The Hypocrisy: New Piracy Act In Entertainment and Hip-Hop

The Hypocrisy: New Piracy Act  in Entertainment and Hip-Hop

Within recent days, the fate of the liberal spirit in the arts and entertainment worlds have been surrounded by lingering doubts and hanging in the balance in lieu of  two newly created Congressional Bills- The Protect IP Act (PIPA), which is before the United States Senate and The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), currently being addressed by the United States House of Representatives. This is the story of how 2 passings of newly reformed bills can potentially put constraints on the the aspiring viral entertainment entrepreneur before they even get their time to shine. 

According to statements made by Google, Inc. (2012), "The U.S. government could order the blocking of sites using methods similar to those employed by China- sanction the whole nation from online media and online liberal arts to which may sway the mindset of citizens within the country, which currently is governed by strict dictatorship. Along with this, search engines could be forced to delete entire websites from their search results. In response to this, companies such as AOL, EBay, Facebook, Google, IAC, LinkedIn, Mozilla, Twitter, Yahoo and Zynga wrote a letter to Congress , entiteld the "Protect Innovation Letter" stating these bills 'pose a serious risk to our industry’s continued track record of innovation and job-creation, would stifle investment in Internet services, throttle innovation, and hurt American competitiveness if passed'".

Google representatives have also stated that there are  41 human rights organizations and 110 prominent law professors  whom expressed their deepest concerns in a letter directed to the United States House of Representatives (Google, 2012). Google explains further that Anti- PIPA/SOPA supporters feel that fighting piracy is important, and pirate websites should be eliminated through structured, closely targeted legislation that rids those sites stream of funding, and feel that there is  no need to make American social networks, blogs and search engines censored on the Internet, nor undermine the existing laws that have enabled the Web to thrive (Google, 2012).   


The first of many piracy blows, struck within the Hip-Hop community first. 

PIPA, SOPA, and Hip-Hop 

On November 23 of 2010, It was reported by numerous sources that the U.S. government seized over 80 website domains and websites that they suspected were engaged in piracy, the sale of couterfeit goods, and the promotion of illegally copyrighted material.  

According an article written by famed Hip-Hop writer and blogger B-Easy of Nappy Afro Dot Com, " Hip-Hop sites OnSmash, RapGodfathers, and Dajaz1 were among them. The sites are now replaced with this image. Of course, since these seizures, the issue of music piracy and the DMCA has been a big topic in the online Hip-Hop community (Easy, 2010). " 

Here is Lupe Fiasco's take on his music being Pirated: 

"People are trapped in the culture where music needs to be free and you don’t need to pay for it....But, at a bare minimum it costs me, literally out of my own pocket, it costs me $3,000 to $4,000 to make a song. It costs me about $700 to $800 to make a freestyle. I’m giving you that. Just imagine if I work with The Neptunes, including studio time and everything that goes into it — flying people around — it gets up into the hundreds of thousands of dollars to make a song like ‘I’m Beamin’ or ‘I Gotcha.’ So to kinda see it on the Internet and, for some instances, for sale, who are you to have the right to tell me that I shouldn’t demand payment or feel a certain way for seeing people put my music out there like that. If I chose to do that, that’s one thing. But I didn’t choose to do that. That music was stolen.”

In early 2011, key songs Lupe Fiasco created for his upcoming album  were illegially stolen and sold without his consent online, as he explains on MTV's TRL. 

This incident happend two years ago, in which in turned, catapulted the efforts of PIPA/SOPA being pushed into effect today,and yet and still, the hip-hop community is being earmarked as the first choice for these organizations to make an example out of. 


MegaUpload.Com and Swizz Beatz

Sources tell Chris RichBurg, contributing Writer for All Hip Hop Dot Com News, that recently, Super-Producer Swizz Beats has  been unaffiliated with Mega Upload as its CEO (Richburg, 2012).  The controversial file sharing website  was seized on January 19, 2012 by Federal prosecutors in McLean, Virginia , claiming that the company has cost copyright holders over $500 million in lost revenue, from pirated films and music being shared on the website.  


Richburg also reports that MegaUpload.com is aslo reported as to have been founded by convicted cyber criminal/entrepreneur Kim Schimtz aka Kim Dotcom and employed over 150 people, mostly IT professionals and software engineers. It has recently been seized due to a numerous list of federal felony crimes which includes massive copyright infringement and racketeering charges, which brought in MegaUpload an alleged $175 Million  in profit (Richburg, 2012). According to All Hip Hop Dot Com and Richburg (2012), Four of the seven defendants named in the case were arrested in New Zealand, and in addition to hundreds of millions of dollars in cash, police have seized Kim Dotcom’s expensive Maserati’s, Mercedes-Benz’s and other luxury vehicles (Richburg, 2012). 


 Richburg (2012), states that, "Federal prosecutors denied that there was a link between Megaupload.com’s shut down and the timing of the SOPA/PIPA legislation that would have given the government tighter control and regulation of piracy on the Internet, but the Justice Department said that this action is among the largest criminal copyright cases ever brought by the United States " 


Apparently, Richbug also reports that Ira Rothken, attorney for MegaUpload.com explained to RollingStone.com that "Kaseem Dean [Swizz Beatz] was never involved in any meaningful way with the website, but was in talks to helm it. We have had negotiations with Mr. Dean to become the CEO, however, nothing was ever official." 

All Hip Hop News finally explains that various major federal and industry websites have been "hacked" and shut down by Internet Hackers, some of which include the Department of Justice, the MPAA, Universal Music, and the RIAA and The FBI’s website, www.fbi.gov, is reportedly the next site on the list for Anonymous, a “hacktivist” group in Sweden that claimed responsibility for shutting down the Department of Justice website (All Hip Hop, 2012). 

 Swizz Beatz, born Kasseem Dean,  has not provided any response comments at this time. 

At The END of the day.....

Such silent protest on an international level, can quite possibly pose tensions between allied United Nations countries, due to the "hactivist" stance, and is becoming quickly more than just a national issue.  By the passing of these new bills, the creative freedom and essence of the most commercialized and globalized artform in the world  can be so constricted online, that it can directly affect the 2nd and 3rd Amendment rights of in country for the passionate individuals within this Culture, this industry, and this ever evolving artform.  

The Senate will begin voting on January 24th, 2012 on this matter.... you can speak up, or be silenced forever. 

Works Cited

Access. (2011, November 15). Letter From The International Human Rights Community . Retrieved January 21, 2012 , from CDT: http://cdt.org/files/pdfs/SOPA-letter-from-Intl-human-rights-community.pdf

Easy, B. (2010, December 7). Lupe Fiasco's Thought on Online Piracy. Retrieved January 21, 2012, from Nappy Afro: http://www.nappyafro.com/2010/12/07/lupe-fiascos-thoughts-about-online-piracy/

Google. (2012, January 19). End Piracy, Not Liberty. Retrieved January 21, 2012, from Google: https://www.google.com/landing/takeaction/

Legal Professionals Against PIPA. (2011, November 15). Professors’ Letter in Opposition to “Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property Act of 2011”.

Retrieved january 21, 2012, from CDT :

http://cdt.org/files/pdfs/SOPA_House_letter_with_PROTECT_IP_letter_FINAL.pdf

McSherry, C. (2010, November 29). U.S. Government Seizes 82 Websites: A Glimpse at the Draconian Future of Copyright Enforcement? Retrieved January 21, 2012, from Eledtronic Frontier Foundation: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2010/11/us-government-seizes-82-websites-draconian-future

Richburg, C. (2012 , January 21). Megaupload.com Update: Lawyer Says Swizz Beatz Is Not Company CEO. Retrieved January 21, 2012, from All Hip Hop Dot Com: http://allhiphop.com/2012/01/21/megaupload-com-update-lawyer-says-swizz-beatz-is-not-company-ceo/