There is also one part of this that a lot of people are missing. It's not just sites hosting copywrited material that can be taken down. It is also sites with links to material that may infringe on a copywrite. For instance if you post links to friends artwork sites from your artwork site you may be targeted because you do not hold the copywrite to the sites/work that you provide links to. This is one place where real danger lies and one place that most posting to the front page or even this thread don't seem to realise. These bills affect everyone not just pirates.

I have a gardening site with blog. Every word is my own. There are less than half a dozen links that go offsite and those that do point to govt. agencies in Canada, the US and the UK. There is some video. If these laws pass in the US I will be forced to remove the links as I do not hold copywrite on the govt. pages I link to. Will I be blacklisted because of those links? I doubt it but I won't take chances either. My site gets me work and thus money. Does yours? This is one way that these pieces of legeslation will stifle the internet.

Currently there are sites and blogs worldwide that link to my video feed. They draw traffic to my site. How many of the US sites that link to my videos will stop linking because they don't own the video they link to? How will that affect my web traffic? There are those of you that do similar things. Are you ready to take the hit to your traffic?

There is a lot more to this than meets the eye.