From a professional standpoint, I can’t sign any petitions or write my state Congressmen to express my concern about the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the PROTECT IP Act, but I can voice it here. I am a proponent of a free and open Internet, with the obvious exception of child pornography.

The federal government has already overstepped its bounds with regard to television and radio censorship, and it would be ill-fated if the government further trampled over free speech with regard to the Internet.

The current legislation requires U.S. sites to police links that may or may not point to infringing content. This would put a ridiculous workload on large sites such as Wikipedia and YouTube. As they have already been doing, I say it is up to the individual companies (recording companies, media outlets, etc.) to alert Wikepedia or YouTube of potential infringements on copyrights. To ask Wikipedia and YouTube to rummage through the recesses of its user-uploaded content in search of offending material is non-sustainable and non-sensical.