expenditure in numerical form.
Now let’s pull up a few of the supporters and what they gave in donations:
In Q3, Comcast spent $4M
In Q4, they spent $4.5M
Hell, Comcast outspent Google for two straight quarters. And yet, you still play ignorant when anyone shows you that the cable/media industry outspent Google. Your conspiracy against Google is great, but it’s time to let go. The SOPA supporters had $175M going for their legislation against a mere $15M from all the tech sectors.
But I guess cro-magnon brains can’t process this…
Google’s strategy was simple: scare people and they’ll do what you ask them to do. They use the stooges they can rely on, like yourself, to lie and spread fear, and then people start protesting something they knew nothing about.
Alright, Cro-mag. Ignore all evidence that the lobbying that Google did was minimal while you got beat by Reddit. Though it’s kind of amusing to be accused of being Mike Masnick…
If I understood it any better, he’s confident in signing under his own name and explaining his own feelings about an issue. I just have to keep laughing because your arguments seem more and more out of the Stone Age.
uh, Comcast wasn’t spending their money trying to fight anti-piracy legislation…
Comcast couldn’t care less about this issue. They’ll win in the end no matter what happens.
Keep jumping that shark, Masnick.
Cro-mag, yes they did. They also saw that the legislation was incompatible with DNSSEC. Link
LOL
This is why it was so easy to spot you. You just posted a link suggesting Comcast protested SOPA, and then we find the link doesn’t mention SOPA once.
It’s always easy to spot the most intellectually dishonest person on the web: you, Masnick.
This is a really pointless argument regardless. You can blame whoever you want but the bill is dead. I know you are hell-bent on trying to reverse the progression of technology that makes information post-scarce, but you won’t get anywhere by hurling insults and conspiracy theories.
I sure as hell didn’t post a link where Comcast protested SOPA. That’s your failing to understand that Comcast understood that SOPA legislation was not compatible with DNSSEC.
Expand that brain and come back to the new millenium Cro-mag.
M, I would be cautious… The bill isn’t dead, merely hibernating. I’m pretty sure that after elections and we have a new Congress, it will come back with force. The same as I’m sure most shills and copyright maximalists are looking at the results of Spain and Ireland in regards to SOPA and seeing how those laws are affected by the legislation that just recently passed in those respective countries.