U.S. Congressman joins League of Legends developer in urging fans to oppose SOPA/PIPA
This morning, Riot Games joined Google, Reddit, Amazon, Twitter, and Facebook on the growing list of internet-based companies to publicly oppose the two extreme anti-piracy bills circling in the U.S. Congress, and asked its fans to do the same. Riot CEO and co-founder Brandon "Ryze" Beck outlined his company's objections to the two bills, the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the Protect IP Act (PIPA), on League of Legends' official forums and gave several examples of how the bills would harm League of Legends' gameplay and community if they passed. Among them, he warns that it could mean the death of livestreaming and other community-generated content websites like DeviantArt and Reddit.
The biggest surprise in the forum thread comes at reply #5, which is made by Congressman Jared Polis of Colorado--avid League of Legends player (he prefers Maokai and Anivia) and opposer of SOPA and PIPA--who expresses his objections to the bills and also urges LoL fans to contact their representatives to oppose the bill. Riot has confirmed his identity, made a special forum image for him, and granted him the rank "United States Congress" on the forums.
If you have questions about the two bills, or why Riot opposes them, hop over to this Reddit thread , where Riot's lawyer is taking questions about their stance on SOPA/PIPA in an "Ask Me Anything" post all day long.
If you want to contact your representive to let them know your feelings on the two bills, you can use Congress' official website or use the pre-written message that Riot recommends through this site .
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