[Script Info]
Title: 
[Events]
Format: Layer, Start, End, Style, Name, MarginL, MarginR, MarginV, Effect, Text
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,[Aaron Swartz] So, for me, it all started with a phone call.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,It was September, not last year, but the year before that, September 2010,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and I got a phone call from my friend Peter.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,"Aaron," he said, "there is an amazing bill that you have to take a look at."
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,"What is it?" I said.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,"It's called COICA, the Combatting Online Infringement and Counterfeiting Act."
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,"Peter," I said, "I don't care about copyright law.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,"Maybe you're right, maybe Hollywood is right, but either way, what's the big deal?
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,"I'm not going to waste my life fighting over a little issue like copyright.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,"Health care, financial reform, those are the issues that I work on.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,"Not something obscure, like copyright law."
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,I could hear Peter grumbling in the background:
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,"Look, I don't have time to argue with you," he said.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,"But it doesn't matter for right now, because this isn't a bill about copyright."
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,"It's not?"\N"No," he said "It's a bill about the freedom to connect."
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Now I was listening.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Peter explained what you've probably long since learned,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,that this bill would let the government devise a list of websites
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,that Americans weren't allowed to visit.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,On the next day, I came up with lots of ways to try to explain this to people.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,I said it was the great firewall of America, I said it was an internet black list,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,I said it was online censorship.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,But I think it's worth taking a step back, putting aside all the rhetoric,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and just thinking for a moment about how radical this bill really was.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Sure, there are lots of times when the government makes rules about speech.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,If you slander a private figure; if you buy a television ad that lies to people;
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,if you have a wild party that plays booming music all night.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,In all these cases, the government can come and stop you.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,But this was something radically different.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,It wasn't that the government went to people and asked them to take down
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,a particular material that was illegal.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,It shut down whole websites.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Essentially, it stopped Americans from communicating entirely with certain groups.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,There's nothing really like it in US law.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,If you play loud music all night, the government doesn't slap you with an order
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,requiring you be mute for the next couple of weeks.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,They don't say nobody can make anymore noise inside their house.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,There's a specific complaint, which they ask you to specifically remedy,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and then your life goes on.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The closest example I could find was a case where the government was at war with an adult bookstore.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The place kept selling pornography, the government kept getting the porn declared illegal,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and then, frustrated, they decided to shut the whole bookstore down.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,But even that was eventually declared unconstitutional,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,a violation of the First Amendment.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,So, you might say, "Surely, COICA would get declared unconstitutional as well."
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,But I knew that the Supreme Court had a blind spot around the First Amendment.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,More than anything else, more than slander, or libel, more than pornography,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,more even than child pornography, their blind spot was copyright.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,When it came to copyright, it was like the power of the justices' brain shut off
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and they just totally forgot about the First Amendment.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,You got the sense that deep down, they didn't even think that the First Amendment applied,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,when copyright was an issue.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Which means that if you did want to censor the internet,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,if you wanted to come up with some way
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,that the government could shut down access to particular websites,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,this bill might be the only way to do it.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,If it was about pornography, it probably would get overturned by the courts,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,just like in the old bookstore case. (?)
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,But if you claimed it was about copyright, it might just sneak through.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,And that was especially terrifying, because as you know,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,copyright is everywhere.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,If you want to shut down Wikileaks, it's a bit of a stretch to claim that you're doing it
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,because they have too much pornography,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,but it's not hard at all to claim that Wikileaks is violating copyright.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Because everything is copyright.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,This speech, you know, the thing I'm giving right now, these words are copyrighted.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,And it's so easy to accidentally copy something.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,So easy, in fact, that the leading Republican supporter of COICA, Orrin Hatch,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,had illegally copied a bunch of code into his own Senate website.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,So, if even Orrin Hatch's Senate website was found to be violating copyright law,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,what's the chance that they wouldn't find something they could pin on any of us?
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,There's a battle going on right now, a battle to define everything that happens on the internet
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,in terms of traditional things that the law understands.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Is sharing a video on BitTorrent like shoplifting from a movie store
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,or is it like loaning a videotape to a friend?
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Is reloading a web page over and over again like a peaceful virtual sit-in
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,or a violent smashing of shop windows?
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Is the freedom to connect like freedom of speech
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,or like the freedom to murder?
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,This bill would be potentially a huge, permanent loss.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,If we lost the ability to communicate with each other over the internet,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,it would be a change to the Bill of Rights and Freedoms guaranteed in our Constitution.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,And freedoms our country had been built on would be suddenly deleted.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,New technology, instead of bringing us greater freedom,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,would have snuffed out fundamental rights we'd always taken for granted.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,And I realized that, talking to Peter, that I couldn't let that happen.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,But it was going to happen.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The Bill COICA was introduced on September 20th, 2010, on Monday.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,And in the press release heralding the introduction of this bill, way at the bottom,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,it was scheduled for vote on September 23rd, just three days later.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,And well, of course, there had to be a vote:
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,you can't pass a bill without a vote.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The results of that vote were already a foregone conclusion,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,because if you looked at the introduction of the law,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,it wasn't just introduced by one rogue, eccentric member of Congress,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,it was introduced by the Chair of the Judiciary Committee
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and co-sponsored by nearly all the other members, Republicans and Democrats.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,So yes, there'd be a vote, but it wouldn't be much of a surprise.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Because nearly everyone who was voting had signed their name to the bill, before it was even introduced.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Now, I can't stress how unusual this is.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,This is emphatically not how Congress works.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,I'm not talking about how Congress should work, the way you see on "Schoolhouse Rock!"
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,I mean this is not the way that Congress actually works.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,I mean, I think we all know Congress is a dead zone of deadlocks and dysfunctions.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,There are months of debates and horse-trading and hearings and stall tactics.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,I mean, you know, first you are supposed to announce that you are going to hold hearings on a problem,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and then, days of experts talking about the issue,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and then you propose a possible solution, you bring the experts back, get their thought on that,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and then other members have got different solutions and they propose those,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and you spend a bunch (?) of time debating, there's a bunch of trading,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,you get members over to your cause and finally you spend hours talking one on one
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,with the different people in the debate, trying to come back with some sort of compromise,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,which you hash out in endless back room meetings.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,And then, when that's all done, you take that, you go through it line by line in public,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,to see if anyone has any objections or wants to make any changes.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,And then you have the vote.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,It's a painful, arduous process: you don't just introduce a bill on Monday
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and then pass it unanimously a couple of days later.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,That just doesn't happen in Congress.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,But this time, it was going to happen.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,And it wasn't because there were no disagreements on the issue.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,There are always disagreements.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Some Senators thought that the Bill was much too weak and needed to be stronger.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,As it was introduced, the Bill only allowed the Government to shut down web sites.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,These Senators, they wanted any company in the world to have the power to get a web site shut down.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Other Senators thought it was a drop too strong.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,But somehow, in a kind of thing you'd never seen in Washington,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,they'd all managed to put their personal differences aside, to come together
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and support one bill they were persuaded they could all live with -
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,a bill that would censor the internet.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,And when I saw this, I realized: "Whoever is behind this is good!"
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Now the typical way you make good things happen in Washington
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,is you find a bunch of wealty companieswho agree with you.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Social Security didn't get passed because some brave politicians decided their good conscience
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,couldn't possibly let old people die starving in the streets.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,....... Social Security got passed because John D. Rockefeller got sick of having money out of his profits
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,to pay for his workers' pension funds.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Why do that, when you can just let the government take money from the workers?
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Now, my point is not that Social Security is a bad thing.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,I think it's fantastic.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,It's just that the way you get the government to do fantastic things
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,is you find a big company willing to back them.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,The problem is, of course, that big companies aren't really huge fans of civil liberties.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,You know, it's not that they're against them, it's just that there's not much money in it.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Now, if you've been reading the press, you probably didn't hear this part of the story,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,as Hollywood has been telling it:
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,the great good copyright bill they were pushing was stopped by the evil internet companies,
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,who make millions of dollars off of copyright infringement.
Dialogue: 0,9:59:59.99,9:59:59.99,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,But it is - it really wasn't true. (8:52)