Rupert Murdoch critical of White House stance on SOPA

January 15, 2012 By Adam Rosenberg

Rupert Murdoch posts a series of tweets responding to the recent stance taken by the White House toward potentially harmful cybersecurity legislation that is embodied by SOPA.

Prepare for a lot of SOPA talk in the coming days. The controversial Stop Online Piracy Act suffered a few setbacks in recent days, with House Majority Leader Eric Cantor promising that no vote will happen until all sides can agree on the bill’s main points. More importantly, a White House blog post came out against any potentially harmful legislation that “reduces freedom of expression, increases cybersecurity risk, or undermines the dynamic, innovative global Internet.” It wasn’t a direct SOPA indictment, but the message is clear enough.

Now, News Corp. chairman and CEO Rupert Murdoch has responded to the White House comments on Twitter with some harsh words. “So Obama has thrown in his lot with Silicon Valley paymasters who threaten all software creators with piracy, plain thievery,” he writes in one tweet. He then goes on to call Google a “piracy leader” for streaming free movies and putting ads around them, an apparent knock on YouTube.

Murdoch later stepped back in a subsequent tweet, calling Google a “great company” that is “doing many exciting things.” His concerns boil down to “only one complaint, and it’s important.”

Make of all of this what you will. Most will readily agree that SOPA, in its current form, has the potential to do more harm than good. Murdoch and his fellow SOPA supporters obviously see things differently. Where do you fall? Do you agree with Murdoch’s points?

Showing 14 comments

Steve Loki Thecoffeepirate Tara at 3:35am 18th January 2012 Murdoch is pure and simple an empire builder, part of an Axis of those seeking global contgrol, they wrestle each other for rank in that empire, no nobility in Murdoch's motives though Google may be what you say, he is worse and a hipocrit.this is no passive movement, but a concerted effort to create a dictatorship, information, is political, in isolation one can indeed see monsters evolving out of F.E.M.A etc, but now we're in a new arena, SOPA was designed above the rhetoric to silence the voices of change in cyber-space, make no mistake. and this,http://www.naturalnews.com/030418_Food_Safety_Modernization_Act_seeds.htmlcontrol of resources of the average citizen, and this won't stop with the US either, when the planet collapses from eco disasters in our lifetimes, they need to ration and control the very food we depend on and it won't stop there either, political control, military, you get the picture.
Steve Loki Thecoffeepirate Tara at 4:32am 16th January 2012 Rupurt, the Mad Hatter who despises democracy and people power by stifling it at every opportunity and one of the most dangerous men on the planet and would back a US police state come global dictatorship at the drop of a... hatJust now ·
Mark Infanger at 6:41pm 15th January 2012 SOPA is a wolf in Sheeps clothing. In the last 100 years NO Govt agency has ever been created, no matter how well meaning, that didnt grow into a multi tentacled Kraken that became a bloated drain on the govt. IRS. EPA. FEMA. FNMA, USPO, Dept. Of Interior, Dept of Education. Every single one becomes a self justifying autocracy that, every year at budget time, finds more ways to get funded. SOPA will become a bloated beached whale that will require far more attention and dollars than it deserves.
Damon Schmitt at 12:32am 16th January 2012 "Not letting me control something, is STEALING CONTROL FROM ME." Ahah.
Terry Bridges at 12:20am 16th January 2012 Rupert needs a very long time out.
James Sysense DeRosier at 11:52pm 15th January 2012 BIG ASSCLOWN!! That is all that has to be said.
Web Marketing Hero at 11:42pm 15th January 2012 So, in case you were confused about where you stand on SOPA, Lord Voldemort is for it, therefore you should be against it.
TechFreak at 11:17am 15th January 2012 I agree with Murdoch. Google is a wolf hiding in sheeps clothing. They favor their own products in their search results. YouTube videos show up first in results, sites with Google + show up over sites without it etc. They even steal content from others and profit from it. Case in point: They use Yelp data like user reviews on Google products and then make money from it. Google also profits from ads run on scraper sites that blatantly steal content from others.I can't blame Murdoch - his companies create content that is stolen from the likes of Google and others. Of course Google's viewpoint is that they simply create the platform (IE search and YouTube), but that only holds water when Google doesn't profit from that platform. And they do.
1. David Stemper at 1:46pm 15th January 2012 Seriously, Are you talking about the guy pictured above or something other Rupert Murdoch? The same guy that condones the hacking of 911 or murder victims phones? The one that sells advertising on his media companies under the same premise from stolen material evidence? Are you living under a rock?OH let me guess he must own this site too.
  1. TechFreak at 3:36pm 15th January 2012 So one wrong condones another? Yes, they should not have been snooping on people, and he is paying the consequences, but how is Rupert stealing content? I didn't think so.
    David Stemper at 8:12am 19th April 2012 Hacking and taking someone's information from their phones is stealing.
    TechFreak at 9:20am 2nd May 2012 In a different context David. Shame on you for trying to go there just to win an argument.
2. Shokur Fahd at 2:19pm 15th January 2012 I think you are missing the Big picture this is not just about pirating, its about Internet censorship.
  1. TechFreak at 3:37pm 15th January 2012 I am against internet censorship just like you, but Google is too far the other way. They literally are making money off of thieves. If there was an underground highway for illegal activities, Google is the platform and revenue source motivating it on the internet.