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Sunday 22 September 2019

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Wikipedia hails blackout protest as success

Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales has hailed the website’s blackout protest as a success, suggesting it galvanised opposition to anti-piracy legislation in Congress.

It's free -  but is it correct? Wikipedia has chalked up its 10th birthday - Keep your claws out of Wikipedia’s anthill
Wikipedia says the blackout was a success Photo: GETTY

The English version of Wikipedia was inaccessible worldwide for 24 hours after 5AM on Wednesday. The protest aimed to highlight the threat its staff, volunteer editors and users perceive from Sopa (the Stop Online Piracy Act) and Pipa (the Protect Intellectual Property Act).

On Twitter, Mr Wales said the page explaining the blackout and urging Americans to contact their congressmen had been viewed 162 million times. On a normal Wednesday at this time of year Wikipedia would register up to 30 million page views, he added.

Mr Wales also said that 35 Senators said they would oppose Pipa, compared to only five last week.

The Wikimedia Foundation, the not for profit organisation that runs Wikipedia, issued a "thank you" message to supporters.

"More than 162 million people saw our message asking if you could imagine a world without free knowledge," it said.

"You said no. You shut down Congress’s switchboards. You melted their servers. From all around the world your messages dominated social media and the news. Millions of people have spoken in defense of a free and open Internet."

Along with Facebook, Google and other major technology corporations, Wikipedia says the laws would place onerous obligations on websites to vet content uploaded by users, and threaten free expression online.

Critics of the blackout argued it was needless, because the White House indicated last week it would block Sopa and Pipa from becoming law if they were approved by Congress. The Obama administration said it objected to provisions that would to allow copyright holders to force internet firms to block websites hosting pirated books, films and music.

It warned it would "not support legislation that reduces freedom of expression, increases cybersecurity risk, or undermines the dynamic, innovative global internet".

Following the President's intervention, the authors of Sopa and Pipa agreed to drop the proposals for website blocking, which caused most of the controversy, but Wikipedia went ahead with its protest anyway.

"Sopa and Pipa are not dead: they are waiting in the shadows," the Wikimedia Foundation said in its message.

"The internet has enabled creativity, knowledge, and innovation to shine, and as Wikipedia went dark, you've directed your energy to protecting it."

Mr Wales said the first Wikipedia article to be edited after the blackout was about the "2012 Newfoundland and Labrador Scotties Tournament of Hearts", a provincial Canadian women's curling competition.

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