Today's the day that a number of high profile websites are demonstrating their opposition to the SOPA and PIPA bills currently pending in Congress. The upshot of these bills passing into law is that they are tantamount to giving powerful content industry groups the power to cut-off from the internet or censor websites that are accused of hosting material that doesn't belong to them. Bear in mind that these bills have been sponsored and co-written by representatives of the entertainment industry (eg the MPAA) and it's plain to see whose interests are being served here.
Under the proposed legislation the US Attorney General would have the power to demand ISPS so block access to foreign websites suspected of dealing in pirated content, as well as making search engines delist such istes from the search indexes. Other powers include the blocking of payement services to accused sites too (and we all know what happened to Wikileaks when its funding services where blocked). If these standards were applied to several prominent US-based sites many of them would be in trouble (eg Tumblr, Wordpress, Blogger, Google, etc).
There have been some last minute amendments to the proposed bills but they haven't removed the threat to free speech entirely. That's why it's good to see several prominent sites doing their bit to raise public awareness of the threats involved.
Over at TorrentFreak you can find a compilation of websites that are participating in a self-imposed censorship/black-out campaign. I'm going to add links or images to those already covered by TorrentFreak as I come across them. Please feel free to contact me either in the comments, via Twitter or email with any more.
Those sites known to be taking part are in today's black-out are:
Wikipedia
Wikipedia, the student's friend, will be down for 24 hours (except for the pages about SOPA and PIPA)
Minecraft
Insanely addictive browser-based game Minecraft is down
Reddit
The community-powered news site, reddit, is down
Open Rights Group
The Open Rights Group are UK digital activists and they are making sure people know about these heinous bills
Wordpress
The creators of the blogging content management system of choice, Wordpress, are censored.
TorrentFreak
Even TorrentFreak themselves are making a stand. Lord knows, they've been inaccurately accused of being pirates enough times
Wired
Ever-popular tech site Wired are in self-imposed blackout mode
Craigslist
The classifieds service, Craigslist, is also making a stand
Rock, Paper, Shotgun
The video game review site Rock, Paper, Shotgun is down
The Oatmeal
Satirical comedy site The Oatmeal is down
Humble Bundle
Online independent games retailer HumbleBundle have gone dark
Wikia
The alternate pop-culture wiki-based encyclopaedia, Wikia, is protesting
XBMC
Makers of the free media centre resource, XBMC, have gone dark
Zeropaid
Piracy-based news site Zeropaid has blacked out
Demonoid
Long-running torrent site Demonoid is blacked out
Boing Boing
Cory Doctorow's Boing Boing site has gone offline
UKNova
UK-based TV catch-up torrent site UKNova had an interesting message for its users
Facebook
Mark Zuckerberg kinda supports the anti SOPA business but Facebook isn't quite going dark
Absolute Punk
The punks over at Absolute Punk are against SOPA
Liberal Conspiracy
Those good folks on the Left at Liberal Conspiracy are blacking out their homepage
Destructoid
The gaming site for gamers, by gamers, Destructoid is dark
Know Your Meme
Not to be outdone by a spreading meme, Know Your Meme actually became part of what they normally document
This Isn't Happiness
The photography/art-based propaganda site This Isn't Happiness embraced the darkness
imgur
As the easy way to share images, imgur was keen to protest
XKCD
Popular online comic site, XKCD, ran a blacked-out sketch
The Verge
The technology-focussed site, The Verge, voiced their opposition
TechCrunch
The AOL-owned technology blog TechCrunch had a colour make-over
Fark
Home to all things satirical, Fark went for a white out
4chan
The home of weirdness (and haters of censorship!) saw some weird things happen, but hey, that's 4chan for you
Funny or Die
Funny or Die's comedy site got serious about the censorship
GoDaddy
Sometime supporters of the bills, GoDaddy, demonstrated their (customer's !?!) commitment to the opposition
More to follow. Maybe...
Under the proposed legislation the US Attorney General would have the power to demand ISPS so block access to foreign websites suspected of dealing in pirated content, as well as making search engines delist such istes from the search indexes. Other powers include the blocking of payement services to accused sites too (and we all know what happened to Wikileaks when its funding services where blocked). If these standards were applied to several prominent US-based sites many of them would be in trouble (eg Tumblr, Wordpress, Blogger, Google, etc).
There have been some last minute amendments to the proposed bills but they haven't removed the threat to free speech entirely. That's why it's good to see several prominent sites doing their bit to raise public awareness of the threats involved.
Over at TorrentFreak you can find a compilation of websites that are participating in a self-imposed censorship/black-out campaign. I'm going to add links or images to those already covered by TorrentFreak as I come across them. Please feel free to contact me either in the comments, via Twitter or email with any more.
Those sites known to be taking part are in today's black-out are:
Wikipedia
Wikipedia, the student's friend, will be down for 24 hours (except for the pages about SOPA and PIPA)
Minecraft
Insanely addictive browser-based game Minecraft is down
The community-powered news site, reddit, is down
Open Rights Group
The Open Rights Group are UK digital activists and they are making sure people know about these heinous bills
Wordpress
The creators of the blogging content management system of choice, Wordpress, are censored.
Even TorrentFreak themselves are making a stand. Lord knows, they've been inaccurately accused of being pirates enough times
Wired
Ever-popular tech site Wired are in self-imposed blackout mode
Craigslist
The classifieds service, Craigslist, is also making a stand
Rock, Paper, Shotgun
The video game review site Rock, Paper, Shotgun is down
The Oatmeal
Satirical comedy site The Oatmeal is down
Humble Bundle
Online independent games retailer HumbleBundle have gone dark
Wikia
The alternate pop-culture wiki-based encyclopaedia, Wikia, is protesting
XBMC
Makers of the free media centre resource, XBMC, have gone dark
Zeropaid
Piracy-based news site Zeropaid has blacked out
Demonoid
Long-running torrent site Demonoid is blacked out
Boing Boing
Cory Doctorow's Boing Boing site has gone offline
UKNova
UK-based TV catch-up torrent site UKNova had an interesting message for its users
Mark Zuckerberg kinda supports the anti SOPA business but Facebook isn't quite going dark
Absolute Punk
The punks over at Absolute Punk are against SOPA
Liberal Conspiracy
Those good folks on the Left at Liberal Conspiracy are blacking out their homepage
Destructoid
The gaming site for gamers, by gamers, Destructoid is dark
Know Your Meme
Not to be outdone by a spreading meme, Know Your Meme actually became part of what they normally document
This Isn't Happiness
The photography/art-based propaganda site This Isn't Happiness embraced the darkness
imgur
As the easy way to share images, imgur was keen to protest
XKCD
Popular online comic site, XKCD, ran a blacked-out sketch
The Verge
The technology-focussed site, The Verge, voiced their opposition
TechCrunch
The AOL-owned technology blog TechCrunch had a colour make-over
Fark
Home to all things satirical, Fark went for a white out
4chan
The home of weirdness (and haters of censorship!) saw some weird things happen, but hey, that's 4chan for you
Funny or Die
Funny or Die's comedy site got serious about the censorship
GoDaddy
Sometime supporters of the bills, GoDaddy, demonstrated their (customer's !?!) commitment to the opposition
More to follow. Maybe...
1 comment:
Australia is known to have a very large population of players of pokies.
The name pokies originated from the game poker though in Australia it is generally used to mean all forms of slots.
Online pokies provide complete comfort to players. With these, you don’t have to leave your house so that you can play.
Many casinos in Australia now provide their members with the chance to play pokies online hence the players are able to
enjoy their favourite games from the comfort of their home. In fact, the online casino Australia population can now enjoy
playing virtually all their favourite casino games from an online casino in the region.
you need more info visit this link
www.casinopokies777.com
mene tänne
Post a Comment