I'm not angry at Reuters for using the word hacker in the common way, since it is used by everyone that way, and they are not in the wrong for using a term with the definition the public uses. I'm angry that Reuters used Mark saying that he is a hacker to imply that he is associated with people who damaged Fortune 500 companies, especially when he (Mark) defines hacker to mean something completely different to the common, and they use that in the article. This entire article was a thinly veiled attempt to launch an ad hominem attack against Silicon Valley for opposing SOPA. The opposition of SOPA by Silicon Valley was even mentioned in the article.
I absolutely agree. This article is an awkward attempt by the author to take a subject which he is clearly opinionated about, and somehow tie the story-du-jour to it in order to draw attention. The two had nothing to do with each other, and the connections he attempted to make were nonsensical.
The article seems to be a better example of a potentially successful SEO strategy than of good journalism.
I actually think that mentioning opposition to SOPA was a good thing for our industry.
People should be reminded who the Silicon Valley companies are and their worth, otherwise you're losing the context: if people had to choose, what would be worse for the U.S. - losing Hollywood, or losing Silicon Valley?
MPAA keeps mentioning how many jobs and money are lost because of piracy. I'm not seeing enough of the opposite perspective: how many jobs and how much money is generated by companies such as Facebook, Google, Amazon, Apple (yes, it's a little weird mentioning Apple considering that they haven't expressed opposition, but remember that the music and movies industries actually hate iTunes because it has been disruptive to their business and not in a good way).
