Wikipedia:SOPA initiative/Post-blackout activities and initiatives/UK petition

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The UK government can be petitioned online using their epetition system. We could put together a petition asking them to oppose SOPA, as others have done e.g. [1], and potentially link to it from the banner in the UK. Proposals and discussion of them is below.

Proposal 1 (submitted)[edit]

We, the undersigned, note with alarm the proposed U.S. laws SOPA and PIPA, which let U.S. courts order the shutting down of almost any UK website - decisions which must be appealed in a U.S. court at length and at significant cost.

Visa, Mastercard, and Paypal will, if ordered, be forced to cut off funding to UK businesses. Google, Bing and Yahoo will have to remove UK businesses and websites from their search results. .net, .com and .org domain names will be withdrawn with increasing regularity. Software used in repressive countries to avoid censorship or torture will be criminalised.

These laws generally need allegations only, no proof and no due process; and enforcers are eligible for legal immunity even if the allegations are later shown to be false. The standards applied to UK sites would not be UK law. The quality and free character of Britons' free speech on the Internet will be damaged. British innovation could well be strangled.

We ask the UK Government to speak out in the strongest terms about these issues which will harm free speech in Britain.

Discussion[edit]

  • Since one idea is to put the link on the SOPA blackout page, I'm going to drop the "We Wikimedians" elect if that's okay? - Jarry1250 [Deliberation needed] 17:43, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Chipping in a few edits - 1/ rmv scaremongering ("will be withdrawn with alarming regularity") and replace by facts (US managed), let others draw conclusions... 2/ censorship or torture, not just "pass information. This is Korea, China, Iran, parts of Africa, we're potentially discussing, 3/ redundant words like "moreover", 4/ irrelevant "debated in US", if they know that they know it, if not not, the point is it's a proposed law which we said, not that it's being "debated". And trim to fit in 1000 chars (991) FT2 (Talk | email) 17:52, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I think "We note with alarm the proposed [US/United States] laws SOPA and PIPA..." is a much stronger and eye-catching start. Any objections? FT2 (Talk | email) 17:54, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Agreed. - Jarry1250 [Deliberation needed] 18:24, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Should specific organisations be mentioned (as they are now), or would it be better to be more generic e.g. saying 'credit cards' and 'search engines'? Mike Peel (talk) 18:32, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    • Hmm, using exact names is probably harder hitting but not entirely sure tbh. - Jarry1250 [Deliberation needed] 18:36, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
      • "Organisations such as Paypal, etc ..." maybe - kind of going for an 'including but not limited to' vibe.217.43.171.1 (talk) 20:22, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Tweaked to reflect exact wording of EFF here. - Jarry1250 [Deliberation needed] 18:47, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
There had better be a section for readers to oppose this, as well as support it. Modest Genius talk 19:58, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
It's not really how petitions work. Users who feel strongly simply don't sign; although, in a few cases, particular causes have prompted counterpetitions which, again, anyone is at liberty to do here. - Jarry1250 [Deliberation needed] 20:01, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I'm aware of how petitions work, but I don't think it's reasonable to have every UK visitor asked to sign a petition that takes a particular standpoint, without giving the chance for those who disagree to voice their opinions too. Either leave petition-writing to someone else, or make sure you're correctly representing the views of all (or at least, a majority) of UK users views (which can only be ascertained by asking them). Modest Genius talk 20:23, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I can't see the logic of that. Those that support the petition sign it. Those that don't don't. We neither have the resources, the time, or the know-how to run opinion polls - and we have no (legitimate) way to determine who is a UK user in any case. AndyTheGrump (talk) 20:38, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Also, I should point out that I envisage the wording of the message to visit the petition as a suggestion rather than an "asking to": "Visitors who agree may wish to sign this petition", etc - Jarry1250 [Deliberation needed] 20:39, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Not sure there should be an opposing statement here. It would make the message that we are sending unclear. The reason for the blackout is that the Wikimedia community is staging a protest. To take another view of it; you wouldn't go to protest government at Westminster and say "We strongly believe this! But...here is the counterargument". It would make us look weak, and the UK government has to see that we are serious about the point we are making. DrMotley (talk) 20:47, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
If we were a campaigning group, yes you have a point. But we're not. We're an encyclopaedia. That seems to have been forgotten over the last few days. Personally I don't think we should be encouraging anyone to sign anything, but if you insist upon doing so then we should at least provide some opportunity for users to express their opposition. Modest Genius talk 21:24, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Their opportunity to express their opposition to the protest is to not participate, in doing so they would be signalling either apathy or disagreement to the cause. Yes we are an encyclopedia, but a free, user generated one. Wikipedia represents what the internet can be - a free society where users create and maintain the community. It is not designed to be taken control of for commercial reasons. Potentially if a copyright violation were to occur on Wikipedia then SOPA would theoretically allow the US government to shut the site. That behavior is against the main values of our site. DrMotley (talk) 21:39, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Which of the five pillars (our main values) would that be? We've been blocked in China for years, and that has neither stopped us nor resulted in a crusade against their laws. also, in the UK it's spelt 'behaviour' Modest Genius talk 21:59, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
The great firewall of china didn't threaten the existence of Wikimedia itself. This does. FT2 (Talk | email) 22:33, 19 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Hardly. Nothing that moving the servers (and the Foundation) couldn't have solved. Sure, that would have resulted in US users being unable to access it, but that's exactly the situation in China. Modest Genius talk 23:23, 19 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I see. Move Wikimedia or its servers somewhere else. Which payment processor would you like the annual fundraiser to use - Visa, Mastercard, Paypal? All US, all can be ordered under SOPA not to allow fundraising. Which search engine would you like users to look up Wikipedia articles in - Google, Bing or Yahoo? All US, all can be ordered under SOPA to remove search entries. Which browser would you like to enter your alternate DNS server on? Firefox, Chrome, Internet Explorer and Safari are all US based and can be ordered not to include anything which would "circumvent" the above. FT2 (Talk | email) 14:21, 20 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oh, so this proposed US legislation could affect the UK too? Puts a slightly different light on things over here, imo. A signed petition sounds good to me, MistyMorn (talk) 20:49, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • While we're talking about the US arrogating to itself ridiculously extensive rights concerning the internet, shouldn't we also mention Richard O'Dwyer?—S Marshall T/C 21:00, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I guess this could be a point to emphasise, as this behavior from the US will only get worse following SOPA/PIPA. Maybe we should be vocal about the potential? DrMotley (talk) 21:15, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
No. We need to stay on topic, and not get diverted into other issues. The petition needs to be specifically about the concerns of the general Wikipedia community, as discussed elsewhere. AndyTheGrump (talk) 21:24, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Okay, well I've submitted the petition as written. It may still not be approved for days, though, which is a bit of an issue. - Jarry1250 [Deliberation needed] 21:46, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Isn't 12 hours rather late notice to have given the community anyway? That hardly gives time for people to comment. Modest Genius talk 21:59, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Well, yes, I agree. But a link to a petition is about as harmless as I think things ever get around here. - Jarry1250 [Deliberation needed] 22:03, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'm in total support of the blackout, but I oppose this. Official epetitions, if successful, end with a debate in the House of Commons, and I don't think it would be a good use of parliamentary time to ask them to debate a bill recently presented on another continent. --FormerIP (talk) 22:15, 17 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
They aren't asked to debate another country's bill. They're asked to debate a response to another country's proposed course of action that affects their own sovreignty. A closer analogy is if (say) some country had bills proposed saying that Gibraltar or Falklands were legitimate targets for some kind of action, one might ask the government to make an official protest to them. FT2 (Talk | email) 22:33, 19 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'm in total support of the blackout AND of the proposed petition. SOPA/PIPA affect all of us, everywhere, and it is completely appropriate that they be debated in the House of Commons if it comes to it. Let it be noted that I am a dual national and hence have a vote in both the US and UK. Cbrody (talk)
  • Ditto in every way. Every part of the response above also applies to me.--Gilderien Talk|Contribs 19:27, 21 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
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