Up until a couple of days ago, few Duke students had heard of PIPA, Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property Act of 2011, or SOPA, Stop Online Piracy Act, until an internet blackout shed light on the issue.
Both bills were introduced in Congress in late 2011 to deter online piracy. The public, however, was largely unaware of this legislation until Wikipedia decided to shut down its site on Jan. 18, 2012 in protest. For 24 hours, the online encyclopedia was unavailable for use. Instead, the site redirected visitors to another page and urged them to contact their local representatives in opposition to PIPA and SOPA.
Organized by Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales and Executive Director of the Wikimedia Foundation Sue Gardner, the blackout was planned to raise awareness and inform the public about the bills before Congress votes on this issue January 24. Other sites, such as Reddit and Boing and Boing, also closed their sites on Wednesday with similar aims.
Online search mogul Google did not shut down its search engines, but instead the company elected to black out its famous logo on its homepage. Upon clicking on the blacked-out logo, visitors were encouraged to sign an online petition.
Google later reported that 4.5 million users signed its petition on Wednesday in opposition to SOPA. Wikipedia executive Gardner reported that 162 million visitors viewed its blacked-out homepage.
The PIPA and SOPA bills were designed to prevent piracy and illegal transmission of data. Google, Wikipedia, and others agree that piracy must be deterred but view this particular legislation as potential censorship.
Duke students seemed to agree with these online companies and expressed a consensus in opposition to the bills.
Some students perceived this legislation as a violation of their First Amendment rights.
"PIPA and SOPA is essentially censorship, something we simply do not tolerate in America," freshman Katie Simmons explained.
Others saw it as a threat to the internet itself.
"The beauty of the internet lies in its open nature and universal accessibility," senior Hamid Ali said. "Hindering it any way would strike at what makes the internet so powerful for humanity."
Duke students were generally supportive of the actual blackout, the inconvenience aside.
“I support the self-censorship of websites in protest against government censorship of websites,” freshman Jesse De Luca said.
In response to this widespread opposition to PIPA and SOPA, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid announced that the vote for PIPA will be delayed. Representative Lamar Smith also agreed to postpone the vote.
Get The Chronicle straight to your inbox
Signup for our weekly newsletter. Cancel at any time.