A good portion of the web is blacked out today in protest of two online piracy bills being considered in Congress: The Stop Online Piracy Act - or SOPA - in the House, and the Protect IP Act - or PIPA - in the Senate. Both bills are being heavily lobbied for by giant corporate media outlets and thus have been ignored in the mainstream news they own.
Wikipedia went dark at midnight last night - and has since been joined by over 10,000 other websites - making this the largest online protest in the history of the Internet. Sponsors of the anti-piracy legislation in both chambers are still pushing forward with their bills - but more and more Members of Congress are dropping their support amid increasing criticism from their constituents and online activists.
The White House has also come out against the bills. This is arguably the first major web-based, grass-roots, citizen lobbying effort in history, and if it doesn't succeed our internet may well look more like Iran's.
If ether passes, expect to pay to use U-tube Wikipedia, and every other popular site that uses more than minimal band width.
