ACTA, SOPA's big brother

[Lightman]

Too many people too attached to money on this world. What matters really is knowledge and resources. For me the whole monetary system can collapse and sooner then better. Maybe then we will have a chance to develop a better system to sustain us and allow positive growth without unnecessary suffering.
Yeah, I know that's not going to happen any time soon, and monetary systems aren't all bad, they create incentives to work harder, still one can dream

PS. Debts don't need to be paid off, they can be written off.

[OldChap]

The petition, open to people worldwide, has gone from around 187,000 to 261,000 signatures in 24 hours

https://www.accessnow.org/page/s/just-say-no-to-acta


The UK Govt. version grew by around 1500 in the same period

https://submissions.epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/20685



This just in: the European Parliament's rapporteur of the ACTA agreement, an agreement which is about as bad as SOPA and creates seriously repressive legislation - that rapporteur has just quit in disgust over how the whole process has been designed to keep citizens and lawmakers in the dark.

http://activepolitic.com:82/News/201..._citizens.html

[01Lude]

Do you not understand that nothing is free? The national debt is currently $15,280,870,300,000 and rising at an incredible rate. In fact, Obama called Bush unpatriotic for his deficit spending of $4.5 trillion over 8 years even though we had two wars (one was absolutely necessary).... yet in only THREE YEARS Obama has spent an additional $6.2 trillion that we had to borrow from foreign countries.

This spending spree is wreckless... and even downright dangerous. Just to put that kind of money in perspective, if you were to divide the debt between every single man, woman, and child in the US... your "fair share" (to use an Obama term) of the debt would be $180,000.

First off this is not the proper venue for political discussion. All of the above nonsense is 1) completely bat-, and 2) completely off topic.

Second, your premise that Obama spent all this money is wrong. Before he even took office all this money was already spent. This is a very old argument by now which has been addressed numerous times. These were financial obligations accumulated under the Bush Administration, so don't try to blame Obama for simply paying Bush's bills. Also, basic Keynesian economics, which has dug us out of numerous recessions in the past, dictates that we should borrow and spend during a recession to spur quick "stimulus" by doing infrastructure projects etc. There is almost no economist on the planet who disagrees with this. Critics of Keynes (including Ron Paul) always conveniently forget the other crucial half of the equation, which is that we are supposed to build up a surplus in times of economic prosperity so that when a recession does hit we have some cash reserves to inject to whatever sectors need it. What GW Bush did was completely the opposite. He inherited a surplus and a booming economy under Clinton, but instead of continuing to build on the surplus he SPENT IT ALL, so that when the recession did finally hit (and they inevitably do from time to time), there was nothing in our savings account to cushion the effects. So why do some politicians ignore basic economics 101? My guess is that they have to be representative of their voter base in order to get any votes, so if the voters are ignorant then the politicians really have no other choice than to cater to ignorance, even if they might actually know better. So the ignorant voter deserves just as much blame as the pandering, deceitful politician.

The way you use the phrase "fair share" to describe Obama completely misrepresents his use of it. His message has been the same since he campaigned in 2008. To paraphrase: "If you make under 250k, you will not see your taxes go up one penny."

So you sir are either purposely misrepresenting the facts or you have no idea what you're talking about.

The main point here is this president has made a massive power grab that now effects almost every aspect of our lives in some way and is causing more and more people to become dependent on big government. This country is becoming more and more like Greece every day. Government now owns car companies, banks, mortgage lenders, and continues to promise more social programs, pensions, benefits, etc... but the whole time was paying for all these things with the national credit card.... just like Greece did.

Now what do you guys think will happen in the next two or three years when other nations stop buying out debt??? What's going to happen when those comfortable medical benefits, retirement pensions, and social security checks stop coming???

And what then happens to all those government owned banks, car companies, mortgage companies, and health care system... when your government cannot get any more loans to pay their obligations?

What happens to your Government regulated and operated Internet??????????? (if these bills were to pass)

... and we all thought the riots in Greece were bad. They have 11 million people. We have 330 million people. We also have 300 million firearms to spice things up just a little.

The power grab part might be true. Presidents have been accumulating power since... I don't recall.. Reagan maybe? There has been a historical trend of a power grab by the Executive branch for at least 30 years. Though many would argue that the U.S. Supreme Court still holds the most power. And since congress is in gridlock they are basically irrelevant anyway.

The rest of your ideas are just complete nonsense.

[lutjens]

It's looking more and more like SOPA and PIPA were introduced to siphon off attention from ACTA, which is the truly malevolent one, IMHO. Anything conceived of, decided on and implemented behind closed doors in total secrecy by a few select individuals/organizations cannot be good at all...

Might sound extreme but maybe it's time to get all these tools the hell out of government by any means necessary? After all they are supposed to represent the people not themselves.

"When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty. "
Thomas Jefferson

Time to make them scared I say

Bang on...unfortunately many actions of government center around making the people afraid of them (and everything else in the world as well).

[OldChap]

The Biggest petition that I am aware of just now is open to people from ANY country

http://www.avaaz.org/en/eu_save_the_...et_spread/?tta

[Dainas]

It is a uniquely merrikan disorder to assume automatically that all the worlds ills are caused by the needy getting some help.

It is also a uniquely merrikan disorder to behave like an temporarily embarrassed millionaire; whose duty is to stand up and protect all the actual financial parasites in our society.

Europe is a mess with a twisted monstrosity sprawling out from brussels, but America it is in the very mentality. Theoretically speaking our government is far more geared for the people, but the sheep keep turning it against themselves.

[Mech0z]

"769,161 have signed. Help us get to 750,000" ehm :p not the best code in the world

[Waterlogged]

I'm against this as much as I was against SOPA and PIPA but I got what might be a stupid Q.

Would ACTA give the RIAA the right to shut down over the air radio stations? If so, I think that shows just how dangerous this thing really can be.

[Aberration]

None of the bills had given RIAA the right to shut down anything.

[JohnZS]

ACTA is both worrying and saddening at the same time.
Yes I agree that measures should be taken to stop piracy of Movies, TV shows, Games and Books...however ACTA would prevent the existence of this very forum.
Why?

Well lots of topics on this thread are about Intel this, AMD that, or nVidia this and ATi that... none of us would be able to post topics or discuss brand names if ACTA is allowed
ACTA also prevents the existence of Wikipedia because it will prevent people sharing knowledge they have learnt with other people.

ACTA is a serious threat to the freedom of expression and creativity on the internet. Once again I would like to reiterate I am all for clamping down on pirates, but this ACTA is something that would have been dreamed up in an Orwellian 1984 novel.

However you may wish to dress it, GLOBAL (Minus Brazil, India and Russia) Corporate Censorship is wrong. The very fact that the true details of this bill are classified is also worrying.

I fear that the UK has already been lost as we have already signed up to ACTA, but many other nations can stand up and say NO!

Some of you may wish to view this video of you are curious as to what ACTA might be and how it could effect your life on the internet


John

[Nightstar]

Your rights should not infringe upon anothers rights. That is a pretty basic and fundamental concept shared pretty much by all developed countries.

You have the right to free speech, unless it infringes on someone elses rights... copyright. You have the right to privacy, unless it infringes on someone elses rights... copyright. A basic and fundamental right is to that of your property and the right to protect it.

I'm one of those fellows with the strange belief that intellectual property beyond a secret is a spurious concept. Setting that difference aside I agree that ones rights should not be infringed without absolute necessity. In that context ACTA and SOPA are particularly offensive since they would serve to attenuate the rights and privliges of the common citizenry which in some nations happen to be grounded in the fundamental constitutional laws and documents of institution. If we're not already enforcing the laws that protect the rights of the citizenry should we really draft laws enshrining the right to controll the dissemination of information?

Call me crazy but this stuff just amazes me. How can this be deemed acceptable given our level of civilization? After all, here we are discussing this in a publicly accessable online forum.

Additionally all things are copies or derivative works from artifice to organism even perception and recollection. This notion of originality is the product of hubris devoid of awareness.

http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/20...opyright-case/

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/n...main-works.ars

[OldChap]

Today's petition standings;

UK, 12,069

Access, 313,379

Avaaz, 1,101,202

ACTA Protest Guide: Rally Details From Around the World

[Gautam]

*click*