From the same people that brought you YOU-CAN-SPAM, give you DOPA. The Deleting Online Predators Act has passed the U.S. House of Representatives. The overly broad law would ban, “any site that allows users to edit a profile, chat to users or post personal data as a social networking site”, from libraries and public schools.

The American Library Association opposed DOPA saying,

“Under DOPA, people who use library and school computers as their primary conduits to the Internet will be unfairly blocked from accessing some of the web’s most powerful emerging technologies and learning applications. As libraries are already required to block content that is “harmful to minors” under the Children’s Internet Protection Act (CIPA), DOPA is redundant and unnecessary legislation.”

DOPA is championed by the likes of Senator Ted Stevens, who recently referred to the Internet as a “Series of Tubes” that can be clogged by information.

Save Your Space is hosting a petition to be submitted to Congress on September 5, 2006. Not that it will do any good, the only public opinions they listen to are the ones that further their agenda.

May I suggest the slogan, “Keep your congressman off DOPA.”