It isn’t often that you see the MPAA on the defensive.  Their recent release about the SOPA/PIPA blackout, Chris Dodd said:

“It is an irresponsible response and a disservice to people who rely on them for information and use their services. It is also an abuse of power given the freedoms these companies enjoy in the marketplace today. It’s a dangerous and troubling development when the platforms that serve as gateways to information intentionally skew the facts to incite their users in order to further their corporate interests.”

(As a friend said:  if this blackout isn’t an Atlas Shrugged moment, I don’t know what is).

I think the MPAA is missing the point.  This blackout isn’t about promoting content piracy; it’s about a broken bill.  The sentiment of SOPA/PIPA is not the problem; it’s the mechanism that’s flawed.

It’s technical regulation written by non-technical people, that shifts power to one group (content owners) while causing significant collateral damage to other groups (e.g.  user-contributed content sites, search engines, DNS operators, etc.)  It also has some serious First Amendment and due process issues.  Worse, it’s unlikely to even address the piracy problem that much.

Jason Harvey wrote an excellent analysis of the technical issues with the proposed bill.  It’s a must-read.

Oh, and don’t forget to contact your congressman.