Attacking Copyright

Since this course deals a lot with the correct use of copyright, I thought it would be appropriate that when I found the article "Anonymous DDoS Attacks Crash U.S. Copyright Office Website" by Audrey Watters on the ReadWriteWeb site, I thought I had better give it a read. 

I never thought that one would be widely opposed to copyright laws to the point where attacks would happen on the U.S. Copyright office!  However, apparently, I am wrong.  There is a group called "Anonymous" who do not see copyright as a legal means to protect intellectual property, but a means to control and limit the freedom on the Internet.

"Anonymous sees itself as the defenders of the Internet, using the denial-of-service techniques as a sort of 21st century form of non-violent civil disobedience. Not a formal political group or organization, Anonymous is rather a loose coalition of individuals who see the crackdowns against file-sharing, done in the name of copyright protection, as contrary to the very freedom of the Internet." (Watters, 2010)

Today, Anonymous released havoc on the U.S. Copyright website and several websites of defenders of copyright - including Gene Simmons website.  Yes, that is "the" Gene Simmons from Kiss!  (At first I thought odd, but I can see where Mr. Simmons would have a slight interest in protecting intellectual property and copyright.)  This group went so far as even redirecting web surfers to a piracy website. 

I love the enthusiam behind this group.  I love that people are willing to make a stand for what they believe in.  However, I do not see that the actions of Anonymous as gaining them any support.  If they are in deed wanting to be a political group that gains support for their cause, they will need to find some respectable means for getting across their message_not antics that gains them some 5 minutes of fame in the media.