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Wikipedia, Reddit, BoingBoing and many other sites went dark Jan. 17, at 9 p.m. to bring public attention to the PROTECT IP Act and Stop Online Piracy Act, bills currently moving towards United States Congress. The bills were drafted with the intention of helping crack down on internet piracy and blocking sites that may have material that infringe on copyright laws. If passed, it would give the U.S. Department of Justice the ability to shut down sites indefinitely without a hearing of any sort. The bills would crack down on sites that have digital copies of counterfeit material or anti-digital rights management programs. Since many of these sites are foreign and not within the DoJ’s jurisdiction, the bill would allow the department to simply block access to the sites. Many websites, and some major web development companies like Google, are outraged by the provisions within the proposal, stating that it sets a dangerous paradigm when they can be blocked without due process. According to Wikipedia, the bill would force sites to monitor all content that users post for copyright infringement. The sheer volume of web traffic to some of these sites make such a task impossible. The show their disapproval, Wikipedia decided to shut down the english portion of the site for 24 hours and replace it with a page that raises awareness for SOPA and PIPA. Many other sites have followed suit and have gone dark as well. Google, while not shutting down, is showing solidarity by linking anti-SOPA material on their homepage.
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OwnerSakshi S Tanver Archives
February 2012
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