Australia's version of SOPA is now law: Why didn't anyone stop it?

On January 18, 2012, black banners appeared across hundreds of websites from Google to Tumblr. On Wikipedia, visitors saw a message that read "Imagine a World Without Free Knowledge."
After a grassroots movement across America demanded Internet companies take a stand against two site blocking laws proposed by the U.S. government, the influential sites told their millions of users to contact their elected representatives, and posted links to petitions and protest marches. According to Twitter, 2.4 million tweets relating to the laws were sent that day. The bills were pulled not long after.

The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and its sister bill the PROTECT IP Act (PIPA), would have allowed the U.S. government to seek a court order forcing Internet service providers (ISPs) to block foreign websites enabling or facilitating piracy for U.S. Internet users, among other measures.

See also: What you need to know about Australia's new site-blocking law

Sound familiar? The site blocking bill that became law this week in Australia will allow copyright holders of content like film and television to apply to the Federal Court for an injunction forcing ISPs, such as Telstra, to block foreign websites that facilitate piracy.
On Monday evening, while the site blocking law passed easily in the Australian senate, the home pages of Google and Wikipedia, not to mention every other website, were up and running.
Why did the protest against SOPA and PIPA become a movement that successfully killed the two bills, while the Copyright Amendment (Online Infringement) Bill faced only opinion pieces by technology journalists, a murmur on social media and one public hearing?
The small Australian population, the fact that most influential online companies are foreign, and the stark silence of homegrown digital players are all potential factors in the lack of cohesive action against Australia's ill-advised site blocking bill.

Australia just isn't that big a deal

Australia's small population may have something to do with it. Jeremy Malcolm, senior global policy analyst for the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), told Mashable Australia the critical mass of Internet users who might notice and take action on such laws just doesn't exist Down Under.
The lack of grassroots sufficiently interested in matters of digital policy is a problem, he suggested. An Australian now living in California, Malcolm said it makes a difference when, like in the U.S., you have hundreds of thousands of people who can pull together and share their energy and funds. The established culture of freedom of expression in the U.S., stemming from a written bill of rights, also continues to make a difference.
Most of the anti-SOPA activists in 2012 would agree Wikipedia and Google made a huge difference, he said, but people matter too. "The grassroots movement set the scene for that. They were both necessary and sufficient causes," he said. "Those are the kind of protests that mobilise the world."
The stakes are also higher in the U.S. "When laws like SOPA and PIPA come in, they will impact the whole world," he said. "Australia's laws, not so much."

Most influential Internet companies are not from here

Companies like Google, Twitter and Wikipedia were not founded in Australia, and although they are enthusiastically used here, they don't seem wholly invested in Australia's digital policy debates. While Google, for example, did submit comment to the senate inquiry into the site blocking bill, there was never an indication a SOPA-style protest was on the table.
"I think obviously Google grew out of Silicon Valley, so they're always going to have a bias towards U.S. policy ... Companies like iiNet have been more active, because they're more invested," Malcolm said, referring to the Australian Perth-based ISP.
Steve Dalby, who commented frequently on the bill in his former position as chief regulatory officer of iiNet agreed, telling Mashable Australia that while companies like Google voiced their concerns, they are at heart, American companies.
Malcolm said Google's policy direction in Australia appears to be focused on working behind the scenes, getting Australia to adopt international obligations of freedom of information, like those contained in the controversial free trade deal currently being negotiated, the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP). "It's not true to say they're not pressuring the Australia government," he said "But maybe through transnational means and not local government."
Mashable Australia contacted Wikipedia, Tumblr, Reddit, Google and Twitter — all companies that participated in the 2012 protests against SOPA online — for comment. None had responded by the time of publication.

Australian companies have been silent

The lack of debate over the metadata retention law passed in March, and now the site blocking bill have made it clear: homegrown Australian companies rarely speak out on matters that affect the Internet.
iiNet has always been happy to participate in discussions of public policy, Dalby said, but he questioned why Australia's other ISPs have failed to make their positions better known. "The big players, Optus, Telstra, send mixed messages," he said. "They only generally comment on competition matters and are generally silent. If they had the courage of their convictions, they may have spoken up a bit more."
Dalby pointed out that it's not just companies we traditionally think of as "Internet companies" or ISPs who need to participate in the conversation. All industries are moving online, he said, from the banks to insurance and retail. Sooner or later they are going to wake up to the fact that when online policy debates are occurring, they need to participate.
Take the Australian Securities and Investment Commission (ASIC) debacle of 2013, for example, when the government agency accidentally took down around 250,000 legitimate websites in an attempt to shut down a few fraudulent sites. "Could you imagine what would happen if the websites of some of those online insurance companies went down, how much damage that would do to their business?" he asked. "Why don't they recognise the threat to their business? Why don't they participate in the discussion?"
"They talk about the digital economy, but people still think in terms of brick and mortar," he added.

See you at the ballot box

Dalby predicts Australia will see a few more disastrous proposals of Internet policy from the government before it attracts the interest of mainstream and corporate Australia. "I expect in five years time this metadata law and website blocking will be repealed," he said. "The next generation of politician will realise it doesn't work and adds a cost to the community."
"I'm telling everyone, if your local member is Labor or Liberal, you should go and tell them you're not going to vote for them," he said. "The only thing they care about is their jobs, so that's where the pressure has got to come from."
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