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Today, many companies are blacking out their websites to protest the Stop Online Piracy Act, and the Protect IP Act proposed in America. Attracting much media and Twitter attention, a number of popular sites, including Wikipedia, are “going dark” for the day (panicking many a student hoping to use the site for last minute assignments!).

The action is intended to draw attention to what the future of the Internet could hold if these Acts were to be put into place. Protesters argue that even websites with basic elements such as user submitted links could breach these Acts, making it impossible for many websites to continue.

On the 24^th of January, Congress will be voting to pass the Internet censorship Act in the Senate. The bills aim to stop the illegalspread of copyrighted material on websites run from outside of the US. Protesters state that the majority of people are opposed to the bills as the language used within them is too broad and could affect legitimate websites. They argue that SOPA and the PIPA will infringe rights to freedom of speech, privacy and prosperity. If the Acts are passed in America, this could also have a knock on effect concerning Internet censorship and website access in other countries the world over.

In an interview with the BBC, Wikipedia founder, Jimmy Wales commented, “these bills are very badly written and don’t address the problem in the right way”. He went on to say, “I strongly support the concept that we should come together in a peaceful, thoughtful way to craft legislation that carves out the problem here and avoids burdening everyone else”.

Sites taking part in the blackout include Reddit, WordPress, TwitPic, Flickr, PostSecret, GreenPeace International, and Free Press. Google, Facebook, eBay, AOL, Yahoo, LinkedIn and Twitter have also spoken out against the bills. Dubbed as the largest online protest in history, website sopastrike.com is encouraging others to blackout their websites and register their protest with Congress.

Sites will be “going dark” for 12 hours, and participants are asked to Tweet all day from their company accounts about the blackout using the hash tag #SOPASTRIKE. Companies and individuals are also asked to share the sopastrike.com website on their Facebook page to help spread the word.

Wikipedia has been trending on Twitter in the UK today, as has #FactsWithoutWikipedia a Twitter users led replacement for Wikipedia for the day, End Piracy, Not Liberty and Tell Congress in the US. End Piracy, Not Liberty has become the catchphrase for the campaign.

Twitter has been busy with talk of the blackout and bills, with tweets such as @DavidShares’s “If #SOPA passes, there’ll be NO YouTube, Twitter, Google, Wikipedia, Facebook & Tumblr, #SOPAstrike today End Piracy, Not Liberty!”, and @blacknight’s, “Think SOPA / PIPA won’t impact you in Europe? Where is .com .biz .whatever based? Hint – not in the EU #sopastrike #stopsopa”.

Others have taken a more humorous, but possibly equally as relevant, approach to the issue, such as @mrbrown who tweeted “If Twitter and Facebook were also blacked out in protest against #SOPA, the world would have to find some other way to waste time at work.

Whether or not the bills pass through Congress and the Senate is yet to be seen. What do you think about the SOPA and PIPA strikes, and the impacts the bills will have if passed; are they protection or censorship?