Displaying items by tag: BSA

Saturday marked the day that Megaupload was reborn in the form of Mega. It was an event that has had much talk since Kim Dotcom first announced that he would be doing this last year. It is also an event that many internet users have been looking forward to for a very long time. On the other side of the coin the content industry (including the MPAA, RIAA, BSA and others) have not been looking forward to this and have tried to make the tired old argument that ALL file sharing services are nothing more than a haven for piracy.

Although the war for a free and open internet has fallen out of the front page news there are still rumblings about it going on in the background as the MPAA, RIAA BSA and other organizations gear up for another round of attacks on the internet as we know it. We expect to see Chris Dodd come back to “the hill” and catch up with his old buddies that are still in active service with the US government. His goal this time will be to get bills like SOPA and PIPA reborn and pushed through in back room deals instead of trying to get things done openly and honestly. What we find interesting is that the MPAA, RIAA and BSA have been using the same old arguments and logic for almost 10 years to no avail, what arguments are they going to us this time, or will they simply make promises to get what they want…

Well, well, well, it seems the plot thickens as things unravel in the case against Megaupload. This morning we noticed a post on Megaupload founder, Kim Dotcom’s Twitter feed asking if there was any truth to the claim that US District Attorney Neil MacBride was still employed by a lobbying agency within one year of his appointment. We took a look and found something rather interesting which could indicate a little bit of bias in the way MacBride is dealing with the case and also may lend a little validation to Dotcom’s claims that the whole case was cooked up by the copyright Lobby.

With SOPA still a hot topic we are hearing about more fallout as lines are being drawn even between one time partners. We have heard that several members of the Business Software Alliance have asked the organization to pull all support from the dangerous and potentially damaging bill. The BSA has complied (for the most part) but has still left enough of an opening that not everyone is satisfied with the way things stand.

There are times when you have to wonder what people are thinking. With the SOPA act we wondered that ourselves; especially after a rash of articles came out linking the BSA (Business Software Alliance) to SOPA and by proxy to any member of that group. Now we have never been one to make leaps like that unless we have additional confirmation, but it was enough for use to try and find out what was going on.