If Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales (News - Alert) has his way, the online resource may soon go offline, at least until the politicians in Washington hear the pleas of the millions who are fighting to prevent the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) from moving through Congress.
Wales issued a post to his personal Wikipedia page on Saturday asking if others in the community support his plan, which is to blackout the online encyclopedia's English site as part of a community strike against the highly-controversial legislation.
If enacted, SOPA would enable federal regulators and intellectual property owners to take near-immediate steps to block websites that are accused of copyright infringement.
Supporters of the bill believe that it will prevent the spreading of pirated material, especially online streaming content (hello Hollywood).
Detractors, meanwhile, argue that the legislation would be the first step toward widespread Internet censorship. Many feel the legislation will also eventually stunt online innovation and result in inadequate Internet security, among other concerns.
From a political standpoint, SOPA has more supporters than detractors. The bill is on a fast track through Congress and is scheduled to be voted on by the Senate’s House Judiciary Committee later this week.
Looking at the issue from a larger scope, SOPA's critics outweigh its backers by a fairly large margin. The who's who of technology companies – including Google, Yahoo, AOL and Facebook (News - Alert) – have expressed their concern over the proposed measure.
While the aforementioned tech firms won't risk a boycott (after all, their end goal is revenue), Wikipedia is singing a different tune.
Wales referenced the story of an Italian Wikipedia community that shut down their site to protest a law that would infringe on their editorial independence, and “the Italian Parliament backed down immediately,” he noted.
“My own view is that a community strike was very powerful and successful in Italy and could be even more powerful in this case,” Wales wrote. “A global strike of at least the English Wikipedia would put the maximum pressure on the US government.”
Wales took a straw poll of Wikipedia users and editors to get their take, and will probably decide later in the week if a blackout is in order. Judging by the thousands of user comments, most are staunch opponents of SOPS, but many believe that using an objective site like Wikipedia for political reasons may set a bad precedent.
“Yes, the law is dangerous and a bad idea,” wrote one user, “but please Jimbo, don't destroy Wikipedia for the sake of a single act of protest.”
We'll keep you up to date on the impending decision. Check out this post from TMC's (News - Alert) Tracey Schelmetic for her unique thoughts on SOPA.
Beecher Tuttle is a TMCnet contributor. He has extensive experience writing and editing for print publications and online news websites. He has specialized in a variety of industries, including health care technology, politics and education. To read more of his articles, please visit his columnist page.
Edited by Jennifer Russell
