"The service will be the highest profile name to join a growing campaign starting at midnight Eastern Time on Wednesday that will see it black out its page so that visitors will only see information about the controversial Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the Protect Intellectual Property Act (PIPA).
"The information will urge Wikipedia readers in the US to contact their local congressman to vote against the bills. Other smaller sites leading the campaign include Reddit.com and Cheezeburger.
" 'This is a quite clumsily drafted legislation which is dangerous for an open internet,' said Wales in an interview." (Source: Aljazeera.com website, 1/17/2012)
In a nutshell this is the issue: If a website publishes intellectual property, be a movie or a song or something similar, without permission, the website would be forced off the air, even if the publication was incidental and unintended. If you did a search on Google, for example, and it turned up this second website that contained the unauthorized material, Google could be closed down. The present procedure is to send notice to the offending website and have them remove the property in question. If they fail to do so other legal remedies are available to the rightful owners. Hollywood and other backers of the proposed legislation say the SOPA and PIPA legislation is essential to protecting their investments against intellectual piracy, which is a problem centered mainly outside the United States. Critics say the legislation goes too far and, as Wales put it, "threatens the future of the internet."
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In a new book Thirty-Nine Years of Short-Term Memory Loss: The Early Days of SNL from Someone Who Was There, by Tom Davis the author recounts how entertainers and artists of all types tried desperately to get on the Johnny Carson show. In the 70s, an appearance on Carson was the key to success and good fortune. It opened doors everywhere for a performer. One comedian, Davis recounts, had a tryout and used his best material and gave it everything he had. He was rejected by the talent director and staff. Ten days later he jumped off the roof of a hotel and landed in the parking lot of the Comedy Club in Hollywood. He had note in his pocket with his name on it and three words: "I was a comedian." (Source: delanceyplace.com, website, 1/17/2012)(Complete blog is here.)
