Blowback: A comparative analysis of college students' response to U.S. Internet IP legislation

In the wake of intellectual property (IP) theft on the Internet, the legislature of the United States, along with many other developed nations, has been under pressure to stem the tide. The latest iteration of this ongoing battle came in 2011 in the form of two pieces of proposed legislation: Senate Bill 968 Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property Act (also known as the PROTECT IP Act, herein PIPA), and House Resolution 3261 Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA). In January 2012, as SOPA and PIPA were scheduled for debate on their respective floors in Congress, the bills met with vociferous attention. But while much has been made about SOPA/PIPA, there has been little public anger at the international treaty that preceded those bills: the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) of 2010. This leads to the main question of this paper: What explains the paucity of college students' rage toward ACTA when compared to SOPA/PIPA?