Students who logged onto Tumblr to update their blogs or turned to Wikipedia for a translation of their textbooks’ academic jargon Wednesday found themselves staring at a dark screen.
The two websites were among hundreds that went black for all or part of the day to protest two anti-piracy bills currently in Congress. Other sites included Reddit, WordPress and Mozilla.
If passed, the Stop Online Piracy Act proposed in the House and the Protect IP Act proposed in the Senate would increase anti-piracy control, limiting the spread and use of information online.
Weinberg senior Isabel Han said she had heard about the protests and planned blackout about a week ago but had not paid much attention until Wednesday.
“My first reaction was that sometimes a certain entity can be so powerful,” Han said. “I just suddenly realized that we rely on Wikipedia so much.”
By Wednesday evening, several senators who had co-sponsored the bills withdrew their support and suggested the legislation needed re-evaluation, according to the New York Times.
Medill Prof. Owen Youngman said the bills addressed the issue too broadly, and policy makers were unfamiliar with the consequences of the legislation.
“The goals of reducing the theft of intellectual property and reducing piracy of copyrighted material are laudable,” Youngman said. “But it seems unrealistic to think that punishing people who wittingly or unwittingly provide a link to places that might be hosting copyright material is going to get at the problem.”
Wikipedia eliminated access to articles published in English, although users could still access the mobile application through their smart phones. Google also showed support for the protests by “censoring” its logo and linking to articles detailing the anti-piracy legislation.
Several students said they had no prior knowledge the online protest was taking place, but supported the idea once they heard.
“I wasn’t aware of it, but I think if Google is doing it and big sites like that, that does raise awareness of what’s going on,” Weinberg junior Aja Ringenbach said.
Illinois Senator Mark Kirk also sent out a press statement Wednesday morning, stating that he is opposed to the bills.
Some students said they were unhappy with the idea of censorship of online media and were pleased to see Congress back down.
“Overall I support them, and I don’t think that Congress should have the power to censor any website that they deem has users that upload copyrighted content,” Weinberg senior Jared Cogan said. “I especially like that Wikipedia is doing it since they have no financial stake.”
Youngman said even though controlling the Internet is an ephemeral idea, the protests call attention to the need for balance in the way online content is controlled.
“The fears of the Internet community may be overblown, but they have a legitimate complaint about the chilling effect that (the acts’) adoption in their original form might have had,” he said.
Medill professor Rich Gordon, who teaches Journalism and the Networked World, said Congress has historically supported copyright holders, but protests by digital media companies have recently raised awareness of the need to balance the free flow of information and the protection of intellectual property rights.
“It’s a very challenging issue for most people to understand the impact of, and this is one good way to bring home what the potential impact of bad legislation could be,” he said.
