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  3. Wikipedia's blackout effort sends the wrong message.

Wikipedia's blackout effort sends the wrong message.

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  • R RJOberg

    It isn't just wikipedia doing this. I haven't even looked at Wikipedia to be honest. I've been looking at secure (non-photocopiable) barcode generation of all things and the first three sites I tried were blacked out. Yes I would have loved to do this yesterday but I got the documentation this morning and I have a call about it later today. Just here to rant.

    S Offline
    S Offline
    Sreedevi Jagannath
    wrote on last edited by
    #16

    Sorry about that. It's a good thing I looked up Digitalis yesterday.

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    • H Henry Minute

      The fact that the black-screen-of-protest can so easily be circumvented sends out a message that I'm sure SOPA/PIPA supporters will use. Namely

      "It doesn't matter if the odd site gets taken down those clever internet users will find a way to continue working."

      I didn't even see the message until I deliberately turned off NoScript so that I could see what they had done. For protests of this type to be effective, they must be real. Difficult for a commercial organization to justify for money many reasons but for a Not For Profit outfit like Wiki they should have really gone dark.

      Henry Minute Do not read medical books! You could die of a misprint. - Mark Twain Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.” I wouldn't let CG touch my Abacus! When you're wrestling a gorilla, you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is.

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      fortycal_sig
      wrote on last edited by
      #17

      The title of your post sends the wrong message. The US congress sends the wrong message. The corporate elite monopolists and propagandists for fascism send the wrong message. Wikipedia sent the RIGHT message, and it was a phenomenal success. Now go crawl back into your mincing, chicken-necked little hole.

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      • H Henry Minute

        The fact that the black-screen-of-protest can so easily be circumvented sends out a message that I'm sure SOPA/PIPA supporters will use. Namely

        "It doesn't matter if the odd site gets taken down those clever internet users will find a way to continue working."

        I didn't even see the message until I deliberately turned off NoScript so that I could see what they had done. For protests of this type to be effective, they must be real. Difficult for a commercial organization to justify for money many reasons but for a Not For Profit outfit like Wiki they should have really gone dark.

        Henry Minute Do not read medical books! You could die of a misprint. - Mark Twain Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.” I wouldn't let CG touch my Abacus! When you're wrestling a gorilla, you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is.

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        R Erasmus
        wrote on last edited by
        #18

        They could at least disabled search optimization... Annoing to waist your time going to a site that says it has info and then get a crappy message. There can always be another wikipedia... They aren't all that. I feel that they were being arrogant in there statement they were trying to make.... "We're wiki and we're so great". Maybe they forgot that it is the people that puts their time and effort into putting the knowledge up. My 2cents... Maybee little harsh and all.

        "Program testing can be used to show the presence of bugs, but never to show their absence." << please vote!! >>

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        • F fortycal_sig

          The title of your post sends the wrong message. The US congress sends the wrong message. The corporate elite monopolists and propagandists for fascism send the wrong message. Wikipedia sent the RIGHT message, and it was a phenomenal success. Now go crawl back into your mincing, chicken-necked little hole.

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          JohnAspras
          wrote on last edited by
          #19

          I Concur ...

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          • R R Erasmus

            They could at least disabled search optimization... Annoing to waist your time going to a site that says it has info and then get a crappy message. There can always be another wikipedia... They aren't all that. I feel that they were being arrogant in there statement they were trying to make.... "We're wiki and we're so great". Maybe they forgot that it is the people that puts their time and effort into putting the knowledge up. My 2cents... Maybee little harsh and all.

            "Program testing can be used to show the presence of bugs, but never to show their absence." << please vote!! >>

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            J Offline
            J Whalan
            wrote on last edited by
            #20

            R. Erasmus wrote:

            They could at least disabled search optimization... Annoing to waist your time going to a site that says it has info and then get a crappy message. There can always be another wikipedia... They aren't all that. I feel that they were being arrogant in there statement they were trying to make.... "We're wiki and we're so great". Maybe they forgot that it is the people that puts their time and effort into putting the knowledge up.
             
            My 2cents... Maybee little harsh and all.

            They did what they had to do to ensure that knowledge would STAY UP. They used the power of the internet to fight a political battle and they won. They became a voice to the people and let the issue be known. They effectively counter acted a political agenda better than any other form of media has done before. We protested without even taking to the streets. The WORLD protested one government. AND if you are here on this forum then surely you could have found a simple loophole.

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            • H Henry Minute

              The fact that the black-screen-of-protest can so easily be circumvented sends out a message that I'm sure SOPA/PIPA supporters will use. Namely

              "It doesn't matter if the odd site gets taken down those clever internet users will find a way to continue working."

              I didn't even see the message until I deliberately turned off NoScript so that I could see what they had done. For protests of this type to be effective, they must be real. Difficult for a commercial organization to justify for money many reasons but for a Not For Profit outfit like Wiki they should have really gone dark.

              Henry Minute Do not read medical books! You could die of a misprint. - Mark Twain Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.” I wouldn't let CG touch my Abacus! When you're wrestling a gorilla, you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is.

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              User 8272238
              wrote on last edited by
              #21

              I'm from the U.K. not the U.S. but we're concerned about this too as it has global implications. All this talk about disabling non U.S. websites at a DNS level could mess up the whole DNS system and damage the internet as a whole So any kind of protest is welcome as far as I am concerned. BTW How can I protest (or any non U.S. Citizen for that matter)

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              • H Henry Minute

                The fact that the black-screen-of-protest can so easily be circumvented sends out a message that I'm sure SOPA/PIPA supporters will use. Namely

                "It doesn't matter if the odd site gets taken down those clever internet users will find a way to continue working."

                I didn't even see the message until I deliberately turned off NoScript so that I could see what they had done. For protests of this type to be effective, they must be real. Difficult for a commercial organization to justify for money many reasons but for a Not For Profit outfit like Wiki they should have really gone dark.

                Henry Minute Do not read medical books! You could die of a misprint. - Mark Twain Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.” I wouldn't let CG touch my Abacus! When you're wrestling a gorilla, you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is.

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                Reelix
                wrote on last edited by
                #22

                Since there was a short delay before the script kicked in, simply pressing "Escape" (Or clicking stop) resulted in a normal wikipedia experience. But yea - It should have had far more of an impact than it did...

                -= Reelix =-

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                • H Henry Minute

                  The fact that the black-screen-of-protest can so easily be circumvented sends out a message that I'm sure SOPA/PIPA supporters will use. Namely

                  "It doesn't matter if the odd site gets taken down those clever internet users will find a way to continue working."

                  I didn't even see the message until I deliberately turned off NoScript so that I could see what they had done. For protests of this type to be effective, they must be real. Difficult for a commercial organization to justify for money many reasons but for a Not For Profit outfit like Wiki they should have really gone dark.

                  Henry Minute Do not read medical books! You could die of a misprint. - Mark Twain Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.” I wouldn't let CG touch my Abacus! When you're wrestling a gorilla, you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is.

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                  User 7996556
                  wrote on last edited by
                  #23

                  Complete rubbish. This protest is not aimed at the internet savvy, rather the millions of regular Joes that use Wikipedia on a daily basis who probably don't even know what SOPA is. The fact that you even *use* NoScript suggests you are aware of internet security risks, and by extension are probably informed about the e-world. I'm gonna guess you're opposed to SOPA - oh look, job done. Wiki's protest is not for you. By making the blackout easily circumventable, Wikipedia have made sure they reach exactly the right audience, without overly inconveniencing the people who need no further information. Geeks, these days, are but a tiny portion of the internet. Stop assuming everyone is you.

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                  • H Henry Minute

                    The fact that the black-screen-of-protest can so easily be circumvented sends out a message that I'm sure SOPA/PIPA supporters will use. Namely

                    "It doesn't matter if the odd site gets taken down those clever internet users will find a way to continue working."

                    I didn't even see the message until I deliberately turned off NoScript so that I could see what they had done. For protests of this type to be effective, they must be real. Difficult for a commercial organization to justify for money many reasons but for a Not For Profit outfit like Wiki they should have really gone dark.

                    Henry Minute Do not read medical books! You could die of a misprint. - Mark Twain Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.” I wouldn't let CG touch my Abacus! When you're wrestling a gorilla, you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is.

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                    rtpHarry
                    wrote on last edited by
                    #24

                    Personally I got around it by viewing Google's cached version of the page.

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                    • H Henry Minute

                      The fact that the black-screen-of-protest can so easily be circumvented sends out a message that I'm sure SOPA/PIPA supporters will use. Namely

                      "It doesn't matter if the odd site gets taken down those clever internet users will find a way to continue working."

                      I didn't even see the message until I deliberately turned off NoScript so that I could see what they had done. For protests of this type to be effective, they must be real. Difficult for a commercial organization to justify for money many reasons but for a Not For Profit outfit like Wiki they should have really gone dark.

                      Henry Minute Do not read medical books! You could die of a misprint. - Mark Twain Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.” I wouldn't let CG touch my Abacus! When you're wrestling a gorilla, you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is.

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                      MattTastic
                      wrote on last edited by
                      #25

                      A few people in this thread have said it already but the wiki protest wasn't for the likes of us. It was for Joe Soap. Joe Soap who if he knew what Javascript was, you can be damn sure he'd have to Google "How to turn off javascript in Internet Explorer". The long and short of it IMO. Also as stated by a few other people too, said civilian would then get such a nasty surprise when they tried to go to Facebook, Gmail...etc after doing as much. In fact, this has to be the most disruptive way of protesting, essentially forcing the client side to accidentally blackout their own internet.

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                      • R RJOberg

                        At least they have it circumventable. I have run up against a few pages which are entirely blacked out for this protest. Yes there is that briefest of brief seconds between the load and the "We are protesting!" page, but I'm not quite fast enough to hit escape during the millisecond required. This protest is all well and good, but some of us have WORK to get done. I propose a counter protest. Any site which has the protest up which does not make an alternative available for those of us who need to get things done, get boycotted from now until forever. :mad: Flippin idiots.

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                        K Offline
                        K Quinn
                        wrote on last edited by
                        #26

                        There is an alternative: books. Let's just hope they don't pass (more) laws banning those too. Also, if you use a resource frequently enough that your day to day job can't be done in the absence of it, make a pdf. Unrelated: remember the good ol' days when you could just download MSDN?

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                        • H Henry Minute

                          The fact that the black-screen-of-protest can so easily be circumvented sends out a message that I'm sure SOPA/PIPA supporters will use. Namely

                          "It doesn't matter if the odd site gets taken down those clever internet users will find a way to continue working."

                          I didn't even see the message until I deliberately turned off NoScript so that I could see what they had done. For protests of this type to be effective, they must be real. Difficult for a commercial organization to justify for money many reasons but for a Not For Profit outfit like Wiki they should have really gone dark.

                          Henry Minute Do not read medical books! You could die of a misprint. - Mark Twain Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.” I wouldn't let CG touch my Abacus! When you're wrestling a gorilla, you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is.

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                          K Offline
                          Kirk Wood
                          wrote on last edited by
                          #27

                          And that is exactly why SOPA is such a bad idea. It won't work. It will cause more problems to the average (presumably law abiding) user than to those who ignore the laws. To the determined, the law simply won't work. In the meantime the bill as written could wipe Wikipedia out for the vast majority of users. This is all to say nothing of the stretching of US powers. Now I am not a supporter of eliminating our sovereignty. But we don't have rights to take down DNS operations for those outside our borders. And the international community would be completely in line complaining if we started doing so. So I believe you are completely wrong. The message was sent and received. A number of people in congress withdrew their support. Even the rumor of the outage caused Obama to come out against this.

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                          • R RJOberg

                            At least they have it circumventable. I have run up against a few pages which are entirely blacked out for this protest. Yes there is that briefest of brief seconds between the load and the "We are protesting!" page, but I'm not quite fast enough to hit escape during the millisecond required. This protest is all well and good, but some of us have WORK to get done. I propose a counter protest. Any site which has the protest up which does not make an alternative available for those of us who need to get things done, get boycotted from now until forever. :mad: Flippin idiots.

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                            DragonHeart335
                            wrote on last edited by
                            #28

                            While I admit that I haven't read the legislation (I've got better things to do) I supported the protest based on my general libertarian stance. But I do agree with you that work still needs to be done. And the website nonsense is a litle annoying.

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                            • F fortycal_sig

                              The title of your post sends the wrong message. The US congress sends the wrong message. The corporate elite monopolists and propagandists for fascism send the wrong message. Wikipedia sent the RIGHT message, and it was a phenomenal success. Now go crawl back into your mincing, chicken-necked little hole.

                              D Offline
                              D Offline
                              DragonHeart335
                              wrote on last edited by
                              #29

                              Good grief. God, go back to your Occupy protest please.

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                              • K Kirk Wood

                                And that is exactly why SOPA is such a bad idea. It won't work. It will cause more problems to the average (presumably law abiding) user than to those who ignore the laws. To the determined, the law simply won't work. In the meantime the bill as written could wipe Wikipedia out for the vast majority of users. This is all to say nothing of the stretching of US powers. Now I am not a supporter of eliminating our sovereignty. But we don't have rights to take down DNS operations for those outside our borders. And the international community would be completely in line complaining if we started doing so. So I believe you are completely wrong. The message was sent and received. A number of people in congress withdrew their support. Even the rumor of the outage caused Obama to come out against this.

                                D Offline
                                D Offline
                                DragonHeart335
                                wrote on last edited by
                                #30

                                Interesting. Does not communist China (for one) regulate Internet communications in and out of their country? And I am sure they are not the only ones.

                                R 1 Reply Last reply
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                                • K Kirk Wood

                                  And that is exactly why SOPA is such a bad idea. It won't work. It will cause more problems to the average (presumably law abiding) user than to those who ignore the laws. To the determined, the law simply won't work. In the meantime the bill as written could wipe Wikipedia out for the vast majority of users. This is all to say nothing of the stretching of US powers. Now I am not a supporter of eliminating our sovereignty. But we don't have rights to take down DNS operations for those outside our borders. And the international community would be completely in line complaining if we started doing so. So I believe you are completely wrong. The message was sent and received. A number of people in congress withdrew their support. Even the rumor of the outage caused Obama to come out against this.

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                                  o_theophilus
                                  wrote on last edited by
                                  #31

                                  Funny that a site where the contributions of information come from the populace of the world can simply, at any time, keep that information from the populace of the world. Govt watchdogging is all well and good but who is watching the watchdogs? :)

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                                  • K K Quinn

                                    There is an alternative: books. Let's just hope they don't pass (more) laws banning those too. Also, if you use a resource frequently enough that your day to day job can't be done in the absence of it, make a pdf. Unrelated: remember the good ol' days when you could just download MSDN?

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                                    L Offline
                                    Luiz Monad
                                    wrote on last edited by
                                    #32

                                    I just download MSDN using some type of tool like HTTrack copier. I even downloaded full rotor source. (each .cs is one html page).

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                                    • H Henry Minute

                                      The fact that the black-screen-of-protest can so easily be circumvented sends out a message that I'm sure SOPA/PIPA supporters will use. Namely

                                      "It doesn't matter if the odd site gets taken down those clever internet users will find a way to continue working."

                                      I didn't even see the message until I deliberately turned off NoScript so that I could see what they had done. For protests of this type to be effective, they must be real. Difficult for a commercial organization to justify for money many reasons but for a Not For Profit outfit like Wiki they should have really gone dark.

                                      Henry Minute Do not read medical books! You could die of a misprint. - Mark Twain Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.” I wouldn't let CG touch my Abacus! When you're wrestling a gorilla, you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is.

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                                      B Offline
                                      BrainiacV
                                      wrote on last edited by
                                      #33

                                      Wait. What? You think the lamebrains who came up with the idea for this legislation would know how to get around it? Even if told? Why that would make you a terrorist and we have ways to make you talk and there are a whole different set of laws to deal with that.

                                      Psychosis at 10 Film at 11 Those who do not remember the past, are doomed to repeat it. Those who do not remember the past, cannot build upon it.

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                                      • U User 8272238

                                        I'm from the U.K. not the U.S. but we're concerned about this too as it has global implications. All this talk about disabling non U.S. websites at a DNS level could mess up the whole DNS system and damage the internet as a whole So any kind of protest is welcome as far as I am concerned. BTW How can I protest (or any non U.S. Citizen for that matter)

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                                        Rob Grainger
                                        wrote on last edited by
                                        #34

                                        That's my thought exactly. It smacks of cultural imperialism to legislate to introduce a law that affects more than your own country. Such an action should require approval of the UN General Assembly.

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                                        • D DragonHeart335

                                          Interesting. Does not communist China (for one) regulate Internet communications in and out of their country? And I am sure they are not the only ones.

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                                          R Offline
                                          Rob Grainger
                                          wrote on last edited by
                                          #35

                                          Indeed they do, but the US is determined to outdo even China, by applying such restrictions to the entire world rather than just the US. It makes it seem very hypocritical when they criticise countries around the world for restricting access to the internet. The argument that its not the government who chooses, but the copyright holders doesn't wash, as the government is largely owned by big business anyway.

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