In case you missed it: Chris Hayes’ roundtable on SOPA is a must-watch, as it directly tackles the major issues around the legislation and explains them in a very effective way, including honestly dealing with the issues his employer, NBC Universal, has with the legislation. (Richard Cotton, one of the major figures representing NBC Universal in the SOPA fight, is part of the debate.) This 18-minute clip is totally worth a watch.
In this video, Richard Cotton, an NBC executive and supporter of SOPA and PIPA, admits that if these bills passed, companies like Google, PayPal, and YouTube would become responsible for policing the Internet. Obviously, this would be an added expense for them. Should a search engine start-up company be forced to police anything?
Countless experts, including Harvard law professors, have reviewed the legislation and said that it threatens free speech and violates the Constitution by giving big business and government too much power over the Internet. Tech companies have said that these bills could break the Internet and pose serious security threats.
Cotton simply denies the accuracy of all those experts, and the viewers of MSNBC, I’m sure, are expected to swallow his claims and accept them as fact. He is, after all, the Executive Vice President of NBC Universal, one of the companies that the experts say is “trying to take control over the Internet.”
I’m having a hard time believing the claims that Cotton is making. He just keeps repeating the same rehearsed line over and over, and there’s nobody on the panel who is qualified to dispute him, like — oh I don’t know — a Harvard law professor. A lawyer from Google or Facebook would be appropriate in a discussion like this.
Kudos to MSNBC for being one of the only mainstream media outlets to report on these bills. But boo to NBC for setting up a panel that is neither fair nor balanced. Go sit by Fox News!
So, for me, instead of feeling better about SOPA or PIPA, I actually feel worse. This entire segment tells me the following:
- NBC Universal thinks I’m stupid and expects me to believe anything its executive VP says. Backfire. I’m only more convinced that these big corporations, especially the media, are trying to screw me.
- MSNBC sets up a debate on an issue and fails to include someone knowledgeable and qualified to interpret the legislation on the panel (you know, an EXPERT on law and/or technology), thus confirming my suspicions that rather than being a source of news and information, they are just another money-grubbing, crony-driven profit center whose sole interest it to protect and increase its own interests.
- Geeks are hot, executives are not.
(via shortformblog)
