The Wild Wild Net

Will SOPA circle the drain as privacy succumbs to piracy?

You’d expect a little less anarchy from something originally funded by the government and built by the military.

But anarchic is exactly what the Internet has become. It’s been that way for a long time, in fact; ever since it metaphorically broke free from the government lab and spread across the world.

Not that there haven’t been efforts to rein it back in. The most recent attempts to tame the wild, wild net were SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act — the House of Representatives’ proposed legislation to fight Web-based copyright infringement) and PIPA (Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property Act, or PROTECT IP Act — the Senate’s version of the same bill).

You probably remember the howls of dismay that reverberated across the digital landscape after these bills were introduced late last year. Protests culminated with the January 18 blackout of Wikipedia, Reddit and an estimated 7,000 other websites.

Critics argue that the bills’ definitions of “piracy” are so broad they would effectively spell an end to news aggregation sites and just about all user-content hosting services (which means no more YouTube and a serious hobbling of Facebook).

The backlash forced SOPA and PIPA to be tabled in committee — not abandoned, exactly, but at least set aside, probably until after the election.

All of which leaves mixed emotions. On one hand, the wild and woolly nature of the World Wide Web has been an awesome adventure in unfettered free enterprise.

On the other hand, online criminality is rampant. Intellectual property is filched like dime store candy. Predators are everywhere. Naive and vulnerable netizens, the very young and very old, get victimized in unspeakable ways.

If SOPA and PIPA aren’t the answer, then what is? Are we addicted to anarchy, or do we grow weary of the lawlessness? 

One thing’s sure: our virtual world is built solely of electrons and consensus. How it’s governed, if it’s governed — that’ll be by consensus, too.

The C4:

1. SOPA and PIPA are controversial for their broad definitions of copyright infringement. These bills are currently dormant, but are by no means dead.
2. The Web we have today came about by what we — all its users — opted to create. We’ve collectively built history’s most powerful tool for communication and commerce.
3. We’ve also built a criminal’s paradise. Some of its victims are our most vulnerable citizens.
4. What’s to be done about that? It’s up to all of us to decide.

Physics, Cigars & Marketing

What happens when two brands attempt to occupy the same space? 

An elemental explosion, probably. We'll find out if the U.S. normalizes relations with Cuba. Will different groups of companies attempt to lay claim to the same brand identities?

Well-respected international cigar brands like Montecristo, Cohiba and Romeo y Julieta were established long before Castro came, then split them into separate entities after the fall of Batista.

Sixty years later, and all those sets of separated twins have grown their own way, on either side of the Caribbean Iron Curtain.

The forced separation could end at any time — at the stroke of a political pen.

Then somehow two organisms must vie for the right to sell you your Cohiba. Will this be the mother of all copyright battles, or will we witness some Berlin-style reunifications?

Aficionados of stogies and lovers of courtroom drama should stay tuned.

The C4:

1. Your unique position will help your brand occupy that space — alone.
2. If you're not assertively copyrighting and protecting your intellectual property, someone else will.
3. Politics and marketing are sometimes intrinsically and inextricably interwoven.
4. A brand is a brand, but a cigar's a smoke.