Corporations that support Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) face boycotts for censoring internet

Corporations are facing heavy boycotts after social media sites went into an uproar over the list of companies that put their support in for the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA). Here's the full list of corporations that support SOPA.

The controversial bill proposed by Texas Representative and House Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith (R), is an insult to the first amendment of the United States and asks that the US government censor websites (blacklisting them like the firewalls of China and Iran), regardless of whether it was user generated content or not.

In fact, the law allows for the government to threaten advertisers with penalties if they support websites with infringing materials. They can even demand a search engine remove your website from their results.

Essentially introducing a new age of fascism for the internet as the policy will likely be copied by other nations as well.

This is probably the biggest news for the internet since DMCA was passed.

Some more coverage of SOPA:

• SOPA supporters slowly learning that pissing off reddit is a bad idea.
• SOPA internet bill with unintended consequences
• SOPA bans Tor, the US Navy's censorship-busting technology that they've used to promote freedom of speech in other countries. What does this say about the US Government?

Reddit is in an uproar over it. When the world realized, Godaddy was a sponsor of the bill, thousands have transferred their domain (including clients of ours) and hosting from Godaddy.

Here's the relevant Godaddy-reddit threads that is boiling with talk of how to punish Godaddy for their attack on the constitution:

• Godaddy Supports SOPA, transfer your domain
• GoDaddy supports SOPA, I'm transferring 51 domains & suggesting a move your domain day
• Godaddy supports #SOPA. Move your domain day being organized
• Cheezburger’s Ben Huh: If GoDaddy Supports SOPA, We’re Taking Our 1000+ Domains Elsewhere
• GoDaddy's Response to the Boycott: "Go Daddy has received some emails that appear to stem from the boycott prompt, but we have not seen any impact to our business." Reddit, Lets make them feel the impact and move your domains! Spread the word!
• Godaddy faces boycott threat from SOPA opponents (PC World) -- Godaddy CEO is an elephant hunter?!!?!
• Go daddy faces boycott (ReadWriteWeb)
• Alternatives to Go Daddy, boycott them (lifehacker) -- some great hosting alternatives if you plan on switching.

Here's the infographic on what SOPA does and what it means for the internet.

You can contact your congressmen from "Stop American Censorship" website.

Certain companies are fighting back. Including Paul Graham of Y Combinator who bans SOPA-supporting companies from his semi-annual event.

Opponents of the SOPA bill include Google, Yahoo!, Facebook, Twitter, AOL, LinkedIn, eBay, Mozilla Corporation, the Brookings Institution, the Wikimedia Foundation, and human rights organizations such as Reporters Without Borders, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the ACLU, and Human Rights Watch.

Update 12/23/2011

Apparently, Godaddy is so bold that they decided to release a statement to Ars Technica:

"Go Daddy has received some emails that appear to stem from the boycott prompt, but we have not seen any impact to our business. We understand there are many differing opinions on the SOPA regulations."

Well now they are just asking for it.

Go Daddy released a statement saying they are now no longer supporting SOPA. However, this is not true, because they still have their congressional statement supporting SOPA and they still have their exception-for-GoDaddy within the proposed law, in order to shut down their competition. They have not backed down, and even their statement is a joke. They are just saying that to stop the bleeding of customers and money. Continue boycotting because if they were serious about switching positions they would have recanted their congressional statements and would be the strongest opponent to SOPA.

Update 12/24/2011
Jimmy Wales of Wikipedia said on twitter, Wikipedia domains will move off of Go Daddy.

One redditor explains why Go Daddy wants SOPA so badly: