Reddit // Current TV

Cheezburger CEO Ben Huh SOPA Smackdown With Rick Cotton of NBC Universal On PBS News Hour (VIDEO)

Beginning earlier this morning at midnight, Wednesday, January 18, 2012 some major... more

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On January 18 Reddit to shut-down in protest of SOPA - What will Current do?

The passing of the Stop Online Piracy Act, or SOPA, could very well scrub the Internet clean of any content that the US government considers questionable.

The massively popularly website Reddit is well aware of these implications and is ready to show the world just what harm SOPA could do to the Internet.

On January 18, Reddit, a user-generated aggregator of content contributed by all corners of the Internet, will black out their own site in protest of SOPA. For an online hub that snags up around 2 billion hits every month, a lot of traffic and ad revenue stands to be lost during the 12-hour span. For the administrators of the site, though, they are running short on finding ways to fight the legislation.

Advocates against SOPA have rallied in Washington and across the country and Internet since a congressional committee began drafting the Act. Under the legislation, websites and people that post or share third-party content could be crushed with heavy fines and imprisoned for the distribution of knowledge. While opposition has existed ever since the terrifying realities of SOPA made its way to the Web, the ban by way of Reddit stands to be the biggest and only protest of its kind so far.

On January 18, Reddit announced that “Instead of the normal glorious, user-curated chaos,” the site will suspend its content and instead post a message about the dangers of both SOPA and the Protect IP Act, a sister legislator of sorts about to go before the US Senate. The site will also post a live stream of the House hearing that will discuss SOPA, which Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian will be testifying at.

“The freedom, innovation, and economic opportunity that the Internet enables is in jeopardy,” reads an official post published by Reddit administrators on their site. “Congress is considering legislation that will dramatically change your Internet experience and put an end to Reddit and many other sites you use every day. Internet experts, organizations, companies, entrepreneurs, legal experts, journalists and individuals have repeatedly expressed how dangerous this bill is. If we do nothing, Congress will likely pass the Protect IP Act (in the Senate) or the Stop Online Piracy Act (in the House), and then the president will probably sign it into law. There are powerful forces trying to censor the Internet, and a few months ago many people thought this legislation would surely pass. However, there’s a new hope that we can defeat this dangerous legislation.”

Reddit users have rallied for other causes online as of late, attracting thousands of comments over such issues as the National Defense Authorization Act. Shutting down their own sight for the sake of protest, though, is a rare move for Reddit.

“Blacking out Reddit is a hard choice, but we feel focusing on a day of action is the best way we can amplify the voice of the community,” add site administrators. Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols at ZDNet agrees, and acknowledges that Reddit already is the leading social network opposed to SOPA and calls the site a “hotbed” for organizing protests. Many users of the site supported a recent campaign against domain registrar GoDaddy after the company offered their support for SOPA. Though the registrar later rescinded their support for SOPA, a campaign largely amplified by Reddit yielded thousands of account cancellations on GoDaddy.

Other major sites that have rallied against supporters of SOPA include WikiLeaks, which cancelled all of its GoDaddy domains in opposition to their initial alignment with the legislation. Some fear though that it will take much more than just a handful of major sites to make a stink bad enough for Congress to second-guess SOPA.

“Chances are if you’re a regular Reddit user, you’re either tech savvy enough to know the dangers of SOPA, or if not, you’ve at least been reading about it on the site’s front page for months,” writes Paul Tassi on Forbes. “Rather, even though Reddit is a massive site, the industry needs a nuclear option to truly decimate SOPA once and for all. Titans like Google and Facebook need to have a similar blackout, which would reach an audience far, far wider than Reddit’s.”

Tassi adds that Reddit’s maneuver is a good first step, but others must fall in line if they want to ensure a success.

“A blackout of the internet’s biggest sites would seal the deal automatically, and we could be free of this nonsense for good,” writes Tassi.
http://rt.com/usa/news/reddit-shut-down-sopa-557/The passing of the Stop Online Piracy Act, or SOPA, could very well scrub the Internet... more

MotherForTruth
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30 days ago
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All the wonky news in one place.

This is a collection of all the mis represented newsreportage regarding Occupy. The... more

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3 months ago
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1 comment

The TRUE Life Story of an 86-Year-Old Vet (Birthday Rage)

This was definitely worth reading :) I'm tearing up because he led an awesome... more

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3 months ago
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Aransas County Judge William Adams Beats Daughter For Using Internet (VIDEO)

WARNING: Viewer Discretion Is Advised. 2004: Aransas County (Rockport, Texas)... more

dryeraser
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3 months ago
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3 comments

URGENT ACTION NEEDED: New Internet Blacklist Bill Could Shut Down Twitter And Youtube!

PLEASE WATCH THE ENTIRETY OF THIS VIDEO AS IT CONTAINS CRITICAL INFORMATION YOU NEED... more

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3 months ago
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Super Frat: It Sucks You In

Bitter's test selling scheme gets put on hold when he gets into a fight on the... more

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5 months ago
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The Walk Show #5: Philly Comic Con Part 2

Tony D hits the comic con floor in Philly for more costumes and comics.

TonyDiGerolamo
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8 months ago
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Why you shouldn't steal laptops from geeks

Don't steal laptops! But if you do steal a laptop, don't use its... more

sbacker
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11 months ago
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1 comment

Tony Destructo: About Your Repost...

Destructo addresses the reposts on message boards.

TonyDiGerolamo
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11 months ago
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1 comment

Reddit Surpasses 1 Billion Monthly Pageviews

Reddit has reached a new milestone: 1 billion monthly pageviews. That’s up 300%... more

Wade_Dokken
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1 year ago
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Gandalf or Dumbledore? [PIC]

Ah Reddit is a great source of images, here's tylerdhurdon with an epic debate on... more

Mcellie
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1 year ago
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1 comment

The Essential Rage Guy Collection

Rage Guy comics are great, but as the Buzzfeed post points out everyone claims... more

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1 year ago
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George Watsky Raps Incredibly Fast (The One)

Twelve hours ago, 23-year-old performer and writer George Watsky's roommate... more

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1 year ago
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Reddit Is Trying to Track Down a Christmas Present Thief in California

The title of the video is "Hot Girl Steals Christmas Presents" and shows... more

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1 year ago
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Hopeful Plaintiff Sues Yahoo, Digg, Reddit, Fark, TechCrunch, And Others

Oh no, we’ve been sued. This week’s hopeful plaintiff is Gooseberry... more

Kristena
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1 year ago
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The Saddest Book in the Universe (PHOTO) - The Daily Blender

After the divorce my diet consisted primarily of uncooked ramen and whiskey.... more

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1 year ago
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Google Engineer gets teen out of jail, Video. « Ramanan50's Blog

one of the good spin offs of internet and social networking.

ramanan50
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1 year ago
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How One Redditor Got an Uncooperative eBay Buyer to Pay for Her Purchase

Selling a ticket to a concert or sport event on eBay can be tough, especially if it is a last minute 'i can't attend' issue. For one eBay user the trouble got worse when the winner refused to buy the ticket after the auction ended (priced $600).

Though after one short con, the user asked Reddit if what he did was ethical.

"I created a new eBay account, "Payback" we'll call it, and sent her a message: "Hi there, I noticed you won an auction for 4 [sporting event] tickets. I meant to bid on these but couldn't get to a computer. I wanted to take my son and dad and would be willing to give you $1,000 for the tickets. I imagine that you've already made plans to attend, but I figured it was worth a shot."

At 11:30pm she responded to Payback: "I'll do it for $1,100, no less. I can meet you at the game if you agree. I need your phone number."

At 11:35pm, Payback wrote: "Deal. Here is my number..." (Thanks Google Voice for the throwaway number). She called a few minutes later and made Payback "promise" to go through with the deal. She emphasized that she'd be out a lot of money if Payback backed out. Payback swore he would never do such a thing.

At 11:45pm, the woman emailed me: "Fine. I'll buy them. But you have to drop them off at my house tonight. I'll have the cash ready." So at f*cking midnight I drove to her house across town and met her on the road in front of her apartment building. She was a nasty and rude individual. Things didn't get any better when I told her I wanted an extra $20 for the trouble of driving there at midnight (yeah, pushing my luck, I know). It became very awkward and she literally threw 31 $20 bills at me. I counted them before handing over the tickets. I said, "thanks for the great transaction" as she flipped me off while walking away.

At 10:00am she called Payback to make sure they were still on for the exchange. Payback said that he could no longer go to the game and wouldn't be able to do the exchange. She blew her fucking top and I swear to god started speaking in tongues. Payback said, "Ma'am, this is eBay, not a car dealership" and hung up.

I got a rabid email 10 minutes later telling me that I was going to hell and that she's reported me to the local police, FBI, and... the fire department. WTF?

I never heard another word from her. I have no idea if she went to the game or not."Selling a ticket to a concert or sport event on eBay can be tough, especially if it is... more

Mcellie
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1 year ago
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Behold the Chicken based steadicam

Ever want make a film but failed to get any steady shots....while on a farm. Well... more

Mcellie
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1 year ago
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