SOPA talk, yo.

[Metaphysician]

This shit is extremely annoying. I am pro-SOPA after these shenanigans.

A taste of what SOPA would be like is so infuriating that you like SOPA now?

It's just spite, mostly. I'd prefer to have somebody try to screw me over in pursuit of their own interests, rather somebody screwing me over and pretending like they're helping me. I don't really think there is much to be worried about, so this seems like an unnecessary hassle.

What makes you think this isn't being done in the interests of the people running these sites?

This. They're making a statement about how this legislation affects them and their customers. And hell, everybody knows the best way to get the attention of Americans is to inconvenience them in a minor way for a short period of time.

[Ideas sleep furiously.]

I'm in a conversation with a friend.
Me- Tries to post Wikipedia link to a friend on thermodynamics.
-Wikipedia is blacked out-
Me- Sends friend an xkcd comic related to the conversation.
-Xkcd is blacked out-

We have seen the future, now we must stop it.

[Gellert1984]

Spoiler:

Spoilered is an anti SOPA/PIPA .gif from www.TheOatmeal.com.

[Carnildo]

This shit is extremely annoying. I am pro-SOPA after these shenanigans.

A taste of what SOPA would be like is so infuriating that you like SOPA now?

It's just spite, mostly. I'd prefer to have somebody try to screw me over in pursuit of their own interests, rather somebody screwing me over and pretending like they're helping me. I don't really think there is much to be worried about, so this seems like an unnecessary hassle.

I've blacked out one of my sites (a fanfiction hosting site) as a warning that if SOPA/PIPA passes, I'll take it down permanently. It will simply be too risky to keep running it.

[Woopate]

Flickr added a button that let's members blackout photos hosted on flickr for 24 hours. Makes me want to get a membership so I can try to go for sheer volume or make a bot to do it.

[Zamfir]

████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████
████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████
████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████
████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████
████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████
████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████
████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████
████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████

[Ptolom]

Wikipedia's blackout would have been far more impressive if they'd just taken the site down altogether, rather than flashing up a weak splashscreen. Perhaps there should be an http error code for protesting. "101 insurrectionist"

[lutzj]

Wikipedia's blackout would have been far more impressive if they'd just taken the site down altogether, rather than flashing up a weak splashscreen. Perhaps there should be an http error code for protesting. "101 insurrectionist"

I like being able to easily access the site in case I need to. The protest will be over by the time the "just turn off java" workaround becomes well-known anyway.

[Steax]

Poor Sony. Now I don't really support anons doing this, and it's pretty reckless either way, but I find it quite amusing (as in the laugh-fishing way) how Sony's getting pushed around by the internet.

[Sgt.Artemis]

Wikipedia's blackout would have been far more impressive if they'd just taken the site down altogether, rather than flashing up a weak splashscreen. Perhaps there should be an http error code for protesting. "101 insurrectionist"

Very true; they could've done something much more elegant than they did. Sure, they've (sort of) gotten their message across, but it could've been handled so much better.

[BlackHatSupport]

If it's passed......wow.

The backlash will be absolutely incredible. Not to mention you'll hear the yelling across the world.

The only time the world literally beats a path to your door.....

....is when you pass SOPA.

[KnightExemplar]

This shit is extremely annoying. I am pro-SOPA after these shenanigans.

A taste of what SOPA would be like is so infuriating that you like SOPA now?

It's just spite, mostly. I'd prefer to have somebody try to screw me over in pursuit of their own interests, rather somebody screwing me over and pretending like they're helping me. I don't really think there is much to be worried about, so this seems like an unnecessary hassle.

I'm assuming you're SOPA/PIPA-neutral. Care to elaborate why you assume that position? I'm curious.

Jakovasaur: you're fine with people suing you over alleged copyright infringement and taking down your site from DNS, from the ISP, taking away your advertisements and removing your financial services before the trial?

Even Wikipedia, despite having a lawyer, would be forced to comply with SOPA takedowns, with no legal recourse. (It is the responsibility of the hyperlink's owner to challenge the decision. Wikipedia would not have the power to legally defend the links on its site for you). Much like DMCA, (which has at least a 37% abuse rate according to Google), SOPA will be abused. According to Google, 37% of the DMCA takedowns it requests don't even have to deal with copyright infringement. The problem is, with so much more power in the SOPA takedowns, you'd be risking more than just a single image or video clip. Entire sites can be wiped off the internet if they so choose. And by "they", I mean the corporations with lawyers and the Attorney General.

(As stated before, I might be fine with the Attorney General having the powers against only foreign sites. But that goes into the DNSSEC issues and other online security problems.)

Obviously, websites like Google and Wikipedia would be affected, as people force Google / Wikipedia to take down LINKS to websites. (It is no longer just a problem to have copyrighted material on your site, but to even link to a website that allegedly has copyrighted material. And again, that alleged site could be put on this blacklist before a trial was conducted). Fortunately, they have lawyers and wouldn't be subjected to the worst of SOPA. The smaller hobby sites like XKCD, small companies (say... employing less than 10 people), hiring a legal defense team to beat back unproven allegations so that you can keep your site up just seems bad for the internet in general.

And for what? Its not like "The Pirate Bay" will be hard to get to anymore. You'd be able to proxy that tracker and still download all your stuff peer-to-peer. It doesn't address the issue of "Magnet Links" at all either.

I am glad that Google, Wikipedia, Reddit, xkcd, etc. etc. are all raising awareness on this issue. Well... maybe not glad... it'd be suicidal to not raise awareness. These are bills that affect the very fabric of the internet, written by ignorant congressmen who don't know how things were worked. With 80% of the money going to support of SOPA, the risk that these bills will pass is non-negligible.

[lucrezaborgia]

Spoiler:

Spoilered is an anti SOPA/PIPA .gif from http://www.TheOatmeal.com.

I think this is the best so far!

[KnightExemplar]

Spoiler:

Spoilered is an anti SOPA/PIPA .gif from http://www.TheOatmeal.com.

I think this is the best so far!

It should be noted that under current law, he can be forced to take down that GIF if Oprah thinks that it really is copyright infringement on that photograph. (Reproduced the photograph in its entirety makes a hard case for "fair use"). This also happens pre-trial, which has caused some bullshit shenanigans over the past 15 years.

However, under SOPA, the whole site is at risk.

Its important to keep in mind what the current law offers, and contrast it with what SOPA will offer to really understand how much bigger the scope of SOPA is. Vague analogies work (everything in the gif is somewhat correct), but these technicalities can be misrepresented.

[netcrusher88]

Jakovasaur: you're fine with people suing you over alleged copyright infringement and taking down your site from DNS, from the ISP, taking away your advertisements and removing your financial services before the trial?

No trial required.

[Steax]

Trials are good and all though, sure, yeah.

[3 days later]

Why waste our precious resources on these mundane trials? We have too many! Just skewer them all!

[mieulium]

SOPA committee either needs to find a better solution or GTFO, thats for certain. If they are not at least compromising, I'm not sure I want to support the American economy anymore.

[Griffin]

What does supporting the American economy have to do with supporting the entertainment giants?

Honestly, the lot of them can rot for all I care. I'd rather see the MPAA and RIAA companies broken down and tossed in the trash than see this law get passed.

[Yakk]

Honestly, the lot of them can rot for all I care. I'd rather see the MPAA and RIAA companies broken down and tossed in the trash than see this law get passed.

How many millions of dollars are you willing to spend to back your position?

Pony up to play.

[@stevegraff]

The folks beating their breasts, tearing their head, and gnashing their
Teeth over SOPA are in many cases the same who were in favor of The Affordable Care Act. This is what happens when we are inconsistent in our defense of liberty: eventually it affects something we care about.

"... Then they came for the cartoonists..."

[Dauric]

I don't know if it's been linked in this thread before, but Propublica has a page that tracks senators and representatives public support or opposition to SOPA/PIPA. Also includes information on who's being funded from where, and can be sorted by state so you can find your state's representatives.

In Colorado I've got one senator that co-sponsored PIPA but doesn't have a lot publicly on record about it, and 1 representative who opposes SOPA and is pretty vocal on the matter. The ratios of contributions from entertainment and computer industries is pretty much as you' expect.

[Panonadin]

I don't know about any of you and I know it wont be a highly popular opinion to have but ....

I went to wikipedia today to read about apoptosis, yay I read a sentence and the site went to some stupid page about raising awareness for PIPA and SOPA, so they keep me from using the "free and public" website to get my attention. They have some links to contact some sort of politician and leave your zip code.

My thoughts as your "average" internet browsing person. I wish there was a link on that stupid black out page to boycott them annoying me by blocking out the site. Now, I'm not clicking any links. If maybe they had put it at the top or had an annoying pop up box I could X out I would have but now, nope. I want them to add a sentence to the paragraph about "compiling the largest encyclipedia in human history" about how they are now using that huge resource to push a personal agenda. "Free and for people unless we don't share your point of view".

Fish and chips!

[Griffin]

There's instructions on the page about how to disable it. In addition, if this legislation isn't killed they are going to end up like that any day without much choice.

They are simply showing you an example of what your apathy will result in, that's all.

[Heisenberg]

There are also instructions in this thread... on the same page as your bitchy post... but I'm sure bitching about it was a much better use of your time.

[Qaanol]

One simple way to bypass the Wikipedia blackout, without disabling Javascript, is to append “?banner=false” (without the quotes) onto a Wikipedia URL.

[Triangle_Man]

The MSPA forums, Memebase and a bunch of other sites are also down today, I think.

I signed the petition offered to me, however. I figure it's the least I can do in response to this shit.

I can live without these sites for a day if it means that we can raise awareness of this bill, right?

[Panonadin]

Bitching / giving my opinion, yeah same thing right?

Just because someone doesn't share your narrow single sided point of view doesn't mean you should lash out, children.

I read the paragraph on the front page, I looked briefly for a button or link to "get rid of this page" and then went back to google and found an article on a different web site. Thats what you average user is going to do. Yeah I could use a cached link yeah I'm sure there are other ways around it. Does that change the fact that they are pushing their personal opinion on other people for something they are against?

Nope.

[Triangle_Man]

Well, what are your views on SOPA/PIPA, then?

[Griffin]

Well, if you're pro-SOPA and using wikipedia, you're a fucking hypocrite and your opinion doesn't really matter, then. ::shrug::

[Panonadin]

Well, if you're pro-SOPA and using wikipedia, you're a fucking hypocrite and your opinion doesn't really matter,(TO ME) then. ::shrug::

FTFY.

It's basically the same old song and dance. The people pushing the possible very important agenda that everyone should be aware about especially the general public don't want the general publics opinion. Brings back memories of the Occupy thing.

[Ghostbear]

Bitching / giving my opinion, yeah same thing right?

Just because someone doesn't share your narrow single sided point of view doesn't mean you should lash out, children.

I read the paragraph on the front page, I looked briefly for a button or link to "get rid of this page" and then went back to google and found an article on a different web site. Thats what you average user is going to do. Yeah I could use a cached link yeah I'm sure there are other ways around it. Does that change the fact that they are pushing their personal opinion on other people for something they are against?

Nope.

They didn't exactly do much to hide that you can avoid it though. First you click learn more. Then you read the following:

Is it still possible to access Wikipedia in any way?
Yes. During the blackout, Wikipedia is accessible on mobile devices and smart phones. You can also view Wikipedia normally by disabling JavaScript in your browser, as explained on this Technical FAQ page. Our purpose here isn't to make it completely impossible for people to read Wikipedia, and it's okay for you to circumvent the blackout. We just want to make sure you see our message.

They explain in fairly straight forward terms on that very page that they are opposed to SOPA/PIPA because those laws are very fundamental threats both to Wikipedia and the goals of Wikipedia. It's much less sharing their "personal opinion" than it is when the RIAA/MPAA put tons of anti-piracy warnings on everything you buy. If you dislike what Wikipedia did, then the point you are supposed to gather from it is that the only way to avoid seeing it again is to ensure those laws don't pass.

[Panonadin]

As I stated in my post, I'm sure there are 50 ways to avoid the page.

I was giving my opinion about what they are doing, my very own point of view. Clicking learn more is obvious, but when I read the paragraph I figured the learn more link would take me to some other speech about these bills and not "how to bypass what we're doing". Instead of learn more a link that said click here to go back to the page you requested would of been ok. Then I would of read their message, maybe even visited the links they provided and moved on about my day more informed and less annoyed.

[Ghostbear]

As I stated in my post, I'm sure there are 50 ways to avoid the page.

I was giving my opinion about what they are doing, my very own point of view. Clicking learn more is obvious, but when I read the paragraph I figured the learn more lilnk would take me to some other speech about these bills and not "how to bypass what we're doing". Instead of learn more a link that said click here to go back to the page you requested would of been ok. Then I would of read their message, maybe even visited the links they provided and moved on about my day more informed and less annoyed.

Why would a learn more link not lead you to a page where you can learn more about what they're doing? That seems like a poor assumption to make. The point there is that not only are there ways to bypass the action, they actually tell you how to avoid it themselves! I don't think it's particularly fair to harshly criticize them when they tell you, all on their own, exactly how to avoid what they're doing. The problem with your idea is that the vast majority of people would have just ignored what they were doing if they made it effortless to avoid. People are lazy, so you have to work around that fact.

They even explain on that page why it's more than just them pushing their opinion on you, far more simply than I could:

In carrying out this protest, is Wikipedia abandoning neutrality?
We hope you continue to trust Wikipedia to be a neutral information source. We are staging this blackout because (as Wikimedia Foundation Trustee Kat Walsh said recently), although Wikipedia’s articles are neutral, its existence is not. For over a decade, Wikipedians have spent millions of hours building the largest encyclopedia in human history. Wikipedia is a tremendously useful resource, and its existence depends upon a free, open and uncensored Internet. SOPA and PIPA (and other similar laws under discussion inside and outside the United States) will hurt you, because they will make it impossible for sites you enjoy, and benefit from, to continue to exist. That's why we're doing this.

[Griffin]

It's basically the same old song and dance. The people pushing the possible very important agenda that everyone should be aware about especially the general public don't want the general publics opinion. Brings back memories of the Occupy thing.

It's pretty simple - if you don't fight the things you want, you'll lose them. Either man up and stop whining or shut up and get out of the way. Then, when it goes down for good, you can rest assured in the knowledge that you did nothing when you could have. So be it. If you really want to do nothing and find a different site to visit instead of wikipedia, guess what? This is your chance!

But asking your "opinion"? Your opinion, quite literally, does not matter. No one here cares about you, because you wouldn't have helped. Wikipedia certainly doesn't, and shouldn't, give a shit about you. The MPAA and RIAA couldn't give two shits about your opinion. If you are content with dooming yourself to irrelevancy with your apathy, do not be surprised if your opinion becomes irrelevant. The blackout of wikipedia is absolutely the fault of people like you.

Why, exactly, should wikipedia need to ask your opinion on whether or not they should be driven out of business? They're opponents certainly didn't ask the public's opinion. Ah, I see, but they're opponents are all incredibly wealthy, and can push their agenda without "annoying" you. Is that it?

Seriously - why, exactly, should anyone give a damn about the opinions of the "general public" in this matter?

[Triangle_Man]

It's part of the problem I wrestle with in my mind over whether or not it's okay to ignore/act against public opinion if that opinion is subjectively/objectively misinformed/stupid/what the hell is wrong with these people?/burn the witch!/whatever.

The Entire Question does Remind me of this Short Story, however.

[Panonadin]

To keep it short and not full of hot air and respond to your few questions.

The general public is who you need to be informed and swayed one way or the other in order to stop what you want to stop. Thats why.

Also, no one asked my opinion. Not Wikipedia, not the fora, not you individually. I gave it. Just like you are currently weaving your opinion in between insults. That is kind of the point of a discussion forum, no? Title of the thread is SOPA talk, yo.

(P.S. sorry I don't do that nested post/reply/quote thing a lot of people do, it makes my posts way to long and I'm sure you can figure out what I am answering/responding to)

[Heisenberg]

Bitching / giving my opinion, yeah same thing right?

Just because someone doesn't share your narrow single sided point of view doesn't mean you should lash out, children.

Just because a non-profit wasn't available to meet your needs doesn't mean you should lash out on a message board, chum. You bitched about Wikipedia using their website as a platform to preach their personal agenda, when even a cursory glance would reveal that they consider this an existential threat to the website, and have responded as they see fit.

Turns out there's other shit happening in the world, and while it's too bad that you suffered an extremely minor inconvenience, attacking Wikipedia with allegations of bias is not an appropriate course of action.

[Griffin]

The general public is who you need to be informed and swayed one way or the other in order to stop what you want to stop. Thats why.

Unfortunately, this just plain isn't try. The opinion of the "general public" is worthless. Assume for a minute we could somehow convince the general public that SOPA was a problem. Every one of them. They all believe it is a problem. Does this help?

If they aren't willing to act on it, not an ounce.

No, the only opinions that matter are the opinions of those willing to sink time and money into the issue. Those willing to spend their social capital in an extent to exert their influence. That's simply the way the world works. Sure, it's nice PR to have the crowd on your side, but as far as legislation goes it's pretty much worthless.

The point of this action was to fight off an existential threat by pushing those willing to act into action. It is very clear you never would have been willing to act either way (I very much doubt you used the opportunity to write a pro-SOPA letter to congress) and thus your opinion is, still, irrelevant.

[Panonadin]

Bitching / giving my opinion, yeah same thing right?

Just because someone doesn't share your narrow single sided point of view doesn't mean you should lash out, children.

Just because a non-profit wasn't available to meet your needs doesn't mean you should lash out on a message board, chum. You bitched about Wikipedia using their website as a platform to preach their personal agenda, when even a cursory glance would reveal that they consider this an existential threat to the website, and have responded as they see fit.

Turns out there's other shit happening in the world, and while it's too bad that you suffered an extremely minor inconvenience, attacking Wikipedia with allegations of bias is not an appropriate course of action.

With sincerity, how (in your opinion) should I of responded?

A discussion forum with a thread based on what they have that page up for seemed like the right place to post my minor annoyance. Of course I figured I would get mostly the response I did I also figured some people would just "discuss it". Share some points of view etc.

[Griffin]

With sincerity, how (in your opinion) should I of responded?

A discussion forum with a thread based on what they have that page up for seemed like the right place to post my minor annoyance.

Since your "annoyance" has nothing to do with SOPA and is pretty much solely a direct result of your own inflated sense of entitlement, perhaps some sort of general purpose "things that annoyed me today" thread? Surely General must have something like that, right?