TorrentFreak

The place where breaking news, BitTorrent and copyright collide

Congress Asked to Return Dirty MPAA Money

mpaaOn Sunday we reported on a “we the people” petition asking the White House to investigate the MPAA’s alleged bribery practices.

Today the petition reached its goal of 25.000 votes, but that’s not the only pressure that Washington is facing over the issue.

Before the Obama Administration has a chance to respond to the petition, several citizen rights groups are gearing up to put pressure on Congress to return “Hollywood’s dirty money”.

“The MPAA is so brazen in its efforts to buy legislation with campaign cash that its leader, himself a former senator, sees nothing wrong with threatening legislators on national TV,” said Free Press Action Fund President Craig Aaron today.

“We think it’s time that Congress showed that its votes are no longer for sale. The first thing Congress must do is give back the MPAA’s tainted campaign cash or give it to charity. Congress must make it clear to the world that it won’t be bullied into supporting censorship.

Now that various congressmen reconsidered their positions on the controversial PIPA and SOPA bills, Free Press thinks they are ready for the next step.

“Last week’s unprecedented grassroots uprising, in which millions mobilized against the Stop Online Piracy Act and the PROTECT IP Act , clearly got Washington’s attention. And we’ve since seen dozens of legislators scrambling to show they were really against these bills all along. But the real test is whether they will put their money where their mouths are by returning Hollywood’s dirty money,” Aaron concludes.

It will be interesting to see how Congress responds to this call for refunds. To be continued.

This post is from the News Bits section of TorrentFreak where we present stories from around the web in a concise summary format. Full TorrentFreak articles can be found here. If you have a tip please let us know. News Bits have their very own RSS feed
  • Mediaget
  • Download Torrents with BTguard

NewsBits

The latest news from around the web, not covered on the frontpage

  • Dutch Parliament Rejects ACTA On Human Rights Violations

    The controversial ACTA treaty is quickly losing support in Europe. After a handful of countries already...

  • ACTA Anti-Piracy Treaty Criticized by EU Parliament President

    Following the massive protests against ACTA yesterday, EU Parliament President Martin Schulz criticized the treaty on...

  • FilePorn Adult Torrent Site Joins Cheggit, Shuts Down

    FilePorn, one of the longest standing adult BitTorrent trackers, has called it quits. After more than...

  • RIAA: “Misinformation May Be a Dirty Trick, But It Works.”

    For years the RIAA has tried to convince the world that piracy is killing musicians. Supported...

  • Russia’s Largest BitTorrent Tracker Under Huge DDoS Attack

    RUTracker, Russia’s largest BitTorrent tracker, has been dealing with the effects of a DDoS attack over...

MostDiscussed

Below are TorrentFreak's most discussed articles of the past month. Join the discussion if you like.

CopyQuote

Left Quote

“The Pirate Bay has been one of the most important movements in Sweden for freedom of speech, working against corruption and censorship.

Peter Sunde Left Quote

RecommendedArticles

A selection of some TorrentFreak's classics dug up from our archives.