Inattentional blindness, a term for when a person fails to notice and react to stimulus that is in plain sight came to my mind while reading a rundown of last week’s SOPA/PIPA drama.  

The demise of the dual Senate and House internet piracy bills is the latest in an ongoing almost traditional battle by two sides competing to influence policy. Thrown into this struggle of money power and influence is the capacity of the internet to quickly inform and gather opposition.

Supporters of the bills and notably some powerful congressional players appear to have been thoroughly blindsided by this capacity. A Reuters reports says:

Some Hollywood executives acknowledge their own flat-footedness in trying to marshal public opinion as opposition mounted. While technology companies brandished the power of the Internet, Hollywood relied on old-media weapons such as television commercials and a billboard in New York's Times Square. It proved to be too little, too late.

One entertainment-company lawyer complained that opposing arguments were often inaccurate but spread like wildfire anyway on the Internet, leaving supporters scrambling to correct the information without the benefit of a strong online network.

"We do some of that (online) stuff, but it has to go through a committee of 14 people," he said. "The other side doesn't have conference calls. They just put stuff out there."

Where have the Hollywood entertainment industrial complex lobbyists been hiding?

An amazing remark when you consider the Arab spring events and more recently the ongoing Occupy movements (or simply the last ten plus years of media upheaval) amply demonstrated the applied power of internet. Even the regular TeeVee news and radio broadcasters reported this for all to see -not sure if it was posted on any billboards.

“Imagine if you will” says the voice over “a world where television commercials and the Times Square billboards can’t turn the tide!”