Poll: Do you think HN should go dark in protest of SOPA?

That is, until someone shares Erlang: the Movie [1], then it is game over.

[1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uKfKtXYLG78

I don't see how. The meat of SOPA is sections 102 and 103. Section 102 only applies to foreign sites so is not applicable.

Section 103 applies to any site, foreign or domestic, that is a site "dedicated to the theft of US property". What it means to be "dedicated to the theft of US property" is defined in 103(a)(1), and can be found here at loc.gov: http://tinyurl.com/3lvuqc4

(I used tinyurl.com because the real URL ends in a colon, and HN seems to have trouble with that).

It certainly doesn't appear on first reading that HN would fall under this. The worst it appears this would do to HN is cause some hassle if content owners filed false notifications that HN had to waste time replying to. However, 103(b)(6) makes knowingly misrepresenting that a site is "dedicated to the theft of US property" in such a notice subject the filer to liability for damages and attorney's fees.

I haven't been through the whole bill, so maybe there is some other section that would put HN at risk?

edit: changed link to higher up in the bill. The link to the specific section was only good for 30 minutes.

I voted yes, but both options have similar outcomes. The front page will be full of stories about sites that have gone dark. The impact on HN will be the same, but attention will be driven to other blackouts.

The grammar is exceedingly thick and difficult to parse, but if you look closely, you'll see:

"the U.S.-directed site...enables or facilitates (a violation of USC Title 17, section 501 and section 1201/ title 17; loosely, the copyright infringement code and copyright protection circumvention code)"

Basically, what this means is that if the core functionality of your site even enables copyright infringment (by, say, submitting links to infringing content, or posting copyrighted content in comment threads like this one), the site is an infringing site. The language doesn't require that you be dedicated to copyright infringement. All it requires is that your core functionality enable it. HN, by any stretch of the imagination, falls under that category. While you and I look at that and say "Oh, that's obviously not meant to target HN", the law doesn't work that way. The language says "if you have a comment box, you're at risk of being labeled an "Internet site is dedicated to theft of U.S. property".

Additionally, you may be labeled "infringing" if you take "deliberate actions to avoid confirming a high probability" of copyright infringement; that is, if you make the deliberate decision that it's not cost-effective to screen every comment posted to your site, then you may be painted as "dedicated to theft".

Because I can post "46 DC EA D3 17 FE 45 D8 09 23 EB 97 E4 95 64 10 D4 CD B2 C2" on Hacker News, it can be argued that its core functionality enables violations of US Code Section 1202, Title 17, and therefore, under SOPA, Hacker News would legally be guilty of being a "Internet site is dedicated to theft of U.S. property".

The "qualifying plaintiff" portions basically give the copyright holders the right to pull the trigger on most any site on which their content shows up on, even if the site isn't "dedicated" to infringement, just so long as the site's core functionality makes it possible to infringe.

Yes, HN Should go dark to protest SOPA