[liberationtech] 11/15 - Stopping SOPA: Copyright, Free Speech, and Popular Constitutionalism

[Yosem Companys]

When: Thursday, November 15, 2012
12:50pm - 2:00pm
Stanford Law School - Room 280B
559 Nathan Abbott Way, Stanford, CA 94305
Free and open to the public.

To RSVP, click here:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?formkey=dGs0SER2U2lUdmhnc1liY0Y1ZkZlc1E6MQ#gid=0

During late 2011 and January 2012, millions of people protested the
passage of the controversial copyright bill the Stop Online Piracy Act
(SOPA) in Congress. The protests culminated in the largest online
protest in the history of the Internet, with web giant Wikipedia and
thousands of other websites going black in a day of self-censorship.
In a few short months, the protesters achieved something remarkable:
they defeated money, politicians, Hollywood, and the copyright lobby,
all in the name of a “free and open Internet.” This talk with
Professor Edward Lee, explains these grassroots movements as a form of
popular constitutionalism. Courts didn't define speech rights. People
did. And, in the end, it was the people's view of free speech that
carried the day.