Protests against SOPA and PIPA
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On January 18, 2012, a series of coordinated protests occurred against two proposed laws in the
United States Congress The United States Congress is the legislature, legislative branch of the federal government of the United States. It is a Bicameralism, bicameral legislature, including a Lower house, lower body, the United States House of Representatives, ...
—the
Stop Online Piracy Act The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) was a proposed United States congressional bill to expand the ability of U.S. law enforcement to combat online copyright infringement and online trafficking in counterfeit goods. Introduced on October 26, 20 ...
(SOPA) and the
PROTECT IP Act The PROTECT IP Act (Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property Act, or PIPA) was a proposed law with the stated goal of giving the US government and copyright holders additional tools to curb acce ...
(PIPA). These followed smaller protests in late 2011. Protests were based on concerns that the bills, intended to provide more robust responses to
copyright infringement Copyright infringement (at times referred to as piracy) is the use of Copyright#Scope, works protected by copyright without permission for a usage where such permission is required, thereby infringing certain exclusive rights granted to the c ...
(also known as piracy) arising outside the United States, contained measures that could possibly infringe online freedom of speech,
website A website (also written as a web site) is any web page whose content is identified by a common domain name and is published on at least one web server. Websites are typically dedicated to a particular topic or purpose, such as news, educatio ...
s, and Internet communities. Protesters also argued that there were insufficient safeguards in place to protect sites based upon
user-generated content User-generated content (UGC), alternatively known as user-created content (UCC), emerged from the rise of web services which allow a system's User (computing), users to create Content (media), content, such as images, videos, audio, text, testi ...
. The move to a formal protest was initiated when
Fight for the Future Fight for the Future (often abbreviated fightfortheftr or FFTF) is a nonprofit advocacy organization, advocacy group in the area of digital rights founded in 2011. The group aims to promote causes related to copyright legislation, as well as ...
organized thousands of the most popular websites in the world, including the
English Wikipedia The English Wikipedia is the primary English-language edition of Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia. It was created by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger on 15 January 2001, as Wikipedia's first edition. English Wikipedia is hosted alongside o ...
, to temporarily close or interrupt their content and redirect users to a message opposing the proposed legislation. Websites such as
Google Google LLC (, ) is an American multinational corporation and technology company focusing on online advertising, search engine technology, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, consumer electronics, and artificial ...
,
Reddit Reddit ( ) is an American Proprietary software, proprietary social news news aggregator, aggregation and Internet forum, forum Social media, social media platform. Registered users (commonly referred to as "redditors") submit content to the ...
,
Mozilla Mozilla is a free software community founded in 1998 by members of Netscape. The Mozilla community uses, develops, publishes and supports Mozilla products, thereby promoting free software and open standards. The community is supported institution ...
, and
Flickr Flickr ( ) is an image hosting service, image and Online video platform, video hosting service, as well as an online community, founded in Canada and headquartered in the United States. It was created by Ludicorp in 2004 and was previously a co ...
soon featured protests against the acts. Some shut down completely, while others kept some or all of their content accessible. According to Fight for the Future, more than 115,000 websites joined the Internet protest.Wortham, Jenna (2012-01-19)
"Public outcry over antipiracy bills began as grassroots grumbling"
. ''New York Times''. Retrieved 2012-01-21.
In addition to the online protests, there were simultaneous physical demonstrations in several U.S. cities, including New York City, San Francisco and Seattle, and separately during December 2011 a mass boycott of then-supporter
GoDaddy GoDaddy Inc. is an American publicly traded Internet Domain name registry, domain registry, Domain name registrar, domain registrar and web hosting company headquartered in Tempe, Arizona, and incorporated in Delaware. GoDaddy is the world's fif ...
. The protests were reported globally. The January protest, initially planned to coincide with the first SOPA hearing of the year, drew publicity and reaction. Days prior to the action, the White House issued a statement that it would "not support legislation that reduces freedom of expression, increases cybersecurity risk, or undermines the dynamic, innovative global Internet." On January 18, 2012, itself, more than 8 million people looked up their representative on Wikipedia, 3 million people emailed Congress to express opposition to the bills, more than 1 million messages were sent to Congress through the
Electronic Frontier Foundation The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is an American international non-profit digital rights group based in San Francisco, California. It was founded in 1990 to promote Internet civil liberties. It provides funds for legal defense in court, ...
, an online petition at Google recorded over 4.5 million signatures,
Twitter Twitter, officially known as X since 2023, is an American microblogging and social networking service. It is one of the world's largest social media platforms and one of the most-visited websites. Users can share short text messages, image ...
recorded at least 2.4 million SOPA-related tweets, and lawmakers collected "more than 14 million names—more than 10 million of them voters—who contacted them to protest" the bills. During and after the January protest, a number of politicians who had previously supported the bills expressed concerns with the proposals in their existing form, while others withdrew their support entirely. Internationally, "scathing" criticism of the bills was voiced from
World Wide Web The World Wide Web (WWW or simply the Web) is an information system that enables Content (media), content sharing over the Internet through user-friendly ways meant to appeal to users beyond Information technology, IT specialists and hobbyis ...
inventor
Sir Tim Berners-Lee Sir Timothy John Berners-Lee (born 8 June 1955), also known as TimBL, is an English computer scientist best known as the inventor of the World Wide Web, the HTML markup language, the URL system, and HTTP. He is a professorial research fellow ...
, as well as the European Commissioner for the Digital Agenda. Some observers were critical of the tactics used; the ''
Boston Herald The ''Boston Herald'' is an American conservative daily newspaper whose primary market is Boston, Massachusetts, and its surrounding area. It was founded in 1846 and is one of the oldest daily newspapers in the United States. It has been awarde ...
'' described the service withdrawals as evidence of "how very powerful these cyber-bullies can be."
Motion Picture Association of America The Motion Picture Association (MPA) is an American trade association representing the Major film studios, five major film studios of the Cinema of the United States, United States, the Major film studios#Mini-majors, mini-major Amazon MGM Stud ...
Chairman
Chris Dodd Christopher John Dodd (born May 27, 1944) is an American lobbyist, lawyer, and Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party politician who served as a United States senator from Connecticut from 1981 to 2011. Dodd is the List of United Sta ...
stated that the coordinated shutdown was "an abuse of power given the freedoms these companies enjoy in the marketplace today." Others such as ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'' saw the protests as "a political coming of age for the tech industry." By January 20, 2012, the political environment regarding both bills had shifted significantly. The bills were removed from further voting, ostensibly to be revised to take into consideration the issues raised, but according to ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'', it was probably "shelved" following a "flight away from the bill". Opponents of the bills noted that they had been "indefinitely postponed" but cautioned that they were "not dead" and "
ould Ould is an English surname as well as an element of many Arabic names. In Arabic contexts it is a transliteration of the word wikt:ولد, ولد, meaning "son". Notable people with this surname include: English surname * Edward Ould (1852–190 ...
return".


Background


Background to bills

The
Stop Online Piracy Act The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) was a proposed United States congressional bill to expand the ability of U.S. law enforcement to combat online copyright infringement and online trafficking in counterfeit goods. Introduced on October 26, 20 ...
(SOPA) and the
PROTECT IP Act The PROTECT IP Act (Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property Act, or PIPA) was a proposed law with the stated goal of giving the US government and copyright holders additional tools to curb acce ...
(PIPA) are bills that were introduced into the
United States House of Representatives The United States House of Representatives is a chamber of the Bicameralism, bicameral United States Congress; it is the lower house, with the U.S. Senate being the upper house. Together, the House and Senate have the authority under Artic ...
and the
United States Senate The United States Senate is a chamber of the Bicameralism, bicameral United States Congress; it is the upper house, with the United States House of Representatives, U.S. House of Representatives being the lower house. Together, the Senate and ...
in the last quarter of 2011. Both are responses to the problem of enforcement of U.S. laws against websites outside U.S. jurisdiction. While the
Digital Millennium Copyright Act The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is a 1998 United States copyright law that implements two 1996 treaties of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). It criminalizes production and dissemination of technology, devices, or ...
(DMCA) and other existing laws have generally been considered effective against illegal content or activities on U.S.-based sites, action is more difficult against overseas websites. SOPA and PIPA proposed to rectify this by cutting off infringing sites from their U.S.-based funding (particularly
advertising Advertising is the practice and techniques employed to bring attention to a Product (business), product or Service (economics), service. Advertising aims to present a product or service in terms of utility, advantages, and qualities of int ...
),
payment processor A payment processor is a system that enables financial transactions, commonly employed by a merchant, to handle transactions with customers from various channels such as credit cards and debit cards or bank accounts. They are usually broken do ...
s, appearances on
search engine A search engine is a software system that provides hyperlinks to web pages, and other relevant information on World Wide Web, the Web in response to a user's web query, query. The user enters a query in a web browser or a mobile app, and the sea ...
s, and visibility on
web browser A web browser, often shortened to browser, is an application for accessing websites. When a user requests a web page from a particular website, the browser retrieves its files from a web server and then displays the page on the user's scr ...
s, instead. Major providers of all these services are predominantly U.S.-based. Notably, the provisions also involved modifying the
Domain Name System The Domain Name System (DNS) is a hierarchical and distributed name service that provides a naming system for computers, services, and other resources on the Internet or other Internet Protocol (IP) networks. It associates various information ...
, a crucial service that underpins the entire Internet and allows computers to locate each other reliably around the world. Supporters included, but were not limited to, media companies and industry associations such as the
Motion Picture Association of America The Motion Picture Association (MPA) is an American trade association representing the Major film studios, five major film studios of the Cinema of the United States, United States, the Major film studios#Mini-majors, mini-major Amazon MGM Stud ...
, the
Recording Industry Association of America The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/o ...
and the
Entertainment Software Association The Entertainment Software Association (ESA) is the trade association of the video game industry in the United States. It was formed in April 1994 as the Interactive Digital Software Association (IDSA) and renamed on July 21, 2003. It is based in ...
. Supporters generally identified a need to have more effective laws to combat the illegal domestic sales of products and services, the counterfeiting and sale of products (such as prescription drugs, athletic shoes, and cosmetics), and worldwide copyright infringing activities which were problematic to prevent inasmuch as they originated outside the United States. Those opposed included a mixture of technology and Internet firms and associations, content creators such as the
Wikipedia community The Wikipedia community, collectively and individually known as Wikipedians, is an online community of volunteers who create and maintain Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia. Wikipedians may or may not consider themselves part of the Wikimedia mo ...
,
free software Free software, libre software, libreware sometimes known as freedom-respecting software is computer software distributed open-source license, under terms that allow users to run the software for any purpose as well as to study, change, distribut ...
authors,
free speech Freedom of speech is a principle that supports the freedom of an individual or a community to articulate their opinions and ideas without fear of retaliation, censorship, or legal sanction. The right to freedom of expression has been recognise ...
organizations, lawmakers, and other websites and organizations, as well as members of the public using their services. They generally identified two main areas of severe side-effects: (1) effects on Internet websites, communities and user-generated content, and (2) effects on critically fundamental internet architecture and security: * ''Effects on websites, web communities and user-generated content'' The scope, language, definitions, procedures, remedies, and provision for
immunity Immunity may refer to: Medicine * Immunity (medical), resistance of an organism to infection or disease * ''Immunity'' (journal), a scientific journal published by Cell Press Biology * Immune system Engineering * Radiofrequence immunity ...
following wrongful allegations was seen as insufficiently narrow and well-defined. Legal analysts suggested that draconian court orders could be obtained without undue difficulty to "take down" an entire site, without dialog or notification, due process, or liability for compensation if incorrect, even if the site were legitimate. Perceived consequences included serious undermining of free speech on the Internet, devastation of the Internet's communities, and widespread closure and chilling of websites, particularly those including user-created content or organizations such as
libraries A library is a collection of Book, books, and possibly other Document, materials and Media (communication), media, that is accessible for use by its members and members of allied institutions. Libraries provide physical (hard copies) or electron ...
providing reference information. Observers also noted the laws could be used strategically against legitimate competitors or during
election An election is a formal group decision-making process whereby a population chooses an individual or multiple individuals to hold Public administration, public office. Elections have been the usual mechanism by which modern representative d ...
s. * ''Effects on critical Internet architecture'' Technical experts testified that the proposed DNS measures conflicted with the fundamental basis of the Internet and would "break" ongoing attempts to make the net more secure against malicious use.
Google Google LLC (, ) is an American multinational corporation and technology company focusing on online advertising, search engine technology, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, consumer electronics, and artificial ...
's policy director, Bob Boorstin, stated that a site like
YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...
supporting user-generated content "would just go dark immediately" to comply with the legislation.
Tumblr Tumblr (pronounced "tumbler") is a microblogging and Social networking service, social networking website founded by David Karp in 2007 and is owned by American company Automattic. The service allows users to post multimedia and other content ...
, one of the first websites active in grassroots activism against the bills, added a feature that "censored" its website on November 16, 2011, and the
social media Social media are interactive technologies that facilitate the Content creation, creation, information exchange, sharing and news aggregator, aggregation of Content (media), content (such as ideas, interests, and other forms of expression) amongs ...
aggregator
Reddit Reddit ( ) is an American Proprietary software, proprietary social news news aggregator, aggregation and Internet forum, forum Social media, social media platform. Registered users (commonly referred to as "redditors") submit content to the ...
also became deeply involved.


Legislative and protest timeline

On November 16, 2011, a first hearing by the U.S. House Judiciary Committee was marked by online protests involving blackened website banners, popularly described as "American Censorship Day." On December 15, 2011, the first House Judiciary Committee mark-up hearing took place for SOPA, prior to its eventual move to the House floor. During the markup session, several proposed amendments to address technological and other concerns were defeated. The mark-up process was put on hold to be resumed after the new year. Around this time, numerous websites began displaying banners and messages promoting their readerships to contact Congress to stop the progress of the bill, and some websites began to discuss or endorse a possible "Internet blackout" before any vote on SOPA in the House, as a means of further protest.
Reddit Reddit ( ) is an American Proprietary software, proprietary social news news aggregator, aggregation and Internet forum, forum Social media, social media platform. Registered users (commonly referred to as "redditors") submit content to the ...
was the first major site to announce an "Internet blackout" for January 18, 2012, and several other sites shortly followed, coordinating actions for that day. A notable political response to the November 2011 protests was the outlining in early December of a
bipartisan Bipartisanship, sometimes referred to as nonpartisanship, is a political situation, usually in the context of a two-party system (especially those of the United States and some other western countries), in which opposing Political party, politica ...
third, alternative, bill with the support of technology companies such as
Google Google LLC (, ) is an American multinational corporation and technology company focusing on online advertising, search engine technology, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, consumer electronics, and artificial ...
and
Facebook Facebook is a social media and social networking service owned by the American technology conglomerate Meta Platforms, Meta. Created in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with four other Harvard College students and roommates, Eduardo Saverin, Andre ...
, which unusually had been posted on the Internet to allow public comment and suggestions in light of the widespread protests related to the SOPA and PIPA bills. It was formally introduced as the
Online Protection and Enforcement of Digital Trade Act The Online Protection and Enforcement of Digital Trade Act (OPEN Act) is a bill introduced in the United States Congress proposed as an alternative to the Stop Online Piracy Act and PROTECT IP Act, by Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon, a Democrat ...
(OPEN) in the Senate on December 17 by Senator
Ron Wyden Ronald Lee Wyden ( ; born May 3, 1949) is an American politician serving as the Seniority in the United States Senate, senior United States Senate, United States senator from Oregon, a seat he has held since 1996 United States Senate special el ...
and in the House on January 18 by Representative
Darrell Issa Darrell Edward Issa ( ; born November 1, 1953) is an American businessman and politician serving as the U.S. representative for California's 48th congressional district. He represented the 50th congressional district from 2021 to 2023. A memb ...
. It proposed placing enforcement in the hands of the
United States International Trade Commission The United States International Trade Commission (USITC or I.T.C.) is an agency of the United States federal government that advises the legislative and executive branches on matters of trade. It was created by Congress in 1916 as the U.S. Tari ...
, keeping provisions that targeted payments and advertising for infringing websites, and tightly targeted wording to avoid many other key areas of concern with SOPA and PIPA. Online discussions of a blackout and concerns over the bills continued unabated after the markup hearing and increased in prominence. On January 11, 2012, Senator
Patrick Leahy Patrick Joseph Leahy ( ; born March 31, 1940) is an American politician and attorney who represented Vermont in the United States Senate from 1975 to 2023. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he also was the pr ...
, the main sponsor for PIPA, said of the DNS filtering provision, "I will therefore propose that the positive and negative effects of this provision be studied before implemented", reported by some papers as removal of those provisions. Opposers deemed this a tactical withdrawal allowing reintroduction at a later stage and ignoring other concerns as well as provisions in PIPA, and evidence that the bill had not been understood or checked by its own creators and that proposals for a blackout were gaining impact. Momentum for the protests continued unchanged since the bills had merely been postponed, and due to their other contentious provisions.


Protests of November 16, 2011 ("American Censorship Day")

On November 16, 2011, SOPA was discussed by the U.S.
House Committee on the Judiciary The U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary, also called the House Judiciary Committee, is a standing committee of the United States House of Representatives. It is charged with overseeing the administration of justice within the federal courts, f ...
.
Tumblr Tumblr (pronounced "tumbler") is a microblogging and Social networking service, social networking website founded by David Karp in 2007 and is owned by American company Automattic. The service allows users to post multimedia and other content ...
, Mozilla,
Techdirt Techdirt is an American Internet blog that reports on technology's legal challenges and related business and economic policy issues, in context of the digital revolution. It focuses on intellectual property, patent, information privacy and copyr ...
, and the
Center for Democracy and Technology Center for Democracy & Technology (CDT) is a Washington, D.C.–based 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that advocates for digital rights and freedom of expression. CDT seeks to promote legislation that enables individuals to use the Internet for ...
were among many Internet companies who protested by participating in 'American Censorship Day', by displaying black banners over their site logos with the words "STOP CENSORSHIP."


December 2011 boycott of GoDaddy

On December 22, 2011, users at
Reddit Reddit ( ) is an American Proprietary software, proprietary social news news aggregator, aggregation and Internet forum, forum Social media, social media platform. Registered users (commonly referred to as "redditors") submit content to the ...
proposed a
boycott A boycott is an act of nonviolent resistance, nonviolent, voluntary abstention from a product, person, organisation, or country as an expression of protest. It is usually for Morality, moral, society, social, politics, political, or Environmenta ...
and a public day for switching away from then–SOPA supporter
GoDaddy GoDaddy Inc. is an American publicly traded Internet Domain name registry, domain registry, Domain name registrar, domain registrar and web hosting company headquartered in Tempe, Arizona, and incorporated in Delaware. GoDaddy is the world's fif ...
, the largest
ICANN The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN ) is a global multistakeholder group and nonprofit organization headquartered in the United States responsible for coordinating the maintenance and procedures of several dat ...
-accredited registrar in the world, known as Move Your Domain Day. The date was later set as December 29, 2011. Popular websites that moved domains included
Imgur Imgur ( , stylized as imgur) is an American online image sharing and image hosting service with a focus on social gossip that was founded by Alan Schaaf in 2009. The service has hosted viral images and memes, particularly those posted on ...
, the
Wikimedia Foundation The Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. (WMF) is an American 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization headquartered in San Francisco, California, and registered there as foundation (United States law), a charitable foundation. It is the host of Wikipedia, th ...
, and Cheezburger—which stated it would remove over 1,000 domains from GoDaddy if they continued their support of SOPA. On December 23, 2011, GoDaddy withdrew its support for SOPA, releasing a statement saying "GoDaddy will support it when and if the Internet community supports it." CEO Warren Adelman stated when asked, that he couldn't commit to changing GoDaddy's position on the record in Congress, but said "I'll take that back to our legislative guys, but I agree that's an important step," when pressed, he said "We're going to step back and let others take leadership roles." Further outrage was due to the fact that many Internet sites would be subject to shutdowns under SOPA, but GoDaddy is in a narrow class of exempted businesses that would have immunity, whereas many other domain operators would not. On December 26, 2011, a
Google bomb The terms Google bombing and Google washing refer to the practice of causing a website to rank highly in web search engine results for irrelevant, unrelated or off-topic search terms. In contrast, search engine optimization (SEO) is the practic ...
was started against GoDaddy to remove them from the No. 1 place on Google for the term "Domain Registration" in retaliation for supporting SOPA. This was then disseminated through
Hacker News Hacker News (HN) is a social news website focusing on computer science and entrepreneurship. It is run by the investment fund and startup incubator Y Combinator. In general, content that can be submitted is defined as "anything that gratifies one' ...
. Reddit users noted that by December 22, 2011, SOPA supporters were discovering the backlash that could arise from ignoring social media users. Reports up to December 29, 2011, described GoDaddy as "hemorrhaging" customers. On December 25, 2011, (Christmas Day) GoDaddy lost a net 16,191 domains as a result of the boycott. However, on December 29, 2011, itself, GoDaddy gained a net of 20,748 domains, twice as many as it lost that day, attributed by Techdirt to a number of causes, in particular customers having moved early, and an appeased customer response to their change of position over SOPA.


Protests of January 18, 2012


Protestors


Wikimedia community

On December 10, 2011,
Wikipedia Wikipedia is a free content, free Online content, online encyclopedia that is written and maintained by a community of volunteers, known as Wikipedians, through open collaboration and the wiki software MediaWiki. Founded by Jimmy Wales and La ...
co-founder
Jimmy Wales Jimmy Donal Wales (born August 7, 1966), also known as Jimbo Wales, is an American List of Internet entrepreneurs, Internet entrepreneur and former Trader (finance), financial trader. He is a Founders of Wikipedia, co-founder of the non-profi ...
drew attention to concerns over SOPA, which he described as a "much worse law" than the '' DDL intercettazioni'' (Wiretapping Bill) in Italy some months earlier, and which was being fast-tracked through the
United States Congress The United States Congress is the legislature, legislative branch of the federal government of the United States. It is a Bicameralism, bicameral legislature, including a Lower house, lower body, the United States House of Representatives, ...
under a "misleading title". He stated he was attending high-level meetings on this, and wanted to gauge the sense of the English Wikipedia community on the issue, and specifically on the question of a blackout similar to that held successfully in October 2011 by
Italian Wikipedia The Italian Wikipedia () is the Italian language, Italian-language edition of Wikipedia. This edition was created on 10 May 2001, and first edited on 11 June 2001. As of , it has articles and more than registered accounts. It is the -largest W ...
editors over the proposed media censorship law in that country: Following initial informal discussions which resulted in a positive response, a formal consultation titled "SOPA Initiative" was opened by the community to consider specific proposals and preferred options. These included matters such as location (United States only or worldwide), and whether content should be disabled completely or still accessible after a click-through page. Eventually, the discussion led to a decision strongly in favor of a 24-hour global blackout of the site on January 18, 2012, disabling normal reading and editing functions, affirmed in a vote of approximately 1,800 editors. The blocking action was purposely not complete; users could access Wikipedia content from the mobile interface or mirror sites, or if they disabled
JavaScript JavaScript (), often abbreviated as JS, is a programming language and core technology of the World Wide Web, alongside HTML and CSS. Ninety-nine percent of websites use JavaScript on the client side for webpage behavior. Web browsers have ...
or other web browser functions. Within hours of the start of the blackout, many websites posted instructions for disabling the banner, by altering URLs, using browser add-ons such as
Adblock Plus Adblock Plus (ABP) is a free and open-source browser extension for content-filtering and ad blocking. It is developed by Eyeo GmbH, a German software company. The extension has been released for Mozilla Firefox (including mobile), Google Chro ...
or Greasemonkey, or interrupting the page from loading completely. The vote formally affected the English Wikipedia only, other language editions and Wikimedia projects were left free to decide whether to hold their own protests given the potential worldwide impact of the legislation, with technical support on offer from the Foundation. On January 17, 2012, Jimmy Wales affirmed the results of the community's decision and that the
Wikimedia Foundation The Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. (WMF) is an American 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization headquartered in San Francisco, California, and registered there as foundation (United States law), a charitable foundation. It is the host of Wikipedia, th ...
, which hosts the English Wikipedia website, would support the community's decision. He called for a "public uprising" against the proposed legislation, which critics feared would threaten free speech. He added that factors such as funding or donations had not been part of the community's considerations, but the matter had arisen as "a principled stand" from the community, and that in his view "our best long-term prospect for Wikipedia in terms of our survival... depends on us being principled." He commented on editors' reasons for the decision: Wikimedia Executive Director
Sue Gardner Sue Gardner (born May 11, 1967) is a Canadian journalist, not-for-profit executive and business executive. She was the executive director of the Wikimedia Foundation from December 2007 until May 2014, and before that was the director of the C ...
posted an announcement of the Foundation's support for the blackout proposal on Wikimedia's blog. The post received over 7000 responses from the general public within the first 24 hours of its posting. The blackout was to run for 24 hours starting at 05:00 UTC (
midnight Midnight is the transition time from one day to the next – the moment when the date changes, on the local official clock time for any particular jurisdiction. By clock time, midnight is the opposite of noon, differing from it by 12 hours. ...
Eastern Standard Time The Eastern Time Zone (ET) is a time zone encompassing part or all of 23 states in the eastern part of the United States, parts of eastern Canada, and the state of Quintana Roo in Mexico. * Eastern Standard Time (EST) is five hours behind ...
) on January 18, 2012. Despite the support of those polled for the action, a small number of Wikipedia editors blacked out their own user profile pages or resigned their administrative positions in protest of the blackout; one editor stated his "main concern is that it puts the organization in the role of advocacy, and that's a slippery slope". Approximately 90% out of the 2097 editors who took part in the votes supported joining the blackout action. It is estimated that only less than half the voters were from the United States, which suggests that Wikipedia acted as a platform for an international community to express its opinion. The most common rationale expressed by about a fifth of the editors was the sentiment that "SOPA was perceived as a worldwide threat". A majority of editors who opposed the participation were concerned with the perceived dissonance between Wikipedia's encyclopedic ethos, neutrality and active participation in a political issue (sentiment endorsed by about 4% of the vote participants); only 0.3% of participating editors suggested they support a tougher copyright regime.


Other websites

According to protest organizer ''Fight for the Future'', more than 115,000 websites participated in the protest, including Google and Firefox. Websites that participated in the blackout included Cheezburger,
Craigslist Craigslist (stylized as craigslist) is a privately held American company operating a classified advertisements website with sections devoted to jobs, housing, for sale, items wanted, services, community service, gigs, résumés, and discussi ...
,
Boing Boing ''Boing Boing'' is a website, first established as a zine in 1988, later becoming a group blog. Common topics and themes include technology, futurism, science fiction, gadgets, intellectual property, Disney, and left-wing politics. It twice wo ...
,
A Softer World ''A Softer World'' is a webcomic by the writer Joey Comeau and artist Emily Horne, both Canadians. It was first published online on 7 February 2003 and was released three times a week until its end in June 2015. Before starting the website in 2 ...
, Cake Wrecks, Cyanide & Happiness, Demand Progress,
Destructoid ''Destructoid'' is a website that was founded as a video game-focused blog in March 2006 by Yanier Gonzalez, a Cuban-American cartoonist and author. Enthusiast Gaming acquired the website in 2017 and sold it to Gamurs Group in 2022. Histor ...
,
Entertainment Consumers Association Entertainment Consumers Association (ECA) is a United States–based non-partisan, non-government, non-profit organization dedicated to the interests of individuals who play computer and video games in the United States and Canada. History Hal ...
, Free Press, Failblog,
Newgrounds Newgrounds is an American entertainment website founded by Tom Fulp in 1995 and owned by Newgrounds.com, Inc. The site hosts user-generated content such as games, films, audio, and artwork. Fulp produces in-house content at the headquarters and ...
, Good.is, GOG.com,
GamesRadar ''GamesRadar+'' (formerly ''GamesRadar'') is an entertainment website for video game-related news, previews, and reviews. It is owned by Future plc. In late 2014, Future Publishing-owned sites ''Total Film'', '' SFX'', '' Edge'' and ''Computer ...
,
Internet Archive The Internet Archive is an American 501(c)(3) organization, non-profit organization founded in 1996 by Brewster Kahle that runs a digital library website, archive.org. It provides free access to collections of digitized media including web ...
,
Marxists Internet Archive Marxists Internet Archive, also known as MIA or Marxists.org, is a non-profit online encyclopedia that hosts a multilingual library (created in 1990) of the works of communist, anarchist, and socialist writers, such as Karl Marx, Friedrich Enge ...
, Jay is Games,
Mojang Mojang AB, trading as Mojang Studios, is a Swedish video game developer based in Stockholm. A first-party developer for Xbox Game Studios, the studio is best known for developing the sandbox and survival game ''Minecraft'', the best-selli ...
, MoveOn.org,
Mozilla Mozilla is a free software community founded in 1998 by members of Netscape. The Mozilla community uses, develops, publishes and supports Mozilla products, thereby promoting free software and open standards. The community is supported institution ...
,
MS Paint Adventures ''MS Paint Adventures'', abbreviated ''MSPAdventures'' or ''MSPA'', was a website and collection of webcomics written and illustrated by Andrew Hussie. According to some estimates, in April 2016 ''MS Paint Adventures'' was the largest collection ...
,
Rate Your Music Rate Your Music (often abbreviated to RYM) is an online encyclopedia of music releases and films. Users can catalog items from their personal collection, review them, and assign ratings in a five-star rating system. The site also features comm ...
,
Reddit Reddit ( ) is an American Proprietary software, proprietary social news news aggregator, aggregation and Internet forum, forum Social media, social media platform. Registered users (commonly referred to as "redditors") submit content to the ...
,
Roblox Roblox (, ) is an online game platform and game creation system developed by Roblox Corporation that allows users to program and play games created by themselves or other users. It was created by David Baszucki and Erik Cassel in 200 ...
,
Oh No They Didn't Oh No They Didn't, also known as ONTD, is the largest community on LiveJournal with over 100,000 members. The community focuses on celebrity gossip and popular culture, pop culture with most of its posts aggregated from other gossip blogs. The sit ...
,
Tucows Tucows Inc. is an American-Canadian publicly traded Internet services and telecommunications company headquartered in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, and incorporated in Pennsylvania, United States. The company is composed of three independent business ...
, blip.tv,
Tumblr Tumblr (pronounced "tumbler") is a microblogging and Social networking service, social networking website founded by David Karp in 2007 and is owned by American company Automattic. The service allows users to post multimedia and other content ...
, TwitPic,
Twitter Twitter, officially known as X since 2023, is an American microblogging and social networking service. It is one of the world's largest social media platforms and one of the most-visited websites. Users can share short text messages, image ...
, The Oatmeal, VGMusic,
Wikia Fandom (formerly known as Wikicities and Wikia) is a wiki hosting service that hosts wikis mainly on entertainment topics (i.e., video games, TV series, movies, entertainers, etc.). The Privately held company, privately held for-profit Delaware ...
,
WordPress WordPress (WP, or WordPress.org) is a web content management system. It was originally created as a tool to publish blogs but has evolved to support publishing other web content, including more traditional websites, electronic mailing list, ma ...
, the webcomic
xkcd ''xkcd'' is a serial webcomic created in 2005 by American author Randall Munroe. Sometimes styled ''XKCD'', the comic's tagline describes it as "a webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language". Munroe states on the comic's website that the ...
as well as the corporate site of the
Linux Linux ( ) is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an kernel (operating system), operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically package manager, pac ...
distribution
openSUSE openSUSE () is a free and open-source software, free and open-source Linux distribution developed by the openSUSE project. It is offered in two main variations: ''Tumbleweed'', an upstream rolling release distribution, and ''Leap'', a stable r ...
and the congressional websites of
Silicon Valley Silicon Valley is a region in Northern California that is a global center for high technology and innovation. Located in the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area, it corresponds roughly to the geographical area of the Santa Clara Valley ...
representatives
Anna Eshoo Anna A. Eshoo ( ; née Georges; born December 13, 1942) is an American politician who served as the United States House of Representatives, U.S. representative for from 1993 to 2025. She is a member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democ ...
and
Zoe Lofgren Susan Ellen "Zoe" Lofgren ( ; born December 21, 1947) is an American politician and lawyer serving as a United States House of Representatives, U.S. representative from California. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Part ...
.
Google Google LLC (, ) is an American multinational corporation and technology company focusing on online advertising, search engine technology, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, consumer electronics, and artificial ...
announced their intention to join the blackout by altering their logo for US visitors for the day, almost entirely obscuring it with an interactive black redaction swath. Clicking through the specially designed logo took readers to an informational page about the bills, and the opportunity to sign a petition to be sent to Congress stating their concerns. The
Mozilla Foundation The Mozilla Foundation is an American non-profit organization that exists to support and collectively lead the Open-source software, open source Mozilla project. Founded in July 2003, the organization sets the policies that govern development, ...
altered the default start page of their
Firefox Mozilla Firefox, or simply Firefox, is a free and open-source web browser developed by the Mozilla Foundation and its subsidiary, the Mozilla Corporation. It uses the Gecko rendering engine to display web pages, which implements curr ...
web browser, blacking it out and providing links with more information on the SOPA/PIPA bills and the opposition to them, and to allow users to email their Congressional representatives.
Mojang Mojang AB, trading as Mojang Studios, is a Swedish video game developer based in Stockholm. A first-party developer for Xbox Game Studios, the studio is best known for developing the sandbox and survival game ''Minecraft'', the best-selli ...
's bestselling game ''
Minecraft ''Minecraft'' is a 2011 sandbox game developed and published by the Swedish video game developer Mojang Studios. Originally created by Markus Persson, Markus "Notch" Persson using the Java (programming language), Java programming language, the ...
'' made a splash text that said "SOPA means LOSER in Swedish!" ''
Wired Wired may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Music * ''Wired'' (Jeff Beck album), 1976 * ''Wired'' (Hugh Cornwell album), 1993 * ''Wired'' (Mallory Knox album), 2017 * "Wired", a song by Prism from their album '' Beat Street'' * "Wired ...
'' magazine's online site used Javascript to place black bars on most of the text on their page, as if the text were redacted. Outside of their key article regarding SOPA/PIPA, readers could remove the bars with a mouse click. The photo-sharing website
Flickr Flickr ( ) is an image hosting service, image and Online video platform, video hosting service, as well as an online community, founded in Canada and headquartered in the United States. It was created by Ludicorp in 2004 and was previously a co ...
created the ability for a registered user to "censor" an unlimited number (up from an initial limit of ten) of photos. The user-selected photographs were greyed out and included informational text, as a demonstration of how SOPA/PIPA regulation would affect the site.
4chan 4chan is an anonymous English-language imageboard website. Launched by Christopher "moot" Poole in October 2003, the site hosts boards dedicated to a wide variety of topics, from video games and television to literature, cooking, weapons, mu ...
ran a banner and "censored" posts by users on all image boards, which could be viewed by hovering over them. A video was circulated by the League for Gamers (founded by Mark Kern and supported by ScrewAttack, ''
Extra Credits ''Extra Credits'' is a video lesson web series, series currently run by Matthew Krol and Geoffrey Zatkin, narrated by Matthew Krol, with artists Scott DeWitt, Nick DeWitt, David "D" Hueso, and Ali R. Thome and Jordan Martin and writers Robert Ra ...
'', and '' LoadingReadyRun'') protesting the
Entertainment Software Association The Entertainment Software Association (ESA) is the trade association of the video game industry in the United States. It was formed in April 1994 as the Interactive Digital Software Association (IDSA) and renamed on July 21, 2003. It is based in ...
's support of SOPA by gathering support to boycott the ESA's popular E3 convention.


Physical demonstrations

In addition to the online blackouts, protests in cities such as New York City, San Francisco, and Seattle were held on January 18 to raise awareness of the two bills. A series of pickets against the bills were held at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow. Two picketers were arrested.


Reaction


Pre-protest

The announcement of the blackout was reported worldwide. Media that covered the story included ABC Australia,
CBC CBC may refer to: Media * Cadena Baja California or Grupo Cadena, a radio and television broadcaster in Mexico * Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Canada's radio and television public broadcaster ** CBC Television ** CBC Radio One ** CBC Music ** ...
,
BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...
, ''
der Spiegel (, , stylized in all caps) is a German weekly news magazine published in Hamburg. With a weekly circulation of about 724,000 copies in 2022, it is one of the largest such publications in Europe. It was founded in 1947 by John Seymour Chaloner ...
'', ''
Le Figaro () is a French daily morning newspaper founded in 1826. It was named after Figaro, a character in several plays by polymath Pierre Beaumarchais, Beaumarchais (1732–1799): ''Le Barbier de Séville'', ''The Guilty Mother, La Mère coupable'', ...
'', ''
Le Monde (; ) is a mass media in France, French daily afternoon list of newspapers in France, newspaper. It is the main publication of Le Monde Group and reported an average print circulation, circulation of 480,000 copies per issue in 2022, including ...
'', ''
Libération (), popularly known as ''Libé'' (), is a daily newspaper in France, founded in Paris by Jean-Paul Sartre and Serge July in 1973 in the wake of the protest movements of May 1968 in France, May 1968. Initially positioned on the far left of Fr ...
'',''
Fox News The Fox News Channel (FNC), commonly known as Fox News, is an American Multinational corporation, multinational Conservatism in the United States, conservative List of news television channels, news and political commentary Television stati ...
'', ''
The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...
'', Menafn,
News Limited News Corp Australia is an Australian media conglomerate and wholly owned subsidiary of News Corp. The group's interests span newspaper and magazine publishing, Internet, market research, DVD and film distribution, and film and television pr ...
,
Sky News Sky News is a British free-to-air television news channel, live stream news network and news organisation. Sky News is distributed via an English-language radio news service, and through online channels. It is owned by Sky Group, a division of ...
, ''
The Age ''The Age'' is a daily newspaper in Melbourne, Australia, that has been published since 1854. Owned and published by Nine Entertainment, ''The Age'' primarily serves Victoria (Australia), Victoria, but copies also sell in Tasmania, the Austral ...
'', ''
The Hindu ''The Hindu'' is an Indian English-language daily newspaper owned by The Hindu Group, headquartered in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. It was founded as a weekly publication in 1878 by the Triplicane Six, becoming a daily in 1889. It is one of the India ...
'', ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'', ''
Taipei Times The ''Taipei Times'' is an English-language print newspaper in Taiwan published by the Liberty Times Group. Founded as the third English-language newspaper on 15 June 1999, it is currently the last surviving English-language print newspaper i ...
'', ''
The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'', locally known as ''The'' ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'' or ''WP'', is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C., the national capital. It is the most widely circulated newspaper in the Washington m ...
'', ''
The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' (''WSJ''), also referred to simply as the ''Journal,'' is an American newspaper based in New York City. The newspaper provides extensive coverage of news, especially business and finance. It operates on a subscriptio ...
,'' and ''
The Times of India ''The Times of India'' (''TOI'') is an Indian English-language daily newspaper and digital news media owned and managed by the Times Group. It is the List of newspapers in India by circulation, third-largest newspaper in India by circulation an ...
''. Several media organizations including ''
The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'', locally known as ''The'' ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'' or ''WP'', is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C., the national capital. It is the most widely circulated newspaper in the Washington m ...
'', ''
The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...
'', and
NPR National Public Radio (NPR) is an American public broadcasting organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It serves as a national Radio syndication, syndicator to a network of more ...
encouraged a "
crowdsourcing Crowdsourcing involves a large group of dispersed participants contributing or producing goods or services—including ideas, votes, micro-tasks, and finances—for payment or as volunteers. Contemporary crowdsourcing often involves digit ...
solution for those left searching for answers" during the Wikipedia blackout by inviting users to ask questions on
Twitter Twitter, officially known as X since 2023, is an American microblogging and social networking service. It is one of the world's largest social media platforms and one of the most-visited websites. Users can share short text messages, image ...
using the hashtag #altwiki. An executive of the
Motion Picture Association of America The Motion Picture Association (MPA) is an American trade association representing the Major film studios, five major film studios of the Cinema of the United States, United States, the Major film studios#Mini-majors, mini-major Amazon MGM Stud ...
(MPAA) dubbed the blackout plan an example of the "gimmicks and distortion" that inflamed passions while failing to solve the problem of copyright infringement by "draw ngpeople away from trying to resolve what is a real problem, which is that foreigners continue to steal the hard work of Americans." Former U.S. Senator and MPAA Director
Chris Dodd Christopher John Dodd (born May 27, 1944) is an American lobbyist, lawyer, and Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party politician who served as a United States senator from Connecticut from 1981 to 2011. Dodd is the List of United Sta ...
stated that the coordinated shutdown was "also an abuse of power given the freedoms these companies enjoy in the marketplace today."MPAA's Chris Dodd takes aim at SOPA strike
''
The Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' is an American daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles city of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper in the U.S. and the larges ...
'' 2012-01-17
Dick Costolo Richard William Costolo (pronounced: ) (born September 10, 1963) is an American businessman. He was the CEO of Twitter, Inc. from 2010 to 2015; he also served as the COO before becoming CEO. Career Costolo was born in Royal Oak, Michigan. In 1 ...
, CEO of social networking site
Twitter Twitter, officially known as X since 2023, is an American microblogging and social networking service. It is one of the world's largest social media platforms and one of the most-visited websites. Users can share short text messages, image ...
, rejected calls for Twitter to join the protest, tweeting that " osing a global business in reaction to single-issue national politics is foolish." Originally, some thought Costolo referred to all of the blackout movements on January 18, 2012, but he subsequently clarified that he was referring to a hypothetical blackout of Twitter and that he was supportive of the Wikipedia blackout itself. The sponsor of the bill, Representative Lamar S. Smith, called the blackout a "publicity stunt," and stated with reference to Wikipedia that "it is ironic a website dedicated to providing information is spreading misinformation about the Stop Online Piracy Act." On January 17, 2012, in response to growing concerns over PIPA and SOPA, the White House stated that it "will not support legislation that reduces freedom of expression, increases cybersecurity risk, or undermines the dynamic, innovative global Internet."


January 18, 2012

The Wikimedia Foundation reported that there were over 162 million visits to the blacked-out version of Wikipedia during the 24-hour period, with at least 8 million uses of the site's front page to look up contact information for their U.S. Congressional representatives. The usage of Wikipedia's front page increased enormously during the blackout with 17,535,733-page views recorded, compared with 4,873,388 on the previous day. A petition created and linked to by Google recorded over 4.5 million signatures, while the
Electronic Frontier Foundation The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is an American international non-profit digital rights group based in San Francisco, California. It was founded in 1990 to promote Internet civil liberties. It provides funds for legal defense in court, ...
reported that more than 1 million email messages were sent to congressmen through their site during the blackout.
MSNBC MSNBC is an American cable news channel owned by the NBCUniversal News Group division of NBCUniversal, a subsidiary of Comcast. Launched on July 15, 1996, and headquartered at 30 Rockefeller Plaza in Manhattan, the channel primarily broadcasts r ...
reported that over 2.4 million
Twitter Twitter, officially known as X since 2023, is an American microblogging and social networking service. It is one of the world's largest social media platforms and one of the most-visited websites. Users can share short text messages, image ...
messages about SOPA, PIPA, and the blackouts were made during a 16-hour period on January 18, 2012, by Twitter users including
Facebook Facebook is a social media and social networking service owned by the American technology conglomerate Meta Platforms, Meta. Created in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with four other Harvard College students and roommates, Eduardo Saverin, Andre ...
founder
Mark Zuckerberg Mark Elliot Zuckerberg (; born May 14, 1984) is an American businessman who co-founded the social media service Facebook and its parent company Meta Platforms, of which he is the chairman, chief executive officer, and controlling sharehold ...
, who had not used the service since 2009, to encourage his followers to contact their congressmen. Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR), a key opponent of the bills, said that "lawmakers had collected more than 14 million more than 10 million of them voters" to protest the legislation. ''
Time Time is the continuous progression of existence that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, and into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequ ...
'' reported that before the day had ended, "the political dominoes began to fall... then trickle turned into flood". It named ten senators who had announced their switch to opposing the bills and stated that "nearly twice that many House members" had done so. During the blackout, libraries at several universities used the outage to remind students that the traditional paper encyclopedias were available for research. Students who grew up turning to the internet to look up information were encouraged to visit the library as an alternative source of information. On Twitter, a joke hashtag #factswithoutWikipedia trended with users posting humorous fake "facts." "Startled" Internet users frustrated or angry at their loss of Wikipedia for the day used Twitter as an outlet; politicians likewise turned to Twitter when overwhelmed by the public communications flood in support of the blackout.
CTV News CTV News is the news division of the CTV Television Network in Canada. The name ''CTV News'' is also applied as the title of local and regional newscasts on the network's owned-and-operated stations (O&Os), which are closely tied to the nationa ...
in Canada published a "survival guide" for "getting around the blackout" on their national website, citing Wikipedia as the answer to "burning questions such as "Are chinchillas rodents?" and "What does 'rickrolling' mean?" The guide provided detailed instructions on how to circumvent the ban and access the English Wikipedia during the protest. CTV referred to the protest as " a date that will live in ignorance." Creative America, a coalition representing movie studios, entertainment unions, and television networks, used the blackout to prompt those affected by it to enjoy other forms of entertainment in place of their normal Internet activities; such ads appeared at
Times Square Times Square is a major commercial intersection, tourist destination, entertainment hub, and Neighborhoods in New York City, neighborhood in the Midtown Manhattan section of New York City. It is formed by the junction of Broadway (Manhattan), ...
in New York City and on various websites.


Post-protest

The impact of the coordinated action was generally considered to be significant.
Yochai Benkler Yochai Benkler ( ; born 1964) is an Israeli-American author and the Berkman Professor of Entrepreneurial Legal Studies at Harvard Law School. He is also a faculty co-director of the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Univers ...
of the
Berkman Center for Internet & Society The Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society is a research center at Harvard University that focuses on the study of cyberspace. Founded at Harvard Law School, the center traditionally focused on internet-related legal issues. On May 15, 2008, ...
stated that the January 18 blackout was "a very strong public demonstration to suggest that what historically was seen as a technical system of rules that only influences the content industry has become something more," further adding "You've got millions of citizens who care enough to act. That's not trivial." California House member
Darrell Issa Darrell Edward Issa ( ; born November 1, 1953) is an American businessman and politician serving as the U.S. representative for California's 48th congressional district. He represented the 50th congressional district from 2021 to 2023. A memb ...
called the collective effort an unprecedented means for upsetting a backroom
lobbying Lobbying is a form of advocacy, which lawfully attempts to directly influence legislators or government officials, such as regulatory agency, regulatory agencies or judiciary. Lobbying involves direct, face-to-face contact and is carried out by va ...
effort, and the immediate political efficacy of the widespread online protest was characterised in terms of a sleeping giant having awakened and of a new player being in town. One
Silicon Valley Silicon Valley is a region in Northern California that is a global center for high technology and innovation. Located in the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area, it corresponds roughly to the geographical area of the Santa Clara Valley ...
lobbyist said the content industry had "a lot to learn," noting that they don't have grassroots support: "There are no Facebook pages to call your congressman to support PIPA and SOPA." ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'', which framed the netizens' revolt in terms of the new economy versus the old economy, headlined the activism as a "political coming of age for the tech industry." James Grimmelmann, an associate professor at
New York Law School New York Law School (NYLS) is a private, American law school in the Tribeca neighborhood in Manhattan, New York City. The third oldest law school in New York City, its history predates its official founding in 1891 by Theodore William Dwight, T ...
, opined two months later that "Legal systems are like Soylent Green: they're made out of people. If you want to protect civil liberties using law, you need to get people on your side who share your vision of what law stands for. That's why the SOPA protests were so effective. They converted an argument about justice into real-world political power." Newspaper editorials had mixed views. The ''
Boston Herald The ''Boston Herald'' is an American conservative daily newspaper whose primary market is Boston, Massachusetts, and its surrounding area. It was founded in 1846 and is one of the oldest daily newspapers in the United States. It has been awarde ...
'' called the protest a "hissy fit" by "Internet powerhouses" saying, "within hours of the online protest, political supporters of the bill... began dropping like flies, thus proving how very powerful these cyber-bullies can be.""A halt to online theft"
''
Boston Herald The ''Boston Herald'' is an American conservative daily newspaper whose primary market is Boston, Massachusetts, and its surrounding area. It was founded in 1846 and is one of the oldest daily newspapers in the United States. It has been awarde ...
'' 2012-01-19
The ''
New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'' described the protest as "Noted, but as a Brief Inconvenience" and, as well, offered an
opinion An opinion is a judgement, viewpoint, or statement that is not conclusive, as opposed to facts, which are true statements. Definition A given opinion may deal with subjective matters in which there is no conclusive finding, or it may deal ...
about the protest and possible accomplishments.
BBC News BBC News is an operational business division of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs in the UK and around the world. The department is the world's largest broad ...
technology writer Rory Cellan-Jones was of the opinion that the blackout achieved its objectives but possibly at some cost to Wikipedia's reputation. Bill Keller was of the view that "Jimmy Wales... assumed a higher profile as a combatant for the tech industry ndsupplied an aura of credibility to a libertarian alliance that ranged from the money-farming Megatrons of Google to the hacker anarchists of Anonymous." Media columnist David Carr wrote in ''The New York Times'' that there were two lessons, one being that "People who don't understand the Web should not try to re-engineer it," and the other that while businesses generally prize their relations with their customers, in the struggle between media and technology companies, the latter have "a much more chronic .e. ongoing intimate relationship with consumers" and would more than likely prevail.
Motion Picture Association of America The Motion Picture Association (MPA) is an American trade association representing the Major film studios, five major film studios of the Cinema of the United States, United States, the Major film studios#Mini-majors, mini-major Amazon MGM Stud ...
chairman
Chris Dodd Christopher John Dodd (born May 27, 1944) is an American lobbyist, lawyer, and Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party politician who served as a United States senator from Connecticut from 1981 to 2011. Dodd is the List of United Sta ...
admitted that the content industry had lost the public relations battle with the Internet industry, adding that " u've got an opponent who has the capacity to reach millions of people with a click of a mouse and there's no fact-checker. They can say whatever they want." Dodd called for Hollywood and Silicon Valley to work out a compromise on the legislation, but was also criticized for a statement on ''
Fox News The Fox News Channel (FNC), commonly known as Fox News, is an American Multinational corporation, multinational Conservatism in the United States, conservative List of news television channels, news and political commentary Television stati ...
'' to the effect that politicians would risk having campaign funding cut off if they did not support media industry proposals. The legal director of public interest group Public Knowledge was quoted on that organization's website as writing:
Threats like that are no way to conduct the serious, sober discussions needed to figure out exactly what ails the movie industry and to come up with solutions. It was Hollywood's arrogance in pushing bills through Congress without proper vetting that caused them to be withdrawn; these threats also are not helpful to figuring out what ails the industry and how to solve their issues.
Among other media industry reactions, Creative America was of the view that " ey've misidentified this issue as an issue about your Internet, your Internet is being jeopardized. In fact their business model is being asked to be subjected to regulation. They're misleading their huge base."
Recording Industry Association of America The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/o ...
President Cary Sherman noted that the major television networks supported the legislation but, unlike Wikipedia and Google, did not use their platforms to try to shape public opinion: "when Wikipedia and Google purport to be neutral sources of information that is not only not neutral but affirmatively incomplete and misleading, they are duping their users into accepting as truth what are merely self-serving political declarations." Rep. Lamar Smith, who sponsored SOPA, flatly stated in a commentary on
Fox News The Fox News Channel (FNC), commonly known as Fox News, is an American Multinational corporation, multinational Conservatism in the United States, conservative List of news television channels, news and political commentary Television stati ...
that "This bill does not threaten the Internet. But it does threaten the profits generated by foreign criminals who target the U.S. market and willfully steal intellectual property by trafficking in counterfeit or pirated goods." While speaking on the Senate floor on January 23 Senator Leahy reiterated his objections to the protests, saying:
Websites like Wikipedia and YouTube... would not be subject to the provisions of the bill. That Wikipedia and some other websites decided to "go dark" on January 18, 2012 was their choice, self imposed and was not caused by the legislation and could not be.
It was disappointing that sites linked to descriptions of this legislation that were misleading and one-sided. The Internet should be a place for discussion, for all to be heard and for different points of view to be expressed. That is how truth emerges and democracy is served. Last week, however, many were subjected to false and incendiary charges and sloganeering designed to inflame emotions.


= International responses

=
World Wide Web The World Wide Web (WWW or simply the Web) is an information system that enables Content (media), content sharing over the Internet through user-friendly ways meant to appeal to users beyond Information technology, IT specialists and hobbyis ...
inventor
Sir Tim Berners-Lee Sir Timothy John Berners-Lee (born 8 June 1955), also known as TimBL, is an English computer scientist best known as the inventor of the World Wide Web, the HTML markup language, the URL system, and HTTP. He is a professorial research fellow ...
"scathingly" attacked the SOPA and PIPA legislation. Speaking at an industry event in
Florida Florida ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders the Gulf of Mexico to the west, Alabama to the northwest, Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia to the north, the Atlantic ...
he praised the protests by major sites for the attention they had drawn, and described the bills as a "grave threat to the openness of the Internet" that "had to be stopped": Two days later,
Vice-President of the European Commission A Vice-President of the European Commission is a member of the European Commission who leads the commission's work in particular focus areas in which multiple European Commissioners participate. Currently, the European Commission has a total of ...
and European Commissioner for the Digital Agenda
Neelie Kroes Neelie Kroes (; born 19 July 1941) is a retired Dutch politician of the People's Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD) and businessperson who served as European Commissioner from 22 November 2004 to 1 November 2014. Kroes studied Economics at ...
described the bills as "bad legislation" that would "threaten the basic foundation of the success of the web." She also said there "should be safeguarding benefits of open net." "Speeding is illegal too but you don't put speed bumps on the motorway," she said.


Related protests

SOPA and PIPA protests were overlapped and followed by protests against the ACTA treaty, which would have been similar in its effects. The ACTA treaty was signed by 22
European Union Member States The European Union (EU) is a political and economic union of Lists of member states of the European Union, 27 member states that are party to the EU's Treaties of the European Union, founding treaties, and thereby subject to the privileges and ...
in Europe, and was expected to be signed before March 2012 by the remaining states: Cyprus, Estonia, Netherlands and Slovakia. It would have then gained legal force over the whole European Union. On February 11, more than 200 European cities took part in a widespread protest against ACTA. Although protests were held in Europe, the signing of ACTA was led by USA, Australia, Canada, South Korea, Japan, New Zealand, Morocco, and Singapore, which were first to sign the treaty at a ceremony on October 1, 2011, in Tokyo.


Legislative impact and aftermath

During the day of January 18, six of PIPA's sponsors in the Senate, including
Marco Rubio Marco Antonio Rubio (; born May 28, 1971) is an American politician, lawyer, and diplomat serving since 2025 as the 72nd United States Secretary of State, United States secretary of state. A member of the Republican Party (United States) , Rep ...
, PIPA's co-sponsor,
Orrin Hatch Orrin Grant Hatch (March 22, 1934 – April 23, 2022) was an American attorney and politician who served as a United States senator from Utah from 1977 to 2019. Hatch's 42-year Senate tenure made him the longest-serving Republican U.S. senat ...
, Kelly Ayotte,
Roy Blunt Roy Dean Blunt (born January 10, 1950) is an American politician and lobbyist who served as a United States Senate, United States senator from Missouri from 2011 to 2023. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he pre ...
,
John Boozman John Nichols Boozman ( ; born December 10, 1950) is an American politician and former optometrist serving as the senior United States senator from Arkansas, a seat he has held since 2011. A member of the Republican Party, he was the U.S. repre ...
, and
Mark Kirk Mark Steven Kirk (born September 15, 1959) is an American retired politician and attorney who served as a United States senator from Illinois from 2010 to 2017, and as the United States representative for Illinois's 10th congressional district f ...
, stated that they would withdraw their support for the bills. Several other congressmen issued statements critical of the current versions of both bills. By the following day, eighteen of the 100 senators, including eleven of the original sponsors of the PIPA bill, had announced that they no longer supported PIPA. By one account, the shift in stated positions on SOPA/PIPA by members of Congress had gone overnight from 80 for and 31 against to 65 for and 101 against. An initial floor vote was scheduled for January 24, prior to the Internet blackout, but following these responses, Senate Majority Leader
Harry Reid Harry Mason Reid Jr. (; December 2, 1939 – December 28, 2021) was an American lawyer and politician who served as a United States Senate, United States senator from Nevada from 1987 to 2017. He led the Senate Democratic Caucus from 2005 to 2 ...
announced that the vote will be postponed, urging the bill's main sponsor, Senator
Patrick Leahy Patrick Joseph Leahy ( ; born March 31, 1940) is an American politician and attorney who represented Vermont in the United States Senate from 1975 to 2023. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he also was the pr ...
, to work out compromise in the bill "to forge a balance between protecting Americans' intellectual property, and maintaining openness and innovation on the Internet." Similarly, the House Judiciary Subcommittee chairman, Representative Lamar S. Smith, announced that further voting on SOPA would be placed on hold "until there is wider agreement on a solution." Later, an updated ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'' news story reported that the two bills were "indefinitely shelved." House Committee on Oversight Chairman
Darrell Issa Darrell Edward Issa ( ; born November 1, 1953) is an American businessman and politician serving as the U.S. representative for California's 48th congressional district. He represented the 50th congressional district from 2021 to 2023. A memb ...
commented that "This unprecedented effort has turned the tide against a backroom lobbying effort by interests that aren't used to being told 'no'", describing the events as a "responsible and transparent exercise of freedom of speech". Opposers cautioned that although "postponed," the bills were "not dead" and "would return." Months after the protests, in July 2012, ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'' summarized events as follows:
Wikipedia went black to protest SOPA and more than seven million people signed
online petition An online petition (or Internet petition, or e-petition) is a form of petition which is signed online, usually through a form on a website. Visitors to the online petition sign the petition by adding their details such as name and email address. T ...
s, many of which said the bills would "break the Internet." Congress, overwhelmed by the popular opposition, quickly backpedaled, leaving the legislation to die.
The development of the electronic
grassroots A grassroots movement is one that uses the people in a given district, region or community as the basis for a political or continent movement. Grassroots movements and organizations use collective action from volunteers at the local level to imp ...
campaign has been the subject of academic analysis.


Other proposed laws

According to the
Electronic Frontier Foundation The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is an American international non-profit digital rights group based in San Francisco, California. It was founded in 1990 to promote Internet civil liberties. It provides funds for legal defense in court, ...
(EFF), "SOPA and PIPA are really only the tip of the iceberg. The same forces behind these domestic U.S. laws have continued to both push for other states to pass similar domestic laws, as well as to secretly negotiate international trade agreements that would force signatory nations to conform to the same legal standards." Examples cited by EFF include: * The
Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) is a plurilateral agreement, multilateral treaty for the purpose of establishing international standards for intellectual property rights enforcement that did not enter into force. The agreement ai ...
(ACTA), a pending international treaty signed by the United States in October 2011, is similar to SOPA. On July 4, 2012, the European Parliament declined its consent, effectively rejecting it, 478 votes to 39, and 165 abstentions. * The
Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership The Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership Agreement (TPSEP), also known as P4, is a trade agreement between four Pacific Rim countries concerning a variety of matters of economic policy. The agreement was signed by Brunei, Chile, Singapore ...
(TPP) - IP terms controversy * Special 301 Reports a United States law mandating annual global copyright and IP law reports, explicitly to protect and act in favour of US
intellectual property Intellectual property (IP) is a category of property that includes intangible creations of the human intellect. There are many types of intellectual property, and some countries recognize more than others. The best-known types are patents, co ...
owners against any other country's domestic or foreign policies or actions not conforming to United States' positions. Threat of action under Special 301 has been used to insert U.S. lobbyistwritten legislation into other countries' laws. Examples considered "similar to SOPA/PIPA" by other analyses: * Ireland's proposed law " S.I. No. 337/2011 – European Communities (Electronic Communications Networks and Services) (Universal Service and Users' Rights) Regulations 2011" has been described by news media as "Ireland's SOPA." As a statutory instrument, no parliamentary vote is required to pass this into law. * Russia's proposed law Duma Bill 89417–6, titled "On protection of children from information harmful to their health and development" has also been described as "Russia's SOPA": poorly defined (overly broad and unclear definitions of which sites are liable under its censorship provisions), and using a flawed blocking mechanism (the blocking of IP addresses, which can be shared by many sites). * USA's CISPA bill (Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act), which would allow for the sharing of Internet traffic information between the U.S. government and technology and manufacturing companies, has been described as "worse than SOPA and PIPA".


Legacy

In January 2022, Tiffiniy Cheng of Techdirt wrote that "The SOPA Blackout not only killed the bill in 2012, but shook Congress so profoundly that no significant copyright legislation has been introduced in the ten years since. Because the Blackout achieved so much progress against the political order in a matter of weeks, this moment in history rewrote what we collectively think is possible in the political realm; in particular among the political set, even though triumphs of this proportion remain elusive, and power is even more entrenched."


See also

* Black World Wide Web protest — the first major Internet protest *
Internet activism Internet activism involves the use of electronic-communication technologies such as social media, e-mail, and podcasts for various forms of activism to enable faster and more effective communication by citizen social movement , movements, the deliv ...
* Italian Wikipedia blackout * List of organizations with official stances on the Stop Online Piracy Act * New Zealand Internet Blackout *
Trans-Pacific Partnership The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), or Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA), was a proposed trade agreement between 12 Pacific Rim countries: Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, Vietn ...


References


Bibliography

* *


External links

* Wikimedia Foundation's official statement and Wikimedia CEO's statement.
SOPA Strike
- Listing of all participating websites for the Internet blackout
Congressional shift
- Infographic of the overnight change in positions regarding SOPA/PIPA by numerous members of Congress {{use mdy dates, date=January 2012 2012 in American politics 2012 in the United States 2012 protests Articles containing video clips History of the Internet History of Wikipedia Internet censorship Internet-based and online protests Internet-related activism January 2012 in the United States Politics and technology 2010s internet outages