The (Possible) KXITX of this site....

[Swoka Swizaw]

watch?v=hLYgs0xMDm0

Put this into YOUTUBE...and see for yourselves what I mean. It might seem a little ambiguous, but the implications could be far-reaching for a site like this. If you love Na'vi like I do (which I gotta start taking more "seriously" in the coming year), watch this video...

For the most part, the bill has changed names and gotten worse. The current incarnation is called S(top) O(nline) P(iracy) A(ct). It has passed the Senate and will be up for vote on the 15th. This bill contains legislation that is much worse of the US, but the very likely seizure of all content that can be copywritten and the site shut down or BLOCKED should be enough to get your attention. I heard that Obama will veto the bill outright, but if not, the sky's the limit as to how far into the ground we'll go...

Fì'ut tse'a, rutxe.

[Tirea Aean]

ah of course, the SOPA :\

well if we aren't advocating or linking to torrent sites or whatever we're fine....right? O_O

[Swoka Swizaw]

ah of course, the SOPA :\

well if we aren't advocating or linking to torrent sites or whatever we're fine....right? O_O

Perhaps, but seeing as how I am not as well versed on this as I could be, I can't answer that. What I can say, from a gut feeling, is that as this grows, anything that CAN be copywritten, will be. This content (Lì'fya leNa'vi) belongs to Paul Frommer, Dr. of Linguistic Sciences at CSU in Los Angeles, CA, but is still blanketed under Cameron and whichever company produced Avatar. From what I've heard, that how this thing works. More or less, any option for anything streaming about Avatar (YouTube), any images, and related content not associated with, or given permission by, the studios that created the Avatar (anything else) would be eradicated. That's how stupid and petty something like this CAN get. And anyone infringing upon an infringeable product/item will get 5 years, if in the US.

Bottom line is, I suggest all read this, get educated and fight what can be fought.

[Payoang]

ah of course, the SOPA :\

well if we aren't advocating or linking to torrent sites or whatever we're fine....right? O_O

Perhaps, but seeing as how I am not as well versed on this as I could be, I can't answer that. What I can say, from a gut feeling, is that as this grows, anything that CAN be copywritten, will be. This content (Lì'fya leNa'vi) belongs to Paul Frommer, Dr. of Linguistic Sciences at CSU in Los Angeles, CA, but is still blanketed under Cameron and whichever company produced Avatar. From what I've heard, that how this thing works. More or less, any option for anything streaming about Avatar (YouTube), any images, and related content not associated with, or given permission by, the studios that created the Avatar (anything else) would be eradicated. That's how stupid and petty something like this CAN get. And anyone infringing upon an infringeable product/item will get 5 years, if in the US.

Bottom line is, I suggest all read this, get educated and fight what can be fought.

Mostly correct. Lightstorm Entertainment (JC's company) owns (rights to) the words that Paul Frommer created. Anything that Dr. Frommer is creating on his own time / approving via the LEP is his property. (I'm not a lawyer, and I don't know the exact legalities, nor the contracts that they signed. Who knows.)

Also, I do believe that LearnNavi is on decent terms with Fox and Lightstorm Entertainment, so I don't foresee any problems... at least not for us. SOPA, however, could be the first step of many that will ruin the Internet as we know it.

[Swoka Swizaw]

SOPA, however, could be the first step of many that will ruin the Internet as we know it.

Irayo, maPayoang. Ìntanet sunu oer. 'Upxaret oeyä virä nang...

I don't want things to change, especially for such BS issues.

[Swoka Ikran]

I hope this bill dies somewhere along the line.

Unfortunately, if it does pass, there's always the option of moving the content overseas. What I've read says the bill would permit shut downs of US-based sites, and filtering of non-US content by removing DNS entries for a domain from US-based servers and scrubbing search results of the sites. But, there's nothing stopping us from using non-US DNS servers and search engines.

I was actually talking to someone who does forensic IT work for the federal government today at university about this...according to him, the current versions of the bill use overly narrow wording that defines the server or site owner as the one responsible for violations. "Server or site owner" does not have to equal "site administrator", meaning that if needed, one could presumably sell a site/server to a trusted user that lives outside SOPA's jurisdiction (i.e. not in the USA), but retain control of it and continue to admin it from the USA.

It's also worth noting that if it did pass, it'd probably take years for any enforcement to actually occur due to the lawsuits that'd result from arguing its constitutionality. That's assuming the courts don't throw it out...

A survey at my university campus (it was mass-emailed to ~4000 students) on this bill came back with these results.

• 1.1% support the bill fully
• 3.4% support it if censorship was restricted to severe violators only (e.g. torrent sites)
• 93.1% against it
• Remaining part being "I don't know/I don't care/Other"

Margin of error was 3%.

[Sіr. Ηaxalot]

Regardless if you move the server or not, it's going to be problematic for all the users in the U.S. to access the site after the DNS block. This is no problem if you're computer savvy enough to get the IP and enter it in the hosts file. But not everyone will know how to do this, and new users most likely wont care to.

[Irtaviš Ačankif]

I would support it if censorship comes after a full lawsuit. Presumption of guilt (blocking and then legal challenges) is unconstitutional. If you can successfully sue a site, you can block it.

[Swoka Ikran]

Regardless if you move the server or not, it's going to be problematic for all the users in the U.S. to access the site after the DNS block. This is no problem if you're computer savvy enough to get the IP and enter it in the hosts file. But not everyone will know how to do this, and new users most likely wont care to.

Agreed. But, if you move the server offshore, you eliminate the risks of the government shutting it down entirely (i.e. confiscating the server). I won't be surprised if SOPA or a future bill requires US datacenters to hand over violating servers without a court order.

This bill effectively relies on lack of user education to be enforceable. Most people don't care WHY or HOW it works, just that it DOES work.

Worse, this lack of education may also create an opportunity for people to sell bogus "unblocking software" at exorbitant prices that could just change your DNS server or adds a boatload of entries to the hosts file for you.


If internet doomsday ever comes, a site owner could always notify their US users ahead of time to configure the hosts file. Getting new US users will be an issue if they can't find the site, but for community sites and the like, a 1 line batch script can make it easy for existing users to keep the site unblocked.

[Irtaviš Ačankif]

Well, if this bill passes, I'm gonna make a DNS changing program to change the DNS to a server in Canada THE FIRST DAY and PUBLICIZE it IMMENSELY.

However, things in the US traditionally require tons of court orders. I'm sure that nothing on LN violates copyright. Additionally, the MPAA will only try to block things that they think are interfering with their making of money, NOT some technical violation. For example, a big screenshot of AVATAR, edited up and parodied, could be a technical violation, but the MPAA wouldn't care. A big screenshot would NOT in any way detriment sales of BluRays of AVATAR. If anything, it will garner interest=more sales for the MPAA. However, torrent sites should be shut down IF and ONLY IF they don't properly remove bad content and instead purposefully advertise themselves as full of illegal stuff (e.g. ThePirateBay should be shut down, but isoHunt should not)

[Swoka Ikran]

Well, if this bill passes, I'm gonna make a DNS changing program to change the DNS to a server in Canada THE FIRST DAY and PUBLICIZE it IMMENSELY.

This was what I was thinking.

isoHunt has actually won a lawsuit against the MPAA...

Never knew this...

[Irtaviš Ačankif]

Bah.

199.166.24.253 (PS0.NS1.VRX.NET) - Toronto, ON, Canada
199.166.27.253 (PS0.NS3.VRX.NET) - Richmond Hill, ON, Canada

Edit: don't be alarmed, the bill didn't pass; i was just demonstrating how easy it is to use a Canada dns

[Tsmuktengan]

I would support it if censorship comes after a full lawsuit. Presumption of guilt (blocking and then legal challenges) is unconstitutional. If you can successfully sue a site, you can block it.

I support this. This is done in France, in very rare cases. Recently this was done for a case where a site uploaded faces and full identity information of police officers supposedly doing things "wrong" without real proof nor academic work, and in an almost insulting way, endangering their work and their families. There has been a full justice lawsuit that went through, and the censorship has been applied by all French ISPs while the precise jurisdiction has been published on institutional websites and placed in the public archives for transparency.

As long as their is an unbiased justice that can regulate this, and progressively state what action is bad from those who are not, and underlining each one's legal and unalienable rights, this can be necessary. There is also a need of transparency. The issue of censorship is that you must know what you cannot access for what reason, in the interest of people, of transparency, and to spot potential cases of illegitimate censorship, corruption or human rights issues.

Yet, fair use is to be taken into consideration, as copyright is a very relative notion and permissions cannot always be given for everything to millions of people. This underlines the issue of blurry rules that may lack precision.

SOPA is irresponsible and dangerous because any site can be guilty by default, which is unconstitutional in almost all the western states I believe. It is mainly a company driven project for their own interest. It wants to impose a very opaque censorship system that may not rely on the state's normal justice system. This can lead to very serious issues concerning fair use, users rights and even restraint liberty expression without being admitted officially (a transparent system could help avoid such an issue).

Anyway, censorship can be avoided. Such a complicated process is currently easily workarounded using the Streisand effect. If this does not help maintaining a site's activity, it can always keep a version of the censored site in the archives of some servers.

[Human No More]

ah of course, the SOPA :\

well if we aren't advocating or linking to torrent sites or whatever we're fine....right? O_O

Sadly, no. This law is designed to ban sites like youtube, google, facebook, or any that link to them.

[Irtaviš Ačankif]

Google?

A service provider shall not be liable ... for infringement of copyright by reason of the provider's transmitting, routing, or providing connections for, material through a system ... operated by or for the service provider, or by reason of the intermediate and transient storage of that material in the course of such transmitting, routing, or providing connections, if --

1. the transmission of the material was initiated by or at the direction of a person other than the service provider;
2. the transmission ... is carried out through an automatic technical process without selection of the material by the service provider;
3. the service provider does not select the recipients of the material except as an automatic response to the request of another person;
4. no copy of the material made ... is maintained ... in a manner ordinarily accessible to anyone other than anticipated recipients [or] for a longer period than is reasonably necessary for the transmission...
5. the material is transmitted ... without modification of its content.

[Payoang]

Google?

A service provider shall not be liable ... for infringement of copyright by reason of the provider's transmitting, routing, or providing connections for, material through a system ... operated by or for the service provider, or by reason of the intermediate and transient storage of that material in the course of such transmitting, routing, or providing connections, if --

1. the transmission of the material was initiated by or at the direction of a person other than the service provider;
2. the transmission ... is carried out through an automatic technical process without selection of the material by the service provider;
3. the service provider does not select the recipients of the material except as an automatic response to the request of another person;
4. no copy of the material made ... is maintained ... in a manner ordinarily accessible to anyone other than anticipated recipients [or] for a longer period than is reasonably necessary for the transmission...
5. the material is transmitted ... without modification of its content.

That's the law right now which google has to abide by. All of this would change... Although I dont think that google will be the prime target for the law.

[`Eylan Ayfalulukanä]

SOPA is a slegehammer response to a problem better fixed with a screwdriver. The basic premise of stopping piracy ESPECIALLY FROM OVERSEAS SERVERS (thus the blocking of DNS, which is about the only effective thing that can be done short of cutting the cable) is not bad. It is just extremely poorly implemented. There are other provisions in SOPA that are very problematic, such as doing away with the 'safe harbor' of the DMCA, and do represent a gross abuse of power.

All that said, I don't think LearnNavi.org is in any real danger. It is video and audio sites that the MPAA seems to be after. The MPAA is has always been extremely heavy-handed. Their goal is to make you pay for each and every viewing of a piece of media. They once proposed requiring all A/D converter chips to have 'copyrighted meaterial detection' circuitry.  Although this could technically be done, it would require all protected video, audio and print material to have a 'watermark' recognizable by the A/D chip. Any time you add something like this to any piece of media, it degrades the quality of that media.

SOPA must be stopped. along with much other burdensome regulation!

[Irtaviš Ačankif]

Yeah. The reason why everybody says "fan sites are in danger" is because in many fan sites, torrent links and blatant copyright violations (like every single frame extracted into a 50 GB file) are rampant.LN is above that mess.

That said, I still think that lawsuits are MUCH MUCH MUCH better than blocking, since blocking would assume presumption of guilt. If a site was blocked and it was innocent, sure it can sue the MPAA and get itself unblocked, but that is putting the burden of proof on the site, not on the MPAA, which is illegal in the US jurisdiction.

[Payoang]

LN is above that mess.

Woo!

[Ikran Ahiyìk]

Yeah. The reason why everybody says "fan sites are in danger" is because in many fan sites, torrent links and blatant copyright violations (like every single frame extracted into a 50 GB file) are rampant.LN is above that mess.

That said, I still think that lawsuits are MUCH MUCH MUCH better than blocking, since blocking would assume presumption of guilt. If a site was blocked and it was innocent, sure it can sue the MPAA and get itself unblocked, but that is putting the burden of proof on the site, not on the MPAA, which is illegal in the US jurisdiction.

Ban Ikran ate them all.































.. so there should be no problem.