January 19, 2012

oh, internet…my sweet internet…

I wrote a story yesterday for business review usa about the sopa and pipa bills with the headline, “pipa and sopa co-founders use facebook to abandon bills.” the article was about just that - a handful of bill co-founders denounced the bills during yesterday’s mega web protest.

when I came into work today, I found that the story had pretty much blown up, primarily on tumblr. someone posted a link to the story in a blog post titled, “sopa and pipa abandoned.” which…isn’t exactly true. or what my article says. 

but I guess a lot of people didn’t read the whole thing? or were just really excited by the prospect? or something?

it’s been reblogged a whole ton of times and as the thread grows, so does the number of ‘yessss we did it!!!!!’ notes and happy happy gifs. 

so I just want to set the record straight, for what it’s worth. sopa and pipa haven’t been completely abandoned and are still slated to go to a vote. yesterday was an impressive victory for the anti-censorship movement, but people shouldn’t get complacent about this because they are misinformed or spread information under false pretenses.

that having been said, I am really excited that my story is circulating and that people thought it was worthy of sharing, whether they fully understood it or not. and many of the people who did reblog and “like” the article understood the facts it presented and said as much.

in my wildest journa-visons, I never thought one of my business review usa stories would pick up this rapidly or intensely. so long and thanks for all the clicks!

p.s. I wrote more about what’s happening with sopa and pipa here, if you care to read it: SOPA and PIPA Battle Rages on. What Now?

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See Post tags #pipa #sopa #business review usa #viral #yay internet