It's Baaaaaaaaack: Lamar Smith Says SOPA Markup To Resume In February

For all the talk from some that SOPA was "dead," it appears it's alive and well and getting ready for its big re-entrance. Lamar Smith has just sent out a press release saying that he intends to resume the markup in February...

But wait until Facebook gets the right to copyright and patent your photos, your life experiences, your friends and DNA. You... Mr JQ public and noted as “we the people” will be required as a human to get a special exemption or pay royalties to Facebook Inc. to have children.

If you think this is far fetched, think again. There is no limit to the reach and extent of global corporations that claim to own intellectual property, the political world, and have patented your genes.

National sovereignty is almost as extinct now as privacy and those that get hung up on ideologies and politics as the problem, are going to be as extinct as dinosaurs. The mindset of most in Congress is a generation behind reality.

Good Morning

Not much good at posting or I'd put this up, but - this morning's excuse for a newspaper here in San Antonio had an article about Smith and this joke of a bill. And for those of us yesterday that wondering about the cost of buying this Bozo's vote:

$88,000 from the TV/move/music industry
$63,500 from the computer industry

So now you know. For that hard to please person on your Christmas list next year, $150k or thereabouts will buy him his own obedient little butt-boy in Congress!

“Lamar Smith is a surprisingly cheap whore”

The worst part about that story: I’ve actually gone to hear him speak, voted for him every time he’s run, and for years believed that he was one of the decent, moral, honest, and upright people in Congress.

And the worst part - given that the person running against him next time will undoubtedly be a typical south Texas democrap POS,,,,,

I’ll probably hold my nose and vote for him again!

Talk about feeling like a cheap whore!!!

I can agree with almost all of that, except that in the case of YouTube, very often what you have is a video for which the audio may be available (very likely as a different recording) but the video is not available anywhere else, or is only available at some ridiculous price.* Personally, I almost never play YouTube vids just for the audio, and have yet to record audio from one, partially because the quality is so mediocre. Besides, if I like the music a lot, then I’ll buy the CD or DVD if it’s available.* However, the vids very often are entertaining, and it irks me to see material not available elsewhere taken down.

Though I understand and agree with your point about fan bases, my point is more that the music companies are missing a lot of potential sales by not simply asking posters to promote purchase of the CD’s or DVD’s, which can be of much higher quality. I think most posters would do that, and if it was marketed right, a lot of fans would respond.

In my younger years I taped everything I could, a lot of it off the radio... but I came to understand that it could sound a lot better, and eventually I ended up with a much larger than average record collection.

*In multiple instances I have paid $20 to $30 for a music DVD that I initially saw a piece of on YouTube, so that probably tells you where I am coming from. I would not pay over that, however, unless it was maybe for some very substantial work like a movies package (Lord of the Rings?) or something like that. I don’t have an income that will sustain more!

Also... You sound like someone who really enjoys music. I’ll bet that with the right speakers and a good amp, you’d eventually decide that MP3’s aren’t quite good enough. :-)

28 posted on Tuesday, January 17, 2012 6:07:55 PM by Buckhead: “In the current cycle, TV/Movies/Music industry are the #1 industry group contributing to his campaign and his “Leadership Pac,” “Computers/Internet are #2, and “Lawyers/Law Firms” are #5, and “Lobbyists” are #7.”

Glad to see you're still posting. I hadn't noticed posts from you for a while since your post regarding the reaction to Osama bin Laden’s death.

I've been reading Free Republic much longer than I've been posting or had a registered account, and I'm always glad to see posts by some of the “oldtimers” who made Free Republic into one of the first major examples of how “crowdsourcing” via the internet can change the course of American politics.

Keep up the good work, whether online or elsewhere.

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