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Comment RSSNew Bill Threat to Online Marketers
Written by Michael MarcheseDecember 15, 2011 # 4:01 pm # Industry News, Legal Challenges # 7 Comments
Congress is at it, again. The House Judiciary Committee is currently meeting to decide what the next steps are for SOPA. As an affiliate marketer, if you are not familiar with this pending legislation, you should do so ASAP. The intention of the bill is meant to help enforce intellectual property protections on the Internet.
As it is written right now, there is a significant risk that affiliate marketers can be blind-sided and shutdown for carrying content on their websites that may be violating someone’s copyright. Theoretically, all it would take would be for an affiliate to unknowingly get copyright-infringing creative from an advertiser, as part of a campaign.
If you think this is far-fetched, here’s a quote from Wikipedia, citing some of the ways an affiliate could get hit, if they were perceived as violating a copyright: “Depending on who requests the court orders, the actions could include barring online advertising networks and payment facilitators such as PayPal from doing business with the infringing website, barring search engines from linking to such sites, and requiring Internet service providers to block access to such sites.”
That’s right. Affiliates could instantly lose their search engine rankings, not get paid, and have their website blocked by their hosting provider.
Many Internet companies are adamantly speaking out against this atrocity-in-the-making. An open letter was sent to congress strongly protesting this legislation. The diversity of Internet companies that were signatories to the letter shows just how serious a threat this legislation is to the Internet and online marketers.
What is interesting is that many original content producers and companies associated with professionally-cited work were signatories, as well. Companies included The Huffington Post, Wikipedia, and Yahoo. Wikipedia is going so far as to threaten to “blank out” every page on their website.
If companies that create content are against the legislation, who benefits? That is the real question.
Details of the bill can be found here: http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h112-3261
Written by Michael Marchese
Michael Marchese is the founder and CEO of Tempesta Media, an original content creation, monetization, and syndication provider. Michael has over 15 years of industry experience. He has served in senior management or board member capacities for companies including Leapfrog Online, WebSideStory, JWT Specialized Communications, and OCC.
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New Bill Threat to Online MarketersStop Online Privacy Act: Congress is at it, again. The House Judiciary Commit… http://t.co/Ypbdsl3Z
With this current administration laws, rules and regulation are being handed down at an alarming rate. It is as if a Tsunami of overwhelming regulations are being proffered to squelch the free market and turn it into a government regulated prison.
I went online a short time ago looking for this new law proposal that would make it illegal to allow farmers kids under 15 years old to work on a farm or operate farm equipment. I never found the “public comment section” for that proposal but, I was mortified at all the other legal proposals I was digging through.
Recently, the FEC (Federal Elections Commission) was tasked with a challenge by an immigrant who wanted to run for president. He was not a natural born US Citizen as required by the constitution. The FEC determined he could run for prez but he couldn’t raise over $5000. Since the FEC said they cannot determine eligibility, they determined they had no control over who runs for office. I think this was a political dodge because Obama is not a natural born US Citizen and they didn’t want the media spotlight for doing the right thing for once.
I beg to differ. If you are not qualified to run, you should not be able to raise a penny to run for president. The problem with this entire issue is that I was one of only 9 people who responded to their public comment period who faxed in offering an opinion. The problem here is, no one knows who, what, when, or where public comment sections are available for people to respond with their opinion.
I think we cannot allow complacency here. We need to educate our elected officials where we stand and with pitchforks if necessary and not some K Street Lobby with deep pockets.
Ed, you do realize these laws come from congress, not the administration. While I agree with what you are saying, but lets get the facts right.
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