The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) has been under fierce attack from web businesses – and this includes cloud companies.
This week, more cloud and web companies join SOPA opposition; DreamHost and Domain.com have publicly made a statement to go up against SOPA, joining Google, Rackspace and the rest. Last week, supposedly a strong supporter of SOPA, GoDaddy has dropped support for SOPA after several big clients threatened to leave the company; its rival, NameCheap – also against SOPA – takes the opportunity to attract clients leaving GoDaddy due to its support to SOPA.
SOPA – good or bad?
SOPA seems to be a good bill to pass – it supposedly helps fighting online trafficking in copyrighted intellectual property and counterfeit goods. However, the impacts if SOPA became a law is devastating; Some aftermaths include the potential for big web companies like Flickr, Vimeo, Twitter, and Facebook to be shut down; e-commerce industry will also face the same consequences; non-profits, such as Wikipedia? Ditto; even uploading content to the cloud might get you into trouble with the law; open source software, like Mozilla, are also threatened…
Does SOPA also potentially disrupt cloud computing industry? Yes. Cloud storage, like Dropbox could be forced to shut down because it’s against the law to store customers’ content. Cloud hosting? Also the same – just ask Rackspace (the “cloud fanatics”.) In fact, the Internet is a huge cloud; so, as SOPA threatens the Internet; it is also threatens the cloud and everything that comes with it.
Ultimately, SOPA is one big, ugly threat to freedom of speech.
Takeaway
Indeed, SOPA is probably the biggest issue on the web entering 2012. It’s basically a US law, but the domino effect if the bill passes is pretty scary. Foreign websites will also have a difficult time facing the SOPA as a law – for instance, Google AdSense and other ad network might need to be shut down, disrupting non-US online business market.
No matter how good the intention of SOPA – it will somehow cause more harm than good. Some experts even consider it as similar to case of Internet censorship in China.
So, what do you think – what would happen if SOPA bill became a law? Would you support SOPA or against it? Please share your thoughts by leaving your comment…
