VDB is excited that Wikipedia and Google's online statements today have brought national attention to the Stop Online Piracy Act (the House bill) and the Protect IP Act (the Senate bill). In December we traveled to Washington DC with the National Alliance of Media Arts and Culture (NAMAC) to learn about laws that could effect us, our customers and our artists - and these two pending acts were at the forefront of discussion.
NAMAC has come out strongly against these bills - and by the end of our time in Washington, we were convinced as well! VDB supports strong protections for artists copyright and intellectual property. However, the wording of these bills goes after "infringing websites" with broad strokes, making websites liable for hosting copyrighted material of any kind, posted by any user. The big sites (Amazon, Yahoo, Google) are understandably worried about this redefinition - but the legal ramifications could also be huge for websites focusing on arts and indepedent media (such as our own).
Last month we spoke with reps from the offices of Mark Kirk (R) and Dick Durbin (D - and Protect IP co-signer) about our concerns as a small web-based and non-profit arts business. If you have the opportunity this week, please do the same!
The Future of Music Coalition has great information regarding how these acts would relate to individual artists:
Coming Clean on SOPA
Protect IP Fact Sheet