Wikipedia Service Blackout

[Shaggin Wagon]

I found that the sites that went " black" just had a button to bypass it. Kinda being pussies and money hungry. If you're gonna do it, actually go black, not just some screen that i didn't even both to read.

[Treasure Chest]

[Cannon88]

Will they go back?

Nice.

[Nash B.]

I found that the sites that went " black" just had a button to bypass it. Kinda being pussies and money hungry. If you're gonna do it, actually go black, not just some screen that i didn't even both to read.

Because taking it out on their loyal users is the most effective way to get their support.

[psdtech]

Will they go back?

They always do but their credit is fucked and now a single parent

[jdgregory84]

The only people that support this anti-piracy bill are government lawmakers and lawyers...............and supporters. I mostly use facebook as a way to keep up with bands that I like and the vast majority of them have posted links to petition against anti-piracy legislature. The SOPA/PIPA bills are fucking bullshit. The government wants to put people in prison for up to 5 years for downloading movies/music when there's a judicial system insanely backed up with cases involving murder, rape, theft, etc...

The current regime is so fucking retarded when it comes to prioritizing real issues right now that it blows my mind.

[tribaltalon]

Dear Don:

Thank you for contacting me with your concerns about the Stop Online Piracy Act. I appreciate hearing your thoughts about online intellectual property, and I am grateful for the opportunity to respond.

As you may know, H.R. 3261,the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) was introduced by Rep. Lamar Smith, and was referred to the House Committee on the Judiciary. Companion legislation in the Senate, S. 968, the Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property Act of 2011 (PROTECT-IP) was introduced by Senator Patrick Leahy and is pending a vote on the Senate floor.

With the growth of new technologies and the Internet, copyright holders are able to promote their creative works for artistic, educational, and commercial reasons. The problem SOPA seeks to address is that these new technologies are providing foreign web sites cheap, fast, and easy ways to engage in unauthorized and illegal reproduction and distribution of copyrighted works. This in effect steals money from American companies.

For example, there are many legitimate streaming websites such as Hulu, Netflix, and YouTube that offer on-demand streaming of copyrighted content over the Internet. However, so-called "rogue" websites have been streaming stolen copyrighted content. These rogue websites harm legitimate American companies by reducing the number of people who would otherwise visit the legitimate providers of copyrighted material.

The current path for copyright holders seeking to enforce their intellectual property rights is to file a lawsuit against the alleged infringer. The U.S. Department of Justice has the power to criminally prosecute particularly egregious copyright infringers. However, under the current law, many illegal streaming websites have been able to evade prosecution, leaving no solution for the rightful copyright holders.

Concerns have been raised about the impact of this legislation on free speech and the technical integrity of the Internet. These are legitimate concerns, and I am working with my colleagues on the House Committee on the Judiciary to ensure that the needs of copyright protection are balanced with the First Amendment Rights of Americans. I am opposed to any censorship of the Internet and am committed to defending free speech. I am carefully reviewing every provision in this legislation to ensure your constitutional rights are protected.

The goal of SOPA is to combat this online piracy and protect the intellectual property of Americans. Lawful and legitimate companies should not have to compete with foreign thieves who steal their intellectual property. This legislation would give the federal government expanded authority to pursue websites which are registered and operate in foreign countries that provide pirated or counterfeit content. Industries supported by intellectual property laws generate as much as 6% of the U.S. gross national product and provide a significant amount of jobs for Americans. Protecting these industries is necessary for U.S. economic growth and development. Congress cannot stand by and do nothing while some of America's most profitable and productive industries are under attack.

Although this legislation is still pending in the House Committee on the Judiciary, you can rest assured that I will keep your concerns in mind should SOPA arrive on the House floor. Thank you again for your concern about this important issue, and please do not hesitate to let me know if I may be of additional assistance in the future.

Sincerely,

John Carter Member of Congress

[CWO]

INTERNETS, 18th of January 2012.
PRESS RELEASE, FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE.

Over a century ago Thomas Edison got the patent for a device which would "do for the eye what the phonograph does for
the ear". He called it the Kinetoscope. He was not only amongst the first to record video, he was also the first person
to own the copyright to a motion picture.

Because of Edisons patents for the motion pictures it was close to financially impossible to create motion pictures
in the North american east coast. The movie studios therefor relocated to California, and founded what we today call
Hollywood. The reason was mostly because there was no patent.
There was also no copyright to speak of, so the studios could copy old stories and make movies out of them - like
Fantasia, one of Disneys biggest hits ever.

So, the whole basis of this industry, that today is screaming about losing control over immaterial rights, is that they
circumvented immaterial rights. They copied (or put in their terminology: "stole") other peoples creative works,
without paying for it. They did it in order to make a huge profit. Today, they're all successful and most of the
studios are on the Fortune 500 list of the richest companies in the world. Congratulations - it's all based on being
able to re-use other peoples creative works. And today they hold the rights to what other people create.
If you want to get something released, you have to abide to their rules. The ones they created after circumventing
other peoples rules.

The reason they are always complainting about "pirates" today is simple. We've done what they did. We circumvented the
rules they created and created our own. We crushed their monopoly by giving people something more efficient. We allow
people to have direct communication between eachother, circumventing the profitable middle man, that in some cases take
over 107% of the profits (yes, you pay to work for them).
It's all based on the fact that we're competition.
We've proven that their existance in their current form is no longer needed. We're just better than they are.

And the funny part is that our rules are very similar to the founding ideas of the USA. We fight for freedom of speech.
We see all people as equal. We believe that the public, not the elite, should rule the nation. We believe that laws
should be created to serve the public, not the rich corporations.

The Pirate Bay is truly an international community. The team is spread all over the globe - but we've stayed out of the
USA. We have Swedish roots and a swedish friend said this:
The word SOPA means "trash" in Swedish. The word PIPA means "a pipe" in Swedish. This is of course not a coincidence.
They want to make the internet inte a one way pipe, with them at the top, shoving trash through the pipe down to the
rest of us obedient consumers.
The public opinion on this matter is clear. Ask anyone on the street and you'll learn that noone wants to be fed with
trash. Why the US government want the american people to be fed with trash is beyond our imagination but we hope that
you will stop them, before we all drown.

SOPA can't do anything to stop TPB. Worst case we'll change top level domain from our current .org to one of the
hundreds of other names that we already also use. In countries where TPB is blocked, China and Saudi Arabia springs to
mind, they block hundreds of our domain names. And did it work? Not really.
To fix the "problem of piracy" one should go to the source of the problem. The entertainment industry say they're
creating "culture" but what they really do is stuff like selling overpriced plushy dolls and making 11 year old girls
become anorexic. Either from working in the factories that creates the dolls for basically no salary or by watching
movies and tv shows that make them think that they're fat.

In the great Sid Meiers computer game Civilization you can build Wonders of the world. One of the most powerful ones
is Hollywood. With that you control all culture and media in the world. Rupert Murdoch was happy with MySpace and had
no problems with their own piracy until it failed. Now he's complainting that Google is the biggest source of piracy
in the world - because he's jealous. He wants to retain his mind control over people and clearly you'd get a more
honest view of things on Wikipedia and Google than on Fox News.

Some facts (years, dates) are probably wrong in this press release. The reason is that we can't access this information
when Wikipedia is blacked out. Because of pressure from our failing competitors. We're sorry for that.

THE PIRATE BAY, (K)2012

[Geor!]

I guess the feds just don't give a fuck. They shut down Megaupload today.

McLEAN, Va. – Federal prosecutors have shut down one of the world's largest file-sharing sites, Megaupload.com, on charges of violating piracy laws -- a day after a 24-hour blackout of popular websites such as Wikipedia drew national attention to the issue.
"This action is among the largest criminal copyright cases ever brought by the United States," the Justice department said in a statement about the indictment.
The indictment accuses seven individuals and two corporations -- Megaupload Limited and Vestor Limited -- of costing copyright holders more than $500 million in lost revenue from pirated films and other content. It was unsealed on Thursday, and claims that at one point Megaupload was the 13th most popular website in the world.
Megaupload was unique not only because of its massive size and the volume of downloaded content, but also because it had high-profile support from celebrities, musicians and other content producers who are most often the victims of copyright infringement and piracy. Before the website was taken down, it contained endorsements from Kim Kardashian, Alicia Keys and Kanye West, among others.
The Hong Kong-based company listed Swizz Beatz, a musician who married Keys in 2010, as its CEO. Beatz declined to comment through a representative.
The individuals in the criminal enterprise each faces a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison on racketeering charges, five years for conspiracy to commit copyright infringement, 20 years on money laundering charges and five years on related charges.
Megaupload was led by colorful Australian Kim Dotcom -- aka Kim Schmitz, or Kim Tim Jim Vestor. He is a a resident of both Hong Kong and New Zealand, and a dual citizen of Finland and Germany, who legally changed his last name to "Dotcom."
The website's founder and "chief innovation officer" was once convicted of a felony but has repeatedly denied engaging in piracy, according to CNET.com -- and he made more than $42 million from the conspiracy in 2010 alone, according to the indictment.
The indictment comes the day after a 24-hour "blackout" of Wikipedia, a protest doodle on the homepage of Google, and numerous other protests across the Internet against proposed anti-piracy legislation that many leading websites -- including Reddit, Google, Facebook, Amazon and others -- contend will make it challenging if not impossible for them to operate.
The Protect Intellectual Property Act under consideration in the Senate and the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) in the House are bills backed by the motion picture and recording industries intended to eliminate theft online once and for all. S. 968 and H.R. 3261 would require ISPs to block access to foreign websites that infringe on copyrights.
Online piracy from China and elsewhere is a massive problem for the media industry, one that costs as much as $250 billion per year and costs the industry 750,000 jobs, according to a 2008 statement by Patrick Leahy, D-Vt.


Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2012/...#ixzz1jwXMef00