Fight SOPA/PIPA, change your license

All over the free world, government laws and court decisions are limiting our access to free Internet. Not that these measures are very useful, most of us hackers are able to circumvent them within minutes. But in essence, these counter measures are simply work-arounds - they do not eliminate the root cause.

The root cause are the big media moguls who successfully lobby our governments and judges to adopt unconstitutional new laws and regulations. Consequently, they are by definition an anti-democratic force. No, it's not about the artists (as a matter of fact, most of them can be considered victims of this industry), it's not about IP (they violate IP laws themselves on a daily basis - just count the lawsuits), it's just about MONEY. Think about it: these industries are obviously willing to trade in our most fundamental civil rights just for a little extra cash. No, they're not the kind of people only a mother can love - they already sold their mothers.

Our politicians are no better. Instead of defying the pressure of a dying industry they have chosen to simply sell out their voters. Often without even having any idea which consequences their decisions may have on their citizens, their own information industry or even the very reputation of the nations they should represent. Ignorance may be a bliss, but not in this case.

So far the community has responded in a variety of ways:

• Shutting down their own websites in protest;
• Petitioning;
• Attacking government and industry websites;
• Educating users on how to circumvent blocks;
• Developing new ways to make it even more difficult to block free Internet access.

However, there is one card we haven't played yet. The FOSS community has achieved complete independence from proprietary software. I predict the music and movie industry will follow in the next few decades. They won't disappear, but they will have to compete and one day we will win.

In the meantime we will have to ensure that we will continue to have free and unlimited access to the Internet, our information highway. It is no secret that governments and even the music and entertainment industry itself have benefited from everything the FOSS community has produced. And we can stop that.

GPLv3 was created to defeat any attempts to make free software less free. A new license may prevent governments and the industry to make the Internet less free. Simply don't allow them to use our software anymore. Change the license.

I know that it is one of the pillars of Free Software - anyone may use it, no restrictions. But as I said, I don't consider it a permanent measure. Just until every attempt to restrict the Internet has ceased permanently. Just until the right to free access to the Internet is part of every international treaty and constitution.

I don't know about you, but I just don't feel comfortable someone who denies me to exercise one of my most basic rights is happily using my software..