CENSORED

Today's the day that a number of high profile websites are demonstrating their opposition to the SOPA and PIPA bills currently pending in Congress. The upshot of these bills passing into law is that they are tantamount to giving powerful content industry groups the power to cut-off from the internet or censor websites that are accused of hosting material that doesn't belong to them. Bear in mind that these bills have been sponsored and co-written by representatives of the entertainment industry (eg the MPAA) and it's plain to see whose interests are being served here.

Under the proposed legislation the US Attorney General would have the power to demand ISPS so block access to foreign websites suspected of dealing in pirated content, as well as making search engines delist such istes from the search indexes. Other powers include the blocking of payement services to accused sites too (and we all know what happened to Wikileaks when its funding services where blocked). If these standards were applied to several prominent US-based sites many of them would be in trouble (eg Tumblr, Wordpress, Blogger, Google, etc).

PROTECT IP / SOPA Breaks The Internet from Fight for the Future on Vimeo.

There have been some last minute amendments to the proposed bills but they haven't removed the threat to free speech entirely. That's why it's good to see several prominent sites doing their bit to raise public awareness of the threats involved.

Over at TorrentFreak you can find a compilation of websites that are participating in a self-imposed censorship/black-out campaign. I'm going to add links or images to those already covered by TorrentFreak as I come across them. Please feel free to contact me either in the comments, via Twitter or email with any more.

Those sites known to be taking part are in today's black-out are:

Wikipedia

Wikipedia, the student's friend, will be down for 24 hours (except for the pages about SOPA and PIPA)

Minecraft

Insanely addictive browser-based game Minecraft is down

Reddit

The community-powered news site, reddit, is down

Open Rights Group

The Open Rights Group are UK digital activists and they are making sure people know about these heinous bills

Wordpress

The creators of the blogging content management system of choice, Wordpress, are censored.

TorrentFreak

Even TorrentFreak themselves are making a stand. Lord knows, they've been inaccurately accused of being pirates enough times

Wired

Ever-popular tech site Wired are in self-imposed blackout mode

Craigslist

The classifieds service, Craigslist, is also making a stand

Rock, Paper, Shotgun

The video game review site Rock, Paper, Shotgun is down

The Oatmeal

Satirical comedy site The Oatmeal is down

Humble Bundle

Online independent games retailer HumbleBundle have gone dark

Wikia

The alternate pop-culture wiki-based encyclopaedia, Wikia, is protesting

XBMC

Makers of the free media centre resource, XBMC, have gone dark

Zeropaid

Piracy-based news site Zeropaid has blacked out

Demonoid

Long-running torrent site Demonoid is blacked out

Boing Boing

Cory Doctorow's Boing Boing site has gone offline

UKNova


UK-based TV catch-up torrent site UKNova had an interesting message for its users

Facebook

Mark Zuckerberg kinda supports the anti SOPA business but Facebook isn't quite going dark

Absolute Punk


The punks over at Absolute Punk are against SOPA

Liberal Conspiracy

Those good folks on the Left at Liberal Conspiracy are blacking out their homepage

Destructoid

The gaming site for gamers, by gamers, Destructoid is dark

Know Your Meme

Not to be outdone by a spreading meme, Know Your Meme actually became part of what they normally document

This Isn't Happiness

The photography/art-based propaganda site This Isn't Happiness embraced the darkness

imgur


As the easy way to share images, imgur was keen to protest

XKCD

Popular online comic site, XKCD, ran a blacked-out sketch

The Verge

The technology-focussed site, The Verge, voiced their opposition

TechCrunch

The AOL-owned technology blog TechCrunch had a colour make-over

Fark

Home to all things satirical, Fark went for a white out

4chan


The home of weirdness (and haters of censorship!) saw some weird things happen, but hey, that's 4chan for you

Funny or Die

Funny or Die's comedy site got serious about the censorship

GoDaddy

Sometime supporters of the bills, GoDaddy, demonstrated their (customer's !?!) commitment to the opposition

More to follow. Maybe...

Top slicing the BBC - the result

Earlier in the week I blogged about the threat facing the BBC posed by the proposed top-slicing. I encouraged readers of this blog and follower over on my Twitter feed to get involved and contact their MP to voice their concerns about the implications of such a move. The civic action group 38 Degrees was crucial to mobilising protest against this movement with it's email template and MP finding resource. I wrote to my MP and I encouraged my colleagues in the University of Sunderland Media department to do this same (a big thank you to all those who got involved - it's appreciated!).

I thought several of you may be interested in the verdict...

I received a mail from 38 Degrees over on Facebook which poitned to the success of the campaign. You can read the message below:

Dear friend,

This week thousands of us worked together to persuade the government not to top-slice the licence fee. The government had been expected to confirm their top-slicing plans in the Queen's speech on Wednesday. This would have threatened the BBC's funding and independence, by handing a chunk of the licence fee to rival broadcasters. After thousands of us signed the petition and wrote to our MPs, the government announced that they aren't pushing ahead with top-slicing, and that the matter will now be reviewed by the next government in 2012.

We've had a big success, which shows that it works when we stand up for the BBC together. But politicians and media millionaires continue to attack the BBC and there could still be a big cut in the licence fee in the future. The more of us there are involved in the campaign, the stronger we'll be when it's time to stand up for the BBC against future threats.

Ask your friends to get involved in the campaign by forwarding this email and asking them to click this link: http://www.38degrees.org.uk/standup4thebbc

We've always known that top-slicing is not the only threat facing the organisation. Many powerful interests will continue attacking the BBC - from rival media companies who resent the competition, to politicians who think that it should tow their line. We know the BBC isn't perfect and has made mistakes which make it more vulnerable to criticism, but it's definitely worth protecting.

The Conservative Party are talking up their plans to cut the licence fee, and potentially close down whole parts of the BBC. Just yesterday, David Cameron said "the BBC has got very overextended and the licence fee is high". [1] [2]

The media multi-millionaire Rupert Murdoch is increasingly vocal in his attacks, calling the licence fee a "scandal". [3] His son, James Murdoch, the chief executive and chairman of News Corporation, says the licence fee should become "much, much smaller".

Together we've seen off the threat of top-slicing, which shows that people power works. The more of us there are, the more effective we'll be in standing up for the BBC against future attacks. Can you ask your friends to join in? Please forward this email and ask them to join the campaign by clicking this link: http://www.38degrees.org.uk/standup4thebbc


Thanks for getting involved,

David, Hannah, Johnny, Nina and the 38 Degrees team


[1] http://www.mumsnet.com/onlinechats/david-cameron-nov-09#BBC_licence_fee

[2] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/6574186/BBC-licence-fee-could-be-cut-Tories-say.html

[3] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/mediatechnologyandtelecoms/digital-media/6533512/Rupert-Murdoch-could-sue-BBC-and-block-Google.html

Good news in the short term! However, the commercial sector will always look to the BBC as a threat and seek to lobby government to curb it's reach. The medium term future of the BBC looks rocky, especially if the Conservative party get into power by next summer. It needs the support of the licence fee paying public, so, stand up for the BBC.

EU Parliment's credibility undermined by 3-strikes U-Turn

Quick post. This week a strange turn of events occurred within the corridors of Europe which casts doubt on the faith we should have in the EU Parliament. Essentially this comes down to the long-standing "3-strikes" which threatens to have internet users disconnected if they are accused of illegal file-sharing (even if the way in which this data is collected is fundamentally flawed). Access to information via the internet is a right - disconnection compromises our civil liberties.

Parliament has voted against this disconnection process on separate occasions with an 88% majority. Just this week the MEP's negotiating team wanted to dilute these judgements (especially Amendment 138) whilst seeking a compromise with the EU Council. Historically, the EU Parliament has been relatively weak in the face of the EU Council and u-turns like this one do not bode well for democracy.

There is a little more detail on the Open Rights Group blog. They also point to an analysis by La Quadrature du Net.

Take action: write to your MEP asking them to put pressure on their team to preserve our rights and the EU Parliament's credibility.

I have written to my MEPs regarding this matter. I urge you to do the same if you care about your digital rights and/or democracy Full text below:

Thursday 15 October 2009

Dear Martin Callanan, Stephen Hughes and Fiona Hall,

I have heard the worrying news that Catherine Trautmann and Alejo Vidal-Quadras (Wed 14th October) have succeeded in leading negotiations to overturn the Telecoms Package, incorporating Amendment 138. As I understand it, Amendment 138 guarantees Internet access and protects fundamental civil liberties and is in danger of being diluted by the aforementioned Parliamentary negotiators seeking a compromise with the EU Council.

It appears that discussions between the Council of the EU, the Commission and the negotiators led to a compromise position regarding Amendment 138 that goes against the intentions of the Parliament that voted for citizens to have guarantees regarding access and other rights. These principles have twice been adopted by an 88% majority of the European Parliament.

This turnaround seems to suggest that Parliament's powers are being undermined. The negotiating team seems to have ignored the mandate they were issued from the Parliament delegation and this sets a dangerous precedent and displays a worrying lack of transparency.

Pressure needs to be placed on the negotiating team in order to preserve our rights and the credibility of the EU Parliament.

Yours sincerely,

Robert Jewitt

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EDIT

It looks like pressure is mounting around this issue: ORG. More effort is required. Get writing to your MEPs if you care bout your digital rights