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Comment by nirvana | Hacker News Reader

This HN title is inaccurate. There's no evidence that Microsoft or Apple actually supported SOPA. Merely an industry association of which they are members, supported it. This association removed its support.

A more appropriate title would be "Business Software Alliance withdraws support for SOPA."

I'm pretty sure most people on HN who know what SOPA is, know who the BSA is, and if not they'd learn it from reading the article.

I don't think its fair to imply that Microsoft or Apple (or any of the other BSA members) supported SOPA, as it seems likely the BSA was engaging in knee jerk support and didn't consult its membership.

I, personally, think the BSA should strongly opposes SOPA because it doesn't represent the interest of its member companies in the long run. But the title given here is just unfair.

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I understand what you are saying and will try to make future HN posts more accurate.

However, the BSA has been the only source of info as to what Apple, Microsoft, and most of the other association members have to say on SOPA. To my knowledge, none of the companies with BSA membership have made any independent statements[1] on the bill, and if so, certainly not on the scale Google did. * My hunch is that the BSA was created for a reason in addition to stopping copyright infringement: To represent these companies without their explicit support, just like any good lobbying company.

If we are considering evidence as to what these companies' positions are, the BSA is the only source we have, and the fact most of them stand to gain from software licenses.

[1] If anyone has seen a BSA member show opposition to SOPA in the past few weeks, I'd like to see.

*Edit

Another example: RIAA - it does exactly what its member companies want, but they get to distance themselves. Similarly, the MPAA.

The BSA represents its members. How could that not possibly suggest complicit support?

I'm an EFF member and strongly support the overall cause, but also strongly disagree with many of its initiatives and positions. I imagine the situation is similar with regards to the BSA and its members, as it is with any group.

If the EFF announced support for a bill that would negatively change the entire landscape of the internet as we know it, would you still be a member of the EFF? Would you continue paying dues and remain silent on the issue?

And once enough of its members kicked up a fuss, it would probably change its position on that matter.

Sound familiar?

BSA's members only kicked up a fuss once people like you and I started making noise.

Sure, but the point is that being a member of the BSA doesn't imply support of SOPA. Maybe it did yesterday, but it especially didn't a few weeks ago, before this whole thing received so much attention.

The simplest explanation is that the members who were indifferent before, have changed their position in light of the recent "noise". But you can't work backwards and say that those members were originally in support of the bill.

I disagree. I think the point is that being a member of the BSA does imply support of SOPA. Which is the very reason its members were forced to make the BSA change its position.

So, the system works.

It was a grassroots campaign of unaligned users of the internet. People from vastly different professions and backgrounds enacting change through varying means; twitter, direct mail, facebook, google+, blogs, articles, comments etc.

There is no system. That's what makes the internet awesome.

No, and no. But when did the BSA announce support for SOPA directly? I may have missed this, but I never saw anything of the sort.

From the article I assumed we were discussing...

'Holleyman's stance marks a reversal for BSA, which originally supported the bill. In a press statement last month, Holleyman said the bill was "a good step" to "address the problem of online piracy."'

off-topic: what are some of their initiatives and positions you strongly disagree with?

I'm not saying you're wrong, but why then was the "Business Software Alliance" supporting SOPA in the first place? I don't think "knee-jerk support" covers it. There's a political reason there, surely.

If MS/Apple/whoever didn't like it, why weren't they publicly saying so?

Maybe their previous strategy was fully backed by most of their members, maybe some members changed their opinion during the last days, maybe some members were always against their previous strategy, maybe the BSA acted somewhat autonomously until members started waking up, it’s hard to say.

One thing I might be willing to infer from the change in direction is that there was no consensus before and that there still isn’t one. I think it’s very plausible that some members were always against and some always for the BSA’s strategy. Members seemingly also decided to solve this problem internally by lobbying for their position privately inside the BSA.

It's possible that it's all a politics game. Either some weird political stuff with the people that actually run the BSA or some idea like "Let's not speak out against this because it will hurt competitors like Google" (so they implicitly support it by not speaking out against the BSA's support of it).

Guilt by association. I didn't hear Apple or Microsoft threatening to withdraw funding for the BSA in light of this bill.

And yet the BSA has revoked its support. Are you just mad because MS didn't 3-way you in when they called BSA to complain?

Personally I'm mad because Microsoft, Apple, and the rest haven't given an opinion one way or another. Without any official statements I can only assume that they were fully in support of the BSA's actions, but they are backpedaling in light of the public outcry.

the interesting thing about corporations having free speech rights is that one would expect that they might use them when standing up in cases like this. I would agree that Microsoft's silence here is probably tacit support.

> it seems likely the BSA was engaging in knee jerk support and didn't consult its membership.

So, you're saying these companies aren't responsible for their actions because they stand behind an organization that they pay into? Must be nice. I wish I could haphazardly align myself with interest groups and just hope everything works out for me, but if it doesn't, have deniability.

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