On January 18, some of the internet's most popular sites went black to protest the SOPA and PIPA bills currently making their ways through Congress. What was the result of a day without Wikipedia and Craigslist?
SOPA, the Stop Online Piracy Act and PIPA, the Protect Intellectual Property Act, are Congress' attempt to curtail websites that illegally publish copyrighted materials. However, the provisions of the bills are written such that one copyrighted image could lead an entire site to be shut down without due process.
If you're not familiar with SOPA, this video featuring Ben Huh, the CEO of Cheezburger, shows the basic flaws with SOPA as it is currently written.
So... were the protests a success? Did the internet blackout led by Wikipedia, Google, Craigslist et al accomplish their goals?
Withdrawing support
If the goal was to pressure Congresspeople to withdraw their support of SOPA and PIPA, the answer would be a resounding yes. The investigative journalism site ProPublica is keeping records of Congresspeople that have made statements both opposing and supporting SOPA. At last count, 102 Congresspeople have stated public opposition to the bills, withdrawn their support or reiterated their opposition.
Creating awareness
If the goal was to create awareness of SOPA and to drive Internet Americans to sign a protest petition, that was accomplished, too. In the funniest portrayal of Why SOPA Is Bad I've ever seen, Matt Inman of the comic blog The Oatmeal created an animated GIF that left users laughing out loud. (Kittens? Flamethrowers? Really? Yes, really.) And yes, he asked visitors to pirate it.
But that's not all. As Inman reported today, his animated GIF was so hilariously concise that it wound up on CNN. And that's not all:
Why else am I telling you this? Because of the combined efforts of some of the internet's biggest players as well as countless awesome underdogs, you could tentatively say that the protests were a success. 18 senators backed off from the bill, 4.5 million people signed a petition, and anyone who used the internet yesterday for more than five seconds is now well aware of what SOPA is and how to stop it.
Pissing off the big guys
If the goal was to piss off the bills' handful of corporate sponsors, that, too, was mission accomplished. MPAA CEO Chris Dodd called the blackout a "gimmick" and an "abuse of power:"
It is an irresponsible response and a disservice to people who rely on them for information use their services. It is also an abuse of power given the freedoms these companies enjoy in the marketplace today. It’s a dangerous and troubling development when the platforms that serve as gateways to information intentionally skew the facts to incite their users in order to further their corporate interests.
A so-called “blackout” is yet another gimmick, albeit a dangerous one, designed to punish elected and administration officials who are working diligently to protect American jobs from foreign criminals.
Personally, I believe the SOPA blackout is the most democratic use of power we've seen in a while. And anything that pisses off Rupert Murdoch, CEO of Newscorp, this much has to be a good thing, right?
For SOPA/PIPA opponents, the good news is in. PCWorld ran a tally of the effects of yesterday's blackout, and the internet definitely rippled with repercussions:
- 4.5 million people signed Google's anti-SOPA/PIPA petition, according to the Los Angeles Times
- 25 Senators now oppose PIPA (the Senate version of SOPA), according to OpenCongress
- Twitter saw more than 2.4 million SOPA-related tweets between midnight and 4 p.m. Eastern on Wednesday
However, keep in mind that, despite all this publicity and online actions and outrage, SOPA isn't dead. From the PC World article:
SOPA sponsor and Chair of the House Judiciary Committee Lamar Smith (R-Tex.) recently vowed to continue working to get the antipiracy legislation passed. And advocacy organizations such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the Center for Democracy say the will continue opposing both SOPA and PIPA. The next Senate vote for PIPA is scheduled for January 24.
A show of force
Without a doubt, the online blackout raised awareness and gave the Little Guy a voice. But what is perhaps more important than these two bills is the power that has been wielded by the democratic web. In the age of SuperPACs that don't have to disclose their largest donors, the internet waged a transparent campaign and won hearts and minds--by simply doing nothing for a day. The New York Times called this flexing of the technology industry's online muscle "a political coming of age for a relatively young and disorganized industry that has largely steered clear of lobbying and other political games in Washington."
This is beyond exciting. This is the internet itself showing its guns in a way that only lobbyists have heretofore been able to. Whether or not SOPA and PIPA pass in their current forms (unlikely), this blackout was the internet saying to Congress, "Hey, guys--no. You can't block things you don't understand, and you can't just not listen to your constituents. Listen to us as we shut down your servers as we tell you that we do NOT support this, and you shouldn't, either."