The internet’s back on. Everybody okay? No lost limbs? Good.
A lot has happened in the last 24 hours since Wikipedia, Reddit, and many other powerful websites went dark to protest SOPA and PIPA. Let’s take a look at the developments, but first a new short video released by New Left Media explaining why PIPA and SOPA are bad bills, who’s behind the bills, and what you can do to stop them.
[yframe url=’http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBy7yooz3MM’]
Most websites that went dark on January 18 pointed users to one of several petitions and methods of reaching congressional representatives. By all accounts, that effort was successful. Google reports that by mid-afternoon over 4.5 million people signed their petition, and early this morning, Wikipedia announced that more than 162 million unique viewers had seen their message with eight million using their tool to find their representatives in congress.
Not everyone thought the strike was so great, though. Users who couldn’t manage to read the Wikipedia splash page flooded Twitter with complaints. Here are a few of my favorites, with apologies for language:
Wikipedia needs to stop fucking around. I’ve got books I haven’t read.
— B▲SH (@AshleyBennia) January 19, 2012
If they shut down wikipedia how the fuck am i gonna write any essays!?!?!?! I’m SCREWED!!!
— louis forsyth (@th4tsw0tshes4id) January 18, 2012
I don’t get it. Why is wikipedia gone? And why might twitter go?
— stephanie (@SteffiLD) January 18, 2012
wikipedia thanx for getting me through ALOT of my classes the past couple of years, ill miss u #RIP
— Varsha (@curryNfries) January 19, 2012
The youth of today, ladies and gentlemen. These people will change your adult diaper one day.
In the Senate, it appears that the wind has shifted. During the day-long protest, 13 senators shifted position from undecided or supporting PIPA to opposing PIPA or leaning toward opposing it. OpenCongress has a current whip count. There is clearly more to be done, so keep calling your senators.
Former Democratic senator and current MPAA CEO Chris Dodd called the strike “an abuse of power.” That’s pretty much what one would expect from the bill’s chief lobbyist, but it’s still a bit jarring. Remember, SOPA and PIPA, two bills that Dodd is paid handsomely to lobby for, would quickly have the same effect as the strike if anyone on those sites, whether deliberately or by accident, broke copyright law.
And that brings me to the major oops of the day. Republican Lamar Smith of Texas is the congressman who initially introduced SOPA in congress last October. Wednesday morning, Jamie Lee Curtis Taete of Vice found that Rep. Smith’s own website violates copyright law. Probably more than once. She also found copyright problems with at least three PIPA-supporting Senators (Roy Blunt, Claire McCaskill, and Sherrod Brown) and SOPA-supporting Rep. Dennis Ross. Under SOPA or PIPA, their combined violations would take down Twitter and the official websites of the U.S. Senate and House.
Thank goodness the Cheezburger network is back up so I can post this:
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