Some time ago EMI, the record company sued the Irish government when it failed to implement a bill that resembles SOPA. But it seems that the pressures of the entertainment industry, including the demand of EMI itself against the Irish government in January not to pursue a law with full powers to the owners, has finally paid off.

As a result of these events, eventually the Irish Government agreed to sign a bill to become law. Although the action is again caused strong protests from some quarters of people and they have launched Stop POTA in Ireland campaign.

Ireland’s Minister for Research and Innovation, Sean Sherlock, approved the bill which aimed at improving copyright law. Once the bill is in place, copyright holders can seek court injections against ISP and social networks providers whose systems are hosting copyright-infringing material.

Sherlock acknowledged that prior to signing the statutory instrument in favor of SOPA, there is a need for more debate and prescriptive. In conjunction to that, the minister is launching the next stage of the Copyright Review Committee which is aimed at removing barriers to innovation. A legal instrument which will allow holders to seek all kinds of injunctions against firms deemed appropriate by the suppliers.

“On many previous occasions I have outlined the reasons why it is necessary for us to proceed to sign this Statutory Instrument in order to ensure compliance with our obligations under EU law,” Sherlock said in a statement. “As there are clearly many diverse interests, it is important that interested parties come together and work in a constructive way to map the path forward. For this reason I am particularly anxious that the consultation paper launched today is studied and comprehensively responded to by all interested parties.”

Sherlock said the Irish government is urging all interested parties, including information providers and ISPs, innovators, rights holders, consumers and end-users, to study it carefully and engage in a constructive debate on all the issues before it become a law.

Thus the Irish government will try to move in two directions at once. First it will serve how the interests of the entertainment industry related to copyright is kept intact and the second is how to enhance innovation and creativity without having to intersect with the interests of copyright holders.

The question of copyright has raised a lot of public debate across the world in recent months. When US government proposed bill seeking to combat piracy in the network (known as SOPA and PIPA), it raised Anti-SOPA Blackout movement among Tech world. More than 10,000 Web sites had joined the protest, including Google, Wikipedia, WordPress, Twitter, Tumblr, Reddit, Mozilla and others, speaking out against cyber SOPA and PIPA.