From: RawStory
The world’s largest encyclopedia will go dark on Wednesday in a dramatic protest against two anti-piracy bills being considered by the U.S. Congress, Wikipedia announced on Monday.
Concerned that the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and its sister in the Senate, the Protect IP Act, might deal severe damage to the Internet’s core architecture and make user-generated sites essentially illegal, Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales announced that the blackout would begin as soon as the clock strikes midnight on Tuesday night.
Wales is following social media forum Reddit.com, which plans to go offline at 8 a.m. on Wednesday, and stay shut down until 8 p.m. Reddit’s plans are hardly unique – dozens of other companies are rumored to be considering a similar move, including Google — but they are the first to confirm that their service will go offline for a day.
The world’s largest encyclopedia will go dark on Wednesday in a dramatic protest against two anti-piracy bills being considered by the U.S. Congress, Wikipedia announced on Monday.
Concerned that the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and its sister in the Senate, the Protect IP Act, might deal severe damage to the Internet’s core architecture and make user-generated sites essentially illegal, Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales announced that the blackout would begin as soon as the clock strikes midnight on Tuesday night.
Wales is following social media forum Reddit.com, which plans to go offline at 8 a.m. on Wednesday, and stay shut down until 8 p.m. Reddit’s plans are hardly unique – dozens of other companies are rumored to be considering a similar move, including Google — but they are the first to confirm that their service will go offline for a day.