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Protests Against SOPA
On January 18, 2012, a series of coordinated protests occurred against two proposed laws in the United States Congress—the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the PROTECT IP Act (PIPA). These followed smaller protests in late 2011. Protests were based on concerns that the bills, intended to provide more robust responses to copyright infringement (also known as piracy) arising outside the United States, contained measures that could possibly infringe online freedom of speech, websites, and Internet communities. Protesters also argued that there were insufficient safeguards in place to protect sites based upon user-generated content. The move to a formal protest was initiated when Fight for the Future organized thousands of the most popular websites in the world, including the English Wikipedia, to temporarily close or interrupt their content and redirect users to a message opposing the proposed legislation. Websites such as Google, Reddit, Mozilla, and Flickr soon featured prote ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Internet Censorship In The United States
Internet censorship in the United States of America is the suppression of information published or viewed on the Internet in the United States. The First Amendment of the United States Constitution protects freedom of speech and expression against federal, state, and local government censorship. Free speech protections allow little government-mandated Internet content restrictions. However, the Internet is highly regulated, supported by a complex set of legally binding and privately mediated mechanisms. Gambling, cyber security, and the dangers to children who frequent social media are important ongoing debates. Significant public resistance to proposed content restriction policies has prevented measures used in some other countries from taking hold in the US. Many government-mandated attempts to regulate content have been barred, often after lengthy legal battles. However, the government has exerted pressure indirectly. With the exception of child pornography, content restric ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Reddit
Reddit ( ) is an American Proprietary software, proprietary social news news aggregator, aggregation and Internet forum, forum Social media, social media platform. Registered users (commonly referred to as "redditors") submit content to the site such as links, text posts, images, and videos, which are then voted up or down ("upvoted" or "downvoted") by other members. Posts are organized by subject into user-created boards called "subreddits". Submissions with more upvotes appear towards the top of their subreddit and, if they receive enough upvotes, ultimately on the site's front page. Reddit administrators moderate the communities. Moderation is also conducted by community-specific moderators, who are unpaid volunteers. It is operated by Reddit, Inc., based in San Francisco. As of February 2025, Reddit is the List of most-visited websites, ninth-most-visited website in the world. According to data provided by Similarweb, 51.75% of the website traffic comes from the United St ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Stop Online Piracy Act
The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) was a proposed United States congressional bill to expand the ability of U.S. law enforcement to combat online copyright infringement and online trafficking in counterfeit goods. Introduced on October 26, 2011, by Representative Lamar Smith ( R- TX), provisions included the requesting of court orders to bar advertising networks and payment facilities from conducting business with infringing websites, and search engines from linking to the websites, and court orders requiring Internet service providers to block access to the websites. The proposed law would have expanded existing criminal laws to include unauthorized streaming of copyrighted content, imposing a maximum penalty of five years in prison. Proponents of the legislation said it would protect the intellectual-property market and corresponding industry, jobs and revenue, and was necessary to bolster enforcement of copyright laws, especially against foreign-owned and operated website ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
United States Congress
The United States Congress is the legislature, legislative branch of the federal government of the United States. It is a Bicameralism, bicameral legislature, including a Lower house, lower body, the United States House of Representatives, U.S. House of Representatives, and an Upper house, upper body, the United States Senate, U.S. Senate. They both meet in the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C. Members of Congress are chosen through direct election, though vacancies in the Senate may be filled by a Governor (United States), governor's appointment. Congress has a total of 535 voting members, a figure which includes 100 United States senators, senators and 435 List of current members of the United States House of Representatives, representatives; the House of Representatives has 6 additional Non-voting members of the United States House of Representatives, non-voting members. The vice president of the United States, as President of the Senate, has a vote in the Senate ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Copyright Bills In The 2011-2012 United States Congress
There were different but similar copyright bills in the 112th United States Congress: The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) in the House of Representatives and the PROTECT IP Act (PIPA) in the Senate. A typical route for legislation like this is to pass some version in both houses (so called ''companion bills''), then refer the two bills to a conference committee, which would produce a single bill likely to pass both houses. These bills were motivated by concerns of copyright holders that their copyright protection in being undermined by the illegal dissemination of copyrighted information via the Internet. Opponents of the proposed legislation say that the proposed remedies are far worse than the problem they are intended to solve. Economic impact of SOPA / PIPA Negative impact on web hosting services Journalist Rebecca MacKinnon argued that making companies liable for users' actions could have a chilling effect on user-generated sites like YouTube. "The intention is not the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Entertainment Software Association
The Entertainment Software Association (ESA) is the trade association of the video game industry in the United States. It was formed in April 1994 as the Interactive Digital Software Association (IDSA) and renamed on July 21, 2003. It is based in Washington, D.C. Most of the top publishers in the gaming world (or their American subsidiaries) are members of the ESA. The ESA also organized the annual Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) trade expo in Los Angeles, California. The ESA's policy is based by member companies serving on the ESA's three Working Groups: "Intellectual Property Working Group", "Public Policy Committee" and "Public Relations Working Group". History The concept of the IDSA/ESA arose from the controversies that the violence depicted in the video game ''Mortal Kombat'' drew. This led to a United States Congress hearing in late 1993, where the video game industry was put under scrutiny for the level of violence in games like ''Mortal Kombat'' and '' Night Trap ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Recording Industry Association Of America
The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/or distribute approximately 85% of all legally sold recorded music in the United States". RIAA is headquartered in Washington, D.C. RIAA was formed in 1952. Its original mission was to administer recording copyright fees and problems, work with trade unions, and do research relating to the record industry and government regulations. Early RIAA standards included the RIAA equalization curve, the format of the stereophonic record groove and the dimensions of 33 1/3, 45, and 78 rpm records. RIAA says its current mission includes: #to protect intellectual property rights and the First Amendment rights of artists #to perform research about the music industry #to monitor and review relevant laws, regulations, and policies Between 2001 and 2 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Motion Picture Association Of America
The Motion Picture Association (MPA) is an American trade association representing the Major film studios, five major film studios of the Cinema of the United States, United States, the Major film studios#Mini-majors, mini-major Amazon MGM Studios, as well as the video streaming services Netflix and Amazon Prime Video. Founded in 1922 as the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (MPPDA) and known as the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) from 1945 until September 2019, its original goal was to ensure the viability of the American film industry. In addition, the MPA established guidelines for film content which resulted in the creation of the Motion Picture Production Code in 1930. This code, also known as the Hays Code, was replaced by a voluntary Motion Picture Association film rating system, film rating system in 1968, which is managed by the Classification and Rating Administration (CARA). The MPA has advocated for the motion picture and television in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
United States Government
The Federal Government of the United States of America (U.S. federal government or U.S. government) is the Federation#Federal governments, national government of the United States. The U.S. federal government is composed of three distinct branches: United States Congress, legislative, President of the United States, executive, and Federal judiciary of the United States, judicial. Powers of these three branches are defined and vested by the Constitution of the United States, U.S. Constitution, which has been in continuous effect since May 4, 1789. The powers and duties of these branches are further defined by Act of Congress, Acts of Congress, including the creation of United States federal executive departments, executive departments and courts subordinate to the Supreme Court of the United States, U.S. Supreme Court. In the Federalism in the United States, federal division of power, the federal government shares sovereignty with each of the 50 states in their respective t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Xkcd
''xkcd'' is a serial webcomic created in 2005 by American author Randall Munroe. Sometimes styled ''XKCD'', the comic's tagline describes it as "a webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language". Munroe states on the comic's website that the name of the comic is not an acronym but "just a word with no phonetic pronunciation". The subject matter of the comic varies from statements on life and love to Mathematical joke, mathematical, Programming language, programming, and science, scientific in-jokes. Some strips feature simple humor or pop-culture references. It has a cast of stick figures, and the comic occasionally features landscapes, graphs, charts, and intricate mathematical patterns such as fractals. New cartoons are added three times a week, on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, with few exceptions. Munroe has released six spin-off (media), spinoff books from the comic. The first book, published in 2010 and titled ''xkcd: volume 0'', was a series of select comics from h ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
WordPress
WordPress (WP, or WordPress.org) is a web content management system. It was originally created as a tool to publish blogs but has evolved to support publishing other web content, including more traditional websites, electronic mailing list, mailing lists, Internet forum, Internet forums, media galleries, membership sites, learning management systems, and shopping cart software, online stores. Available as free and open-source software, free and open-source software, WordPress is among the most popular content management systems – it was used by 22.52% of the top one million websites . WordPress is written in the PHP programming language and paired with a MySQL or MariaDB database. Features include a plug-in (computing), plugin architecture and a web template system, template system, referred to within WordPress as "Themes". To function, WordPress has to be installed on a web server, either as part of an Internet hosting service or on a personal computer. WordPress was first ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wikipedia
Wikipedia is a free content, free Online content, online encyclopedia that is written and maintained by a community of volunteers, known as Wikipedians, through open collaboration and the wiki software MediaWiki. Founded by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger in 2001, Wikipedia has been hosted since 2003 by the Wikimedia Foundation, an American 501(c)(3) organization, nonprofit organization funded mainly by donations from readers. Wikipedia is the largest and most-read reference work in history. Initially available only in English language, English, Wikipedia exists list of Wikipedias, in over 340 languages. The English Wikipedia, with over million Article (publishing), articles, remains the largest of the editions, which together comprise more than articles and attract more than 1.5 billion unique device visits and 13 million edits per month (about 5edits per second on average) . , over 25% of Wikipedia's web traffic, traffic comes from the United States, while Jap ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
