If you were using the web yesterday and weren’t sure why some websites weren’t working properly, then clearly you were not aware of the Anti-SOPA Blackout movement.  Many sites shut down their services for 12-24 hours in a form of protest against the Stop Online Piracy Act and Protect IP Act.  Both bills, when passed, will curtail internet freedom as well as cripple most of the websites we all love and use.

Let’s look at the events that unfolded yesterday during the big internet blackout.

Websites

Google, the internet search giant who kept silent as to what they were planning for blackout day, surprised everyone when users found themselves staring at a black censorship strip covering the Google logo then below that was a link to information on how to contact their local lawmakers on how to stop SOPA.  Google also has a published blog entitled “Don’t censor the web,” which enlightens people what would happen if these two bills get passed into laws.  Aside from that, Google’s Pierre Far announced in his G+ account that they configured Googlebot to crawl at a much lower rate yesterday but made sure that sites participating in the blackout won’t be affected.

Reddit, Boing Boing, Wikipedia and WordPress are just some of the sites that joined the blackout.  For 24 hours, Wikipedia showed a black page with the words “Imagine a World Without Free Knowledge” big and bold to greet you.  At WordPress’ home page, some blogs were marked “censored” but not by Wikipedia but of the blog owners themselves.

Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian spoke with Bloomberg‘s Margaret Brennan on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange regarding his site’s blackout:

“I was supposed to testify down in DC today with a bunch of geeks, explaining why SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) as written was a terrible piece of legislation. Fortunately, the backlash has been so strong, so loud from the tech community, from the investor community, from Americans, that they backed off. The PROTECT IP Act (Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property Act) is still on the table, and we are across the country hosting protests. These are probably the geekiest protests ever — of tech workers, job creators going to our Senator’s offices, and actually right after this I’m going to head up to Shumer and Gillbrand’s offices in the city, and I have some sympathy cards for them mourning the loss of the Internet should they continue to sponsor and support these bills.”

Craigslist steered users to a page with a black background and a message in white letters asking visitors to “imagine a world without craigslist, Google, Wikipedia.” The San Jose, California-based company provided visitors with a link to a page with online tools for contacting lawmakers to voice opposition to the Hollywood-backed legislation.

Even social networks like Facebook and Twitter voiced out their opposition for the bills. Facebook co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg voiced out his opposition to SOPA and PIPA on his Timeline stating that, “Facebook opposes SOPA and PIPA, and we will continue to oppose any laws that will hurt the internet.  The world today needs political leaders who are pro-internet. We have been working with many of these folks for months on better alternatives to these current proposals. I encourage you to learn more about these issues and tell your congressmen that you want them to be pro-internet.”  While Twitter executive chairman and founder Jack Dorsey tweeted “#SOPA and #PIPA: we can do better. Take a moment to learn why these acts are bad for the Internet and tell Congress NO (tweet, email, call).”

Lawmakers

In the past weeks, a lot of brands and websites retracted their support for SOPA and PIPA and in twisted turn of events, co-sponsors of the bills have also turned their backs on the bills.  This could be because of the statement that The White House issued which clearly states that they do not support SOPA and PIPA.

Co-sponsors of the bill Senators Marco Rubio, a Florida Republican, Roy Blunt, a Missouri Republican, Ben Cardin, a Maryland Democrat, Orrin Hatch of Utah, as well as Senators Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire, John Boozman of Arkansas, Mark Kirk of Illinois, Republican Representatives Ben Quayle of Arizona, Lee Terry of Nebraska, and Dennis Ross of Florida are just a few who withdrew their support for the House Bill because they deem it would give unnecessary power to the government which could be detrimental for the internet community.  Click here and here to see a list of legislators who backed away from supporting SOPA and PIPA.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith (R-TX), the man who introduced the bill, announced that the debate for SOPA will resume in February.  The government is persistent in their move against piracy but with great public uproar, the bills passing into law won’t be happening anytime soon.