Remember when the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) rejected that Sin City: A Dame To Kill For poster because someone could make out a little too much of Eva Green‘s breast through her robe? Well, the censorship board trade panel has taken affront to a poster that shows too much all of Oscar-winning actor Christoph Waltz‘s rear end.
The poster teases the latest flick by director and sh!t-stirrer Terry Gilliam — Monty Python animator and auteur of such movie masterpieces as Brazil and 12 Monkeys (and the highly underrated The Adventures of Baron Munchausen) — and it’s called The Zero Theorem.
If you enlarge the above photo, you will notice that the tiny male figure is entirely naked. (See, ladies, it is not only the female body that offends America’s Puritanical Sensibilities.) Continue reading
In an extraordinary change of heart today, Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas) has changed his mind about the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) – and the forces allied against it – and pulled his bill from consideration by the House Judiciary Committee indefinitely. In addition, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nevada) has canceled the Jan. 24 Senate vote on its version of the legislation, known as the Protect IP Act (PIPA).
I applaud these reasoned actions, because now the conversation can shift to where it should be focused: on how to protect intellectual property intelligently. Nobody wants content to be pirated. As a creator of content myself, I most definitely want to be paid for my work. But there are better ways to do it than wiping out the Internet. After all, printing presses weren’t outlawed to stop libel. This is clearly a victory for those looking to preserve free speech and innovation on the Internet. However, the fight is far from over – for both sides. But without the threat of a flawed “fix” being rushed into law, all sides can work together to stop criminals. Continue reading
Today, Jan. 18, 2012, I am blacking out my personal blog, Read at Joe’s, in solidarity with thousands and thousands of other websites in order to protest PIPA/SOPA legislation in the United States of America. Y’know, that country that boasts a First Amendment to its Constitution that states:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
That wording is truly awe-inspiring, and makes the United States the world leader in innovation. Ironically, it’s the main reason the U.S. entertainment industry dominates the globe. So why does Hollywood want to strangle free expression? Because Hollywood cannot bottle free thought and sell it to you. If you think original thoughts, you won’t need to buy Hollywood’s prepackaged ideas. And the monolithic entertainment industry cannot charge you for thinking your own thoughts. Well, not yet, anyway….
After you’ve watched the video, please consider taking action to help defeat this horrifying legislation, which is bad for the United States — and the rest of the world. The website AmericanCensorship.org makes it easy to sign petitions and take other constructive action, including a painless way to write to your representatives in Congress.
And now I’d like to express my thanks to you for your time and effort on behalf of freedom of expression. I’d also like to thank WordPress for giving its members the freedom to black out our pages — and leaving anyone who supports SOPA free to express that opinion and not block their pages.
Remember when the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) rejected that Sin City: A Dame To Kill For poster because someone could make out a little too much of Eva Green‘s breast through her robe? Well, the 
Read at Joe's 
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