Websites Protest SOPA and PIPA
Five major websites will go dark on Wednesday protesting two Congressional bills, which critics argue could curtail Internet and free speech.
If passed, The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and its Senate counterpart, the Protect IP Act or PIPA, would allow the US government to seek a court order and even shut down websites that contain content or links to unauthorized copyrighted content. Moreover, advertisers and Internet service providers would be banned from doing business with transgressors.
Proponents of the legislation include companies that are trying to protect their copyrights, such as the Motion Picture Association of America, the NBA, Pfizer, Nike, L’Oreal, as well as the US Chamber of Commerce, the Fraternal Order of Police, and the US Conference of Mayors.
However, voices of opposition include Internet giants Google, Yahoo!, Facebook, Twitter, eBay,Mozilla, and Wikipedia – who say that the proposed laws constitute a First Amendment violation, promote censorship, and harm the democratic flow of information.
Three ways Web sites and users have been protesting SOPA
People upset with the Stop Online Piracy Act have a small reason to cheer this morning. The anti-piracy bill, which many Internet users feel could have a chilling effect on the Web, got tabled until early next year, giving a brief respite and an opportunity for alternative bills (such as Rep. Darrell Issa’s OPEN act) to gain footing. Being a creative bunch, many users have taken to design tricks, boycotts, even music to protest what they feel is a dangerous bill. Here are just a few examples of SOPA protests online:
- one Scribd, taking a bit of a cue from Tumblr but even more ambitiously, made the articles on their site disappear yesterday, word by word.
- two A number of Reddit users have begun a movement to move domains away from GoDaddy en masse, in protest of their support of SOPA.
- three Leah Kauffman, the songwriter who wrote “I Got a Crush on Obama,” just released an anti-SOPA protest song titled “Firewall.”
Say No To SOPA
A List Apart strongly opposes United States H.R.3261 AKA the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), an ill-conceived lobbyist-driven piece of legislation that is technically impossible to enforce, cripplingly burdensome to support, and would, without hyperbole, destroy the internet as we know it.
We at ALA are not alone in our opposition to SOPA. Other opponents of the bill now before the U.S. House of Representatives include Google, Facebook, Twitter, Mozilla, Yahoo!, AOL, LinkedIn, eBay, Tumblr, Etsy, Reddit, Techdirt, Wikimedia Foundation, the American Civil Liberties Union, Human Rights Watch, and the Center for Democracy and Technology.
The bill has its supporters, too, including Hollywood, media firms, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and their lobbyists, who have spent over $91 million to push this new law through.
- Americans, Tumblr has created a system that will call you with talking points, and then connect you to your representative.
- You can contact your representatives and your senators.
- Those outside the US can sign this petition. Registration is required. A US zip code is not.
We urge everyone reading this to take action today. Only an overwhelming show of solidarity gives us a chance of defeating this poorly written, dangerous bill.
Accumulating random crap since 1976! Mostly strange humor, fountain pens, history, politics, LGBT issues, art, odd pictures from my iPhoto library, and irrelevant status updates. I'm an ESTJ. In my day job I'm a scientist or something. And I like boys.
