GoDaddy Pulls an About-Face, No Longer Supports SOPA
Internet domain registrar GoDaddy isn't afraid to ruffle a few feathers, because if it was, it would never run all those sexually suggestive ads during the Super Bowl and at other times during the year. But what really got GoDaddy in hot water was the fact that it was supporting the "Stop Online Piracy Act," or SOPA. When word got out that GoDaddy was backing the controversial bill, it was like a 'Flame On!' button for the Internet community at large, and so GoDaddy has wisely chosen to reverse its support.
"Fighting online piracy is of the utmost importance, which is why Go Daddy has been working to help craft revisions to this legislation - but we can clearly do better," Warren Adelman, Go Daddy's newly appointed CEO, said. "It's very important that all Internet stakeholders work together on this. Getting it right is worth the wait. Go Daddy will support it when and if the Internet community supports it."
SOPA, in case you've been living in a bomb shelter 300 feet under a rock on another planet in a far off galaxy over in an alternate time line 4,000 years in the past, is an Internet censorship bill that would essentially force ISPs to block sites merely suspected of hosting copyright infringing material. With a court order, the U.S. attorney general could force an ISP to block access to a website, and it could require them to monitor customers' traffic. There's a whole lot of nasty in the bill, and people were surprised to find GoDaddy among the list of companies supporting it.
While GoDaddy has pulled an about-face, some of the damage is already down. Wikipedia's Jimmy Wales, for example, announced via Twitter that he's pulling all Wikipedia domain names away from GoDaddy.
"Fighting online piracy is of the utmost importance, which is why Go Daddy has been working to help craft revisions to this legislation - but we can clearly do better," Warren Adelman, Go Daddy's newly appointed CEO, said. "It's very important that all Internet stakeholders work together on this. Getting it right is worth the wait. Go Daddy will support it when and if the Internet community supports it."
SOPA, in case you've been living in a bomb shelter 300 feet under a rock on another planet in a far off galaxy over in an alternate time line 4,000 years in the past, is an Internet censorship bill that would essentially force ISPs to block sites merely suspected of hosting copyright infringing material. With a court order, the U.S. attorney general could force an ISP to block access to a website, and it could require them to monitor customers' traffic. There's a whole lot of nasty in the bill, and people were surprised to find GoDaddy among the list of companies supporting it.
While GoDaddy has pulled an about-face, some of the damage is already down. Wikipedia's Jimmy Wales, for example, announced via Twitter that he's pulling all Wikipedia domain names away from GoDaddy.
