The special interests behind the Stop Online Piracy Act and the Protect IP Act are in full retreat, throwing the bills’ most controversial provisions overboard in a desperate attempt to stop the entire bill from sinking. Realizing that proposals to create a DNS-based blacklisting scheme had become politically radioactive, the bills’ sponsors—Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX) and Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT), respectively—have pledged to drop these provisions. On Tuesday, even the Motion Picture Association of America declared that DNS filtering was “off the table” for this year’s legislation.
(Read the rest of the article here or by clicking on the title of this post. Ars Technica performs some of the most consistent, intelligent, and honest examinations of technology and science issues that I’ve seen. I had been looking for a solid summary of the real ramifications of these two bills and I feel like I’ve finally found it.)
