The page English Wiki users are greeted too

Wikipedia has gone ahead and taken its English site down today for 24 hours as a protest against proposed anti-piracy laws in the US.

Users attempting to access the site will be welcomed by a black screen giving them information on why the site is down with a political statement: “Imagine the world without knowledge.”

The news site Reddit which runs on user-generated submissions has also joined Wikipedia with the blackout and also the the blog Boing Boing.

Twitter however has declined to join the shutdown.

Wikipedia, which attracts millions of hits every day, opposes SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) and PIPA (Protect Intellectual Property Act) which are being debated by Congress.

The legislation would allow the Justice Department and content owners to seek court orders requiring search engines to block results associated with piracy.

The sites founder, Jimmy Wales, has stated: “Proponents of SOPA have characterised the opposition as being people who want to enable or to defend piracy. But that’s not really the point. The point is the bill is so over broad and so badly written that it’s going to impact all kinds of things that, you know, don’t have anything to do with stopping piracy.”

The message replacing the normal Wikipedia front page on the internet says: “For over a decade, we have spent millions of hours building the largest encyclopaedia in human history. Right now the US Congress is considering legislation that could fatally damage the free and open internet. For 24 hours, to raise awareness, we are blacking out Wikipedia.”

The site is still available on mobile phones however.

Wednesday January 18^th 2012
The Onlines