In all the hubbub over the SOPA/PIPA protest last week, we missed a story that dropped Friday that is pretty important. Turns out that Rogers is throttling. Big surprise! And the CRTC does not like it one bit. Deets after the jump.
Month: January 2012
…and we’re back. Protests work? Wow.
When this site along with tons of others went dark yesterday, we just assumed nothing would happen and today we would all get on with our lives. Well fuck me. This protest thing actually worked. Not that SOPA and PIPA have been withdrawn or anything, but a whole bunch of congressmen and senators withdrew their support for their respective bills. That group includes Senators Marco Rubio and Orrin Hatch, who were actually co-sponsors of PIPA, and Congressman Lee Terry who co-sponsored SOPA. Wow. And just as important, the day of protest rose awareness of the bills across the internet and mainstream media alike. I’m almost giddy today at the whole thing.
While the political fallout was great, from a fun point of view without a doubt the highlight of the day was #FactsWithoutWikipedia on Twitter. Absolute brilliant job, Twitterverse. Even yours truly got in on the act. Stupid hilarity like that is what the internet was made for.
Good job all around, internet!
How much more black could this be? None. None more black. SOPA/PIPA blackout tomorrow
The internet is a-protesting! Tomorrow, many many important sites will go black to protest the SOPA and PIPA legislation in front of the House and Senate respectively. This blog will join them, leaving all three of my readers in the dark, so to speak. Why should a Canadian protest American legislation you ask? Damn good question. Read this. If you don’t want to read all of that, the simple fact is that the American legislation will have extra-territorial effects. That’s a fancy way of saying that any Canadian site with a .com address could be targeted. Like this one.
Fight the power. Fade to black. See you on Thursday.
http://allen.mendelsohn = $185,000
As of today, ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, the internet’s governing body, in a sense), is accepting applications for new generic Top Level Domains, or gTLDs. Don’t worry, I’m out of acronyms. These new gTLDs could be just about anything. What is this and why is this important and / or stupid? You’ll have to find out after the jump. Don’t worry, there’s video to make it fun!
Parliament enjoys mediocre pop-rock and hypocrisy
Not to be outdone by their American counterparts, someone at Parliament is illegally pirating things off the internet, as uncovered by the Pirate Party of Canada. What’s the big deal? It’s not like the House of Commons is trying to pass legislation to reform copyright for the digital age. Oh wait. Deets after the jump.