CRANY

An estimated 7000 websites joined the blackout on Wednesday 18^th January 2012 including giants such as Google and WordPress. Since this point only 2 days ago, at least 8 key lawmakers have withdrawn their support for the acts and the American President has declared concerns regarding their content. The anti-piracy laws are being criticized by supporters of a free internet as they aim to make internet companies accountable for hosting and linking to websites offering pirated downloads of all forms of media. The bills also plan to outlaw sites from containing information on how to access sites which have been blocked. The bills favor false action to be taken against parties due to false positives- it would be nearly impossible for a normal citizen to ever counter a decision made by the US state- they simply wouldn’t have a chance.

The authors of the legislation are being blamed for not truly understanding how the internet works. Since the publication of the SOPA and PIPA proposals several other alternative Acts have appeared. One example is OPEN- Online Protection and Enforcement of Digital Trade but this is not without its critics as well. OPEN suggests a central body where those affected by piracy can make complains and those sites supporting the illegal material will be confronted. The IT company Google has stated that those who carry out piracy are doing it for financial reasons and the best way to counter is to cut off their sources of funding- Google Blog.