I'm currently on a train travelling back to the Village and just a little bored as I observe a self imposed twitter blackout in support of the Stop SOPA campaign. Honestly I think the only person hurt by my blackout is myself as I have to try and occupy my time with other things. The pun was fully intended and you can take it any way you want.
One thing I took away from J17 yesterday was a connection it has with the stop SOPA blackout of today, that being the almost total lack of serious coverage in the mainstream media. The only major msm coverage of Occupy Congress came late in the day when some fool threw a smoke bomb of some sort over the White House fence. As the White House was locked down the sudden explosion of headlines would have you think it was the modern version of the storming of the Tuileries Palace. In fact is was probably the only negative occurrence of a long day filled with protests and marches.
If not for the Wikipidia shutdown I wonder if the SOPA blackout would have gotten any positive coverage at all. Most of the msm outlets are of course owned by organizations that are members of or own members of the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA). The MPAA is the main force behind SOPA and in all likelihood its lawyers wrote the bill. The MPAA calls the blackout a “gimmick… designed to punish elected and administration officials who are working diligently to protect American jobs from foreign criminals.” MPAA president, and a senator for thirty years, Chris Dodd was crying on all the morning news shows while Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales was nowhere to be seen. Dodd said on one show that the blackout turns web users into "corporate pawns." I think just maybe he should look in the mirror more often.
One blog post that totally irritated me said that the twitter blackout wasn't a political issue at all but simply a meme and its participants lemmings following the leaders over a cliff. I was forced to post a rare comment and you can read it here.
Maybe I should just play Angry Katies, emm, birds.
One thing I took away from J17 yesterday was a connection it has with the stop SOPA blackout of today, that being the almost total lack of serious coverage in the mainstream media. The only major msm coverage of Occupy Congress came late in the day when some fool threw a smoke bomb of some sort over the White House fence. As the White House was locked down the sudden explosion of headlines would have you think it was the modern version of the storming of the Tuileries Palace. In fact is was probably the only negative occurrence of a long day filled with protests and marches.
If not for the Wikipidia shutdown I wonder if the SOPA blackout would have gotten any positive coverage at all. Most of the msm outlets are of course owned by organizations that are members of or own members of the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA). The MPAA is the main force behind SOPA and in all likelihood its lawyers wrote the bill. The MPAA calls the blackout a “gimmick… designed to punish elected and administration officials who are working diligently to protect American jobs from foreign criminals.” MPAA president, and a senator for thirty years, Chris Dodd was crying on all the morning news shows while Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales was nowhere to be seen. Dodd said on one show that the blackout turns web users into "corporate pawns." I think just maybe he should look in the mirror more often.
One blog post that totally irritated me said that the twitter blackout wasn't a political issue at all but simply a meme and its participants lemmings following the leaders over a cliff. I was forced to post a rare comment and you can read it here.
Maybe I should just play Angry Katies, emm, birds.
