Dear Marvel: Stop Supporting SOPA

No es bueno.

Today, Thwipster linked to an online petition to ask Marvel to end its support of the Stop Online Piracy Act, a really really bad piece of legislation that if passed would cripple the internet and take away our rights.

WHAT IS SOPA?

Some of the worst legislation ever seen is currently before Congress. Three pieces of legislation, H.R. 3261 in the House of Representatives and S.968 and S.978 in the Senate, would cripple the internet by stripping your due process rights and making everyday users wary that the next thing you post might get you sued or thrown in jail.

And unfortunately, Marvel Entertainment is supporting it.

Thwipster made it clear where it stands on SOPA and piracy a few days ago, with this great blog post:

SOPA
We at Thwipster wholeheartedly oppose SOPA as it currently stands and as we understand it. We believe in due process and not a Patriot Act for media companies to take down parts of the internet. You can find out more about it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop_Online_Piracy_Act

Piracy
If you know anyone downloading illegal things off the internet, take a moment and tell them to stop being a dick. We don’t need the government and media companies to tell us not to steal…

Media Companies
You’ve got it hard, right? You make all this stuff that people are so ravenous over that they steal it, remix it and share it with everyone they (don’t)know. But hey, you gotta get paid! Guess what? Don’t be a dick. Cut out the DRM, cut out practices like making things unavailable for 30 days on Netflix or iTunes, and cut out going after people celebrating your products…

(more in link)

(Image by ToobyDoo via Flickr)

It doesn’t surprise me that Marvel supports anything that prevents digital piracy, but this legislation spells trouble for anyone who uses the internet in any way.

(And, really, does digital piracy really do that much damage? It’s not cool, but there’s a strong correlation between the most illegally downloaded work and the bestselling material. I’d argue that a huge number of those downloaders would never have been paying customers in the first place.)

Thanks to a wave a bad publicity, a lot of companies are pulling their support of SOPA, including GoDaddy, Nintendo, and EA (see the links below).

If you have a problem with Marvel’s stance, check out the petition at DearMarvel.com, and share how this will effect your support of Marvel’s product.

Personally, I love a lot of Marvel’s comics, and a lot of its creators’ work, but I have trouble with the idea of my money going to support taking away our freedoms. The best solution I can think of is to buy the Marvel books I want secondhand, so I can read the stuff I want without putting my money towards a bad cause.

I’m interested to see Marvel’s reaction (or lack thereof) – Marvel tends to be like Teflon with a lot of its controversial policies, but tends to make changes when it gets hit in the pocketbook.

What do you think?

Related articles

• Steve Niles speaks out against Stop Online Piracy Act (digitalspy.co.uk)
• ESA confirms SOPA commitment (gamesradar.com)
• A Huge List of Companies Supporting SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) (blogworld.com)
• EA, Nintendo, and Sony Electronics remove SOPA support (gamesradar.com)
• SOPA and the Comic Book Industry (axmujica.wordpress.com)
• SOPA Controversy Reveals the Generational Rifts Beneath Our Content Infrastructure (forbes.com)
• Corporate Supporters Back Away from SOPA (blogworld.com)
• Marvel and Disney on the Pro-SOPA Bandwagon (graphicpolicy.com)
• Why The Movie Industry Can’t Innovate and the Result is SOPA ” Steve Blank (lostincolonisation.com)
• Chrome Extension Warns You When You Browse A SOPA-Supporter’s Website (readwriteweb.com)
• Boycotting SOPA Supporters is All or Nothing (lockergnome.com)