24-hour information blackout protests piracy bill
(rt.com) The “knowledge blackout” is aimed at protecting the Internet – and the website’s very existence – from online censorship, which many are equating to a complete disregard of due process.
The blackout of one of the world’s most-visited websites is meant to protest the Stop Online Piracy Act and the Protect IP Act, two controversial anti-piracy bills currently on the table in the US Congress. Lawmakers argue the bills will protect copyrighted material, but many, including http://www.demandprogress.org founder and executive director Aaron Swartz, believe it will change the rules for the Internet not just in the United States, but around the world.
“Under this bill, the rules totally change,” Swartz told RT. “It makes everyone who runs a website into a policeman. And if they don’t do their job of making sure nobody on their site uses it for anything that’s even potentially illegal, the entire site could get shut down – without even so much as a trial.”
Read more: https://rt.com/news/sopa-pipa-protest-internet-029/
