Tried to get onto Wikipedia today? If you're from an English-speaking nation, then you were probably presented with the image above, and not the free source of community-built knowledge that the web encyclopedia is known for. And it's going to stay that way until 5am (GMT) tomorrow too.

Why? In protest to controversial US anti-piracy bills: The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and its Senate partner, the Protect IP Act (PIPA).

The bills are intended to strengthen the position of intellectual property holders and content providers on the net, who argue their industries are being monumentally damaged by online pirates. Their argument is sound, but many feel the bills' combative methods are not; while the music, film and software industries may be protected by the SOPA and PIPA bills, Internet advocates fear the heavy-handed tactics proposed by the bills will lead to a stifling of free speech on the net.

The new legislation would support laws already in place to protect copyrighted material, like the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). However, while the DCMA targets the removal of the infringing content, SOPA and PIPA set their sights on the platforms hosting the content, giving the Justice Department the power to hunt down even foreign websites, cutting their support (and often revenue streams) from US-based advertisers, ISPs and card companies.

It essentially means all webmasters worldwide would have to vigorously monitor their sites for infringing content, something that many feel not only crosses the line into censorship, but, in the case of massively popular websites, would also prove a gigantic policing task and resource hog. Start-ups couldn't defend against possible violations, and the Internet's growth would be cut short.

And while the legislation primarily targets foreign sites hosting the infringing content, even domestic US sites could face heavy penalties, just for linking to the foreign pages in question. On a community driven site like Reddit, which relies on the sharing of content and healthy, open forum it has created to survive, it could eventually spell the end.

As a result, many sites alongside Wikipedia (including BoingBoing, Mozilla, WordPress, TwitPic, MoveOn.org and Reddit) are putting a "blackout" blanket over their sites to illustrate the potential dangers of the bills. Other sites, like Twitter and Facebook, have not took part in the blackout, but have been equally vocal in opposition, while Google too has a protest doodle with the message" Tell Congress: Please don't censor the web" alongside it.

"Today Wikipedians from around the world have spoken about their opposition to this destructive legislation," said Jimmy Wales, Wikipedia co-founder.

"This is an extraordinary action for our community to take - and while we regret having to prevent the world from having access to Wikipedia for even a second, we simply cannot ignore the fact that SOPA and PIPA endanger free speech both in the United States and abroad, and set a frightening precedent of Internet censorship for the world."

It's been an important few days in the fight against the bills. While no-one questions the fact that Internet piracy is a massive problem for the creative industries, even the White House has now began to withdraw support for SOPA, awaiting modifications for the legislation.

However the Senate is still scheduled to hold a procedural vote on PIPA on January 24th, which could yet see the bill instated.

If you think this is primarily a US concern, think again. The USA, in effect, could potentially hold the entire web to ransom, and where the US leads, the UK is sure to follow with similar legislation on our own domestic sites. With so many massive companies and media conglomerate's bank-balances tied to the success of PIPA and SOPA, there is heavy pressure for the bills to be passed.

The Internet as we know it could be about to change forever.

Wikipedia have announced that they are to "blackout" their immensely popular web encyclopedia on January 18th in protest against proposed anti-piracy acts in the US.

After 72 hours of discussions between 1800 Wikipedia members, the decision to fight against the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the Protect Intellectual Property Act (PIPA) with an unprecedented period of intentional downtime was confirmed.

Though SOPA is now thought to be beaten (with the White House pulling support for the bill), the Wikipedia community still fear the potential dangers of the PIPA bill, which could lead to widespread, damaging censorship on the net.

While online piracy is a major problem on the web, costing the creative industries in particular dearly (as well as software developers), many see the proposed bills as too heavy-handed in the almost-blanket like approach to censorship.

"PIPA is still extremely dangerous," said Jimmy Wales, Wikipedia co-founder.

"Today Wikipedians from around the world have spoken about their opposition to this destructive legislation. This is an extraordinary action for our community to take - and while we regret having to prevent the world from having access to Wikipedia for even a second, we simply cannot ignore the fact that SOPA and PIPA endanger free speech both in the United States and abroad, and set a frightening precedent of Internet censorship for the world."

The Wikipedia blackout will begin 5AM GMT on Wednesday 18th January until 5AM GMT on Thursday 19th January.

Internet service providers and UK telecoms giant BT are being put under pressure by the BPI (a coalition of music industry officials, publishers and Hollywood studios) to pull access to file-sharing site The Pirate Bay.

The request comes following a landmark high-court ruling that aims to enforce UK copywright law was passed, causing fellow file-sharing site Newzbin2 to be blocked by BT.

With that precedent set, BPI member groups and Pact, the Motion Picture Association and the Publishers Association, are hoping to force BT's hand, switching off the website for BT's 6 million customers.

Speaking to the Guardian, a BT spokesperson said "We can confirm we are now in receipt of a letter from the BPI [ requesting that BT block the Pirate Bay site]. BT is considering its response.

In line with the Newzbin judgment, a court order will be needed before any blocking could begin. BT is currently focused on implementation of that order."

The BPI are hoping BT will act voluntarily.

It wouldn't be the first time The Pirate Bay has been pulled by an ISP. In other territories across Europe, including Ireland, Denmark, Italy, Belgium and Sweden service providers have also removed the access to the torrent-hosting site.

The Who's windmilling guitarist Pete Townshend has marked Apple as a "digital vampire" during his talk at the first annual John Peel lecture in Salford last night (October 31st).

Stating that the internet is "destroying copyright as we know it" and causing new artists to struggle, the "My Generation" star levelled much of the blame at Apple.

"Is there really any good reason why, just because iTunes exists in the wild west internet land of Facebook and Twitter, it can't provide some aspect of these services to the artists whose work it bleeds like a digital vampire, like a digital Northern Rock, for its enormous commission," said Townshend.

"Apple should employ 20 talent scouts from the dying record business to give guidance to new acts and provide financial and marketing support to the best ones."

Townshend also spoke of the dilemna struggling new artists must face when their music is shared illegally.

"A creative person would prefer their music to be stolen and enjoyed than ignored. This is the dilemma for every creative soul: he or she would prefer to starve and be heard than to eat well and be ignored."

Townshend is not the only person to attack Apple as the root cause of a flailing music industry. Jon Bon Jovi famously stated that the late Steve Jobs was "killing the music business" through the creation of iTunes and growth of digital music in the wake of the iPod.

Nintendo's Zelda franchise hits the iPhone!

Well, sort of.

"Ultimate iZelda Climb", developed by Audio Attack is the app in question.

Rather than being a swashbuckling adventure full of magic, dungeons and fair maidens however, Ultimate iZelda Climb is a DoodleJump clone. It's as classy as it is likely to get official endorsement from old Ninty.

We're pretty sure Nintendo President Satoru Iwata will be more than a bit miffed at this unauthorized app. Speaking to Japanese business daily Nikkei back in September, he stated that Nintendo gaming apps were "absolutely not under consideration," despite relatively tough times for the company following the less-than-stellar response to the Nintendo 3DS.

"If we did this, Nintendo would cease to be Nintendo," continued the Nintendo boss. "It's probably the correct decision in the sense that the moment we started to release games on smartphones we'd make profits.

"However, I believe my responsibility is not to short term profits, but to Nintendo's mid and long term competitive strength."

What with Apple's stringent app approval process, you can't help but think the Cupertino team are having a bit of a laugh at Nintendo's expense with this one.

If you're interested, you can grab the app by clicking here. It costs 0.69p. Be quick though, this one will be pulled faster than you can say "bootleg Triforce".

The Pirate Party, an independent political group who claim to represent digital rights and civil liberties for file sharers, have gained a landmark 8.9% of votes in the preliminary results of the Berlin local elections.

Boasting 12,000 members since forming in 2006, the party opposes European data retention laws and information privacy, as well as calling for major changes to copyright laws.

With legislation like the Digital Economy Act dividing voters in the UK, and similar laws being introduced in a state-by-state basis in the US, expect to see more political parties leaning heavily on issues of digital rights.

"We will get right to work," said Andreas Baum, Pirate party to ZDF television according to the Washington Post.

"This is all new for us."

Lawmakers in the state of Tennessee have passed a measure which could potentially drastically change the way we use premium online services like Netflix and Rhapsody. The new law, awaiting the Tennessee governor's signature, would make it a crime to share login information for paid-for online content portals.

While it's unlikely those living in Tennessee who share accounts with a sibling or spouse will come under fire, those who share a single account with many friends that may live many miles apart could potentially be breaking the law when the measure becomes standard.

The bill is aimed at preventing hackers and black market merchants from selling passwords to bulk buyers, and is intended to quell the growing tide of piracy that password and licence sharing online now facilitates.

Though the law so far has only been put forward in Tennessee, it has the potential to set a precedent for lawmakers across the States, and potentially the rest of the globe too. It would likely receive the full backing of all major record industry labels, as they continue to struggle to find effective ways to monetise their music catalogues online.

Via: The Huffington Post

The long-running court case between P2P file-sharing service LimeWire and a handful of record labels has concluded, resulting in a bill of $105 million worth of damages to be paid by LimeWire.

The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), representing 13 labels that include Warner and Sony, have spent the last year in court against LimeWire, suing for breaching copyright.

With the court ruling in the RIAA's favour, CEO Mitch Bainwol shared his pleasure by saying:

"We are pleased to have reached a large monetary settlement. Designing and operating services to profit from the theft of the world's greatest music comes with a stiff price.

"The resolution of this case is another milestone in the continuing evolution of online music to a legitimate marketplace that appropriately rewards creators."

Surprisingly, LimeWire founder Mark Gorton seemed equally happy to put the whole case behind him, despite losing. A statement from his law firm reads, "Lime Wire and its founder, Mark Gorton, are pleased that this case has concluded."

In some senses, you can't blame him; at one point LimeWire was accused of owing $75 trillion worth of damages. $105 million must feel like pocket money in comparison.

Via: Reuters

After months of legal wranglings, it looks as though Facebook will soon own the trademark for the word "Face".

Zuckerberg's empire have had their trademark application accepted by the US Patent and Trade Office, with the reins passing to them from Faceparty.com.

If you were worried about you're own ugly mug incurring legal dealings because of the move, you needn't; the trademark only covers the use of "face" in regards to "telecommunication services, namely, providing online chat rooms and electronic bulletin boards for transmission of messages among computer users in the field of general interest and concerning social and entertainment subject matter, none primarily featuring or relating to motoring or to cars".

That means if you're planning on starting a social network or online communications system of any form with the word "Face" in the title, you could be in trouble. If you're not online, or not social however, you should still be able to use "Face", it would appear.

Facebook have three months to seal the deal, which you'd assume they most certainly will. Excuse me while I go apply for the trademark to the words "Eye", "Nose" and "Bum". And, just to throw a spanner in the works "Faceb" too.

High-fives all around at Nintendo HQ today, as the High Court has ruled that importing, advertising or selling R4 cartridges in the UK is now illegal.

R4 cards can be used to download and play illegally ripped versions of Nintendo DS games from ROM sites on the web. While some argue that the cards have a legitimate use in the homebrew community, allowing budding coders and developers a platform to test their work on, the court found the card's widespread application for piracy too damaging to ignore.

The news follows a similar court ruling in the Netherlands just a week ago.

While the homebrewing community will be up in arms, many agree with the High Court ruling. Not least of all do ELSPA (the Entertainment and Leisure Software Publishers Association ) who released this statement following the news:

"We are delighted with today's decision to make the advertisement, importation and sale of R4 copier cards illegal. The ELSPA Intellectual Property (IP) Crime Unit was central in bringing the defendants to the attention of law enforcement authorities. I am grateful to them and our partners at Nintendo and Trading Standards in securing this significant judgement," said Michael Rawlinson, Director General of ELSPA. "Intellectual property theft is an important issue for the videogames industry, and this judgement will assist the IP Crime Unit team in actively pursuing and stopping other individuals who deal in R4 cards."

So where do you stand? Is it wrong to deny the innocent tinkerers the right to develop and practise their coding skills on the DS with the cards, not to mention opening up the hardware beyond limitations imposed upon it by Nintendo. Or do you consider the whole homebrew scene too small a community to defend those who use the cards for fairly widespread piracy?

Leave your feelings in the poll below.

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Related Stories | Video: Nintendo 3DS hands-on preview

UK dance music label Ministry of Sound have issued letters to thousands of UK based file-sharers, demanding compensation for copyright theft, or else have the accused face further legal action.

As many as 2,000 people are thought to have been recipients of the letters from intellectual property lawyers Gallant Macmillan, asking for as much as £350 from those believed to have downloaded and shared Ministry of Sound albums over the web illegally.

However, many of the recipients are protesting that they are innocent, oblivious to the accusations being levelled at them. Speaking to the Guardian was Luke Bellamy, who recently was asked by the label for compensation.

"Getting a letter like this is extremely worrying," Bellamy said. "I have never downloaded anything from this website and yet I am being chased for this money. My parents have been worried by this, and frankly I've got better things to do with my time than deal with this."

Steve Purdham, CEO of music steaming website we7, believes it very difficult to identify the core, harmful file-sharers in cases like this: "This is a move which is directed at protecting the media industry and copyright law, while it's very important that the music industry has a legal and enforceable method to deter and convict copyright infringers, we have to realise that with technologies such as spoofing and zombies (where a person's machine is effectively used without their knowledge) it is still exceptionally difficult to enforce the current legal approach.

"File-sharing sites have risen in the gulf between what consumers wanted and what has been available. Internet users don't want to use p2p networks; most are far from intuitive, full of sub-standard products and leave users' computers open to attack and infection.[...] At we7, we believe most people want to support the music they care about and we think with the rise of legitimate services the momentum is going in the right direction".

Have you received a letter from the Ministry of Sound? Were you file-sharing or have you been wrongly singled out? Let us know.

Via: The Guardian

Prince AKA The Artist Formerly Known as Prince AKA The Symbol AKA the little crazy dude with a preference for purple, has predicted the death of the internet as a viable way for musicians to make money.

The singer, whose new album "20Ten" will be given away free with the Daily Mirror and Daily Record newspapers, has said in an interview that his tech-phobic stance will mean it is unlikely he will sell the new over the internet at all. His main target for attack appears to be Apple's iTunes.

"The internet's completely over," he explained in a Daily Mirror interview. "I don't see why I should give my new music to iTunes or anyone else. They won't pay me an advance for it, and then they get angry when they can't get it."

"The internet's like MTV," he continued "At one time MTV was hip and suddenly it became outdated. Anyway, all these computers and digital gadgets are no good. They just fill your head with numbers, and that can't be good for you."

However, Steve Purdham, CEO of we7, believes that Prince is being a little short sighted.

"However, the Internet is increasingly becoming a basic requirement of modern life, just like electricity and flowing water, and we haven't seen anything yet as the Internet as we know it is still in its infancy.  Regarding Prince's reference to MTV, it's just a series of TV programs which has fallen out of vogue, TV certainly hasn't died."

"It's a clear fact that within 10 minutes of Prince's album being released, it will be available globally via the Internet," Purdham continued. "Nevertheless, choosing to distribute his latest album using newspapers is a great way to get all of his money in one go and mitigate the risk of failure or piracy, and that tactic has to be applauded."

Either way, it looks as if that iPod I bought for Prince's birthday will be going up on eBay then...

Pirate Bay, one of the world's largest and most controversial torrent/file-sharing websites could soon be given an unlikely lifeline through a loophole in Swedish law. The Pirate Party, a political group advocating file-sharing in Pirate Bay's native Sweden, are planning to host the website themselves through the Swedish parliament.

If the Pirate Party could manage to win parliamentary seats in the upcoming September elections, they would then be able to use parliament to host the website, which under Swedish law would grant them immunity from prosecution.

And that's not as far fetched a chain of events as you may imagine; this is hardly the Monster Raving Loony Party we're talking about. They only need to attain four percent of votes, and already achieved 7.1% in European parliament elections last summer.

"The Pirate Party recently started to deliver Internet bandwidth to The Pirate Bay, a bittorrent search engine," reads a post on the party's blog.

"It is a website that helps people to share digital content, regardless of form. Since The Pirate Bay was founded in 2003, the copyright industry has constantly tried to sabotage and prevent both its servers and users from communicating. This is a problem affecting free speech as well as the internet infrastructure."

The saga of Pirate Bay and what constitutes digital rights looks set to continue for quite some time it would seem.

Via: Wired

The Digital Economy Bill, the move rushed in during the last days of the Labour government that would see ISPs suspending the accounts of illegal file-sharers, will not be repealed.

That is according to the New Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport Secretary, Jeremy Hunt. Many had hoped that a Conservative coalition with the Liberal Democrats in the new government would lead to the bill being scrapped, as was suggested by the LibDem's pre-election manifesto. However, this will not be the case. "We're not going to repeal it" Hunt bluntly told Paid Content.

Any fixed-line ISP with over 400,000 customers will now be required to send letters of warning to those downloading copyrighted material illegally. Those who do not heed the order will see their accounts suspended for an as-yet-indeterminate period of time. The bill is expected to eventually expand to cover ISPs with customer numbers less than 400,000 too.

Though the news will come as a blow to campaigners, at least one of the bill's most controversial points will not be carried out by the new government. Plans had initially been in place to see websites blocked if they could be used to break copyright laws, meaning that many bit-torrent sites would have faced closure. The new coalition government, as it stands for the time being, have not suggested that they will continue to move on that idea.

Rupert Murdoch, the News Corporation chairman and massively rich media-maestro, has once again attacked Google in defence of his plans for paywalls on his news sites.

"We are going to stop people like Google or Microsoft or whoever from taking stories for nothing... there is a law of copyright and they recognise it," Murdoch told an audience of students, journalists and other media professionals at a National Press Club event at George Washington University.

He accused search engines of theft, and of having tapped into a "river of gold" by aggregating his website's content for free. "They take [news content] for nothing. They have got this very clever business model," he said.

Defending against critics who believe his paywall plans for the Times and Sunday Times are untenable considering the amount of content readily available for free on the web, Murdoch said "When they have got nowhere else to go they will start paying. If it is reasonable. No one is going to ask for a lot of money."

During the interview with Marvin Kalb, Murdoch also praised Apple's iPad as a game-changing device that could save newspaper publishing from the falling circulation it currently faces.

"I got a glimpse of the future last weekend with the Apple iPad. It is a wonderful thing," he said. "If you have less newspapers and more of these... it may well be the saving of the newspaper industry."

Via: The Guardian

While illegal MP3 downloads may be giving the internet a bad name, here's a story proving it isn't all theft and piracy in the world of digital music.

Scars on 45, a UK band funded by fans via the Slicethepie website, have just bagged themselves a major label record deal with Atlantic Records.

With Slicethepie, music aficionados take on the A&R role, making money by reviewing tracks, spotting new talent and ensuring the best bands get put forward for financing. Fans can also invest anything from £1 upwards to help a band they think are worthy of hitting the big-time.

And that's just what they did with Scars on 45. Within weeks of signing up to the site, the band had raised £15,000 directly from music fans to record their self-produced debut album. Their track "Beauty's Running Wild" was then featured on hit US show CSI:NY and from there on in it all fell into place.

David Courtier-Dutton, Slicethepie CEO said: 'We are delighted for both the band and their fans who, in this case, have truly been instrumental in their success. We believe that consumer driven filtering has an increasingly influential role to play in the future of the industry enabling talented artists to access an ever widening range of commercial opportunities."

Check the Scars on 45 Myspace page here.

Think you've got an ear for the next saviours of pop? Try your hand at a bit of online A&R at Slicethepie here.

Pirate Bay founders Gottfrid Svartholm and Fredrik Neij have been fined a further one million Swedish kronor (£87,500) after failing to heed a court order asking that the torrent site be shut down.

EMI Music, Universal Music, Sony BMG and Warner Music took the pair to court last year for encouraging and facilitating the illegal downloading and sharing of copy-protected materials and won .

As ever Neij remained as nonchalant and un-phased as ever. Already being chased for a 50 million kronor (£4.3 million) fine from last year's court case, he said of the news that " a few million more or less doesn't really affect me."

So torrent sites like Pirate Bay; web liberators, the Robin Hoods of the digital age, or just plain thieves? What do you think? Let us know in the comments section below or via Twitter here.

It seems like a match made in cinema/gaming heaven, but those waiting for a Metal Gear movie better stop holding their breath. According to Hollywood producer Michael De Luca, the project is in no-mans land without any super high-tech stealth gadgets to protect it.

De Luca, who was spearheading plans for the game's silver screen adaptation, said to Collider.com, "I don't think it's going to move forward because I got the sense that there may not be enough of a coordinated will at this point on the side of certain parties to see a movie get made."

He continues "Video game companies are very protective of their property and there are certain things a studio requires freedom-wise to market and distribute a movie effectively in a global marketplace and sometimes getting those two things to match up is really hard, and in the case of Metal Gear Solid, the agendas just....not because the parties weren't amicable, it was just kind of impossible to get the agendas to match up."

The genesis of this rumour has been knocking about for over a decade, way back to when Metal Gear Solid achieved rave reviews back on the original PlayStation. As I remember back then, a genuinely inspired casting move put the late Patrick Swayze as rumoured to take the lead role of Solid Snake, with his brother Don as arch nemesis Liquid Snake. More recently, Christian Bale had been linked with the project.

Paying lip service to the fans, Snake voice actor and Hollywood scribe David Hayter was even said to be on script writing duties. The project even had a director, Kurt Wimmer of Equilibrium fame.

With so much at least rumoured ready to go, what went wrong?

As is always the case, it's looking like money is the real road-block here. Rumour has it Sony Pictures were only willing to cough up something in the region of $60 million for production of a Metal Gear movie. To give some context, the last James Bond film, Quantum of Solace, cost $230 million to make. Metal Gear maestro Hideo Kojima and Konami are said to feel that such a paltry budget could not do justice to Solid Snake's epic adventures.

If it truly is the case that a Metal Gear movie may never see the light of day it truly is a shame; if done correctly and faithfully, the stealthy, black-ops tales of espionage would make for perfect (and surprisingly high-brow) popcorn fare.

Come on Sony! Dig a little deeper! Surely animating the Metal Gear mechs themselves alone would cost 60 million bucks?!

Check the game footage above to see how exciting it all could be.

Via: Kotaku

Two days after the Pirate Bay announced their to-hell-with-the-copyright video service the last thing we were all expecting was for Peter Sunde and Co. to cash in their legendary download service. But they have.

All the comments I've read about the story have been on how the dream is over and that the founders of one of busiest sites on the web has sold its community up the river, but not so, say I and to prove so, here's five reasons why the Pirate Bay was right to sell to Global Gaming Factory, if only for £4.7m:

1) It's legal

With all the announcements around Digital Britain and the constant threats from lawyers and copyright infringement watchdogs, one might have thought it would come as a bit of a relief that you can download anything you want without having to worry about huge fines, bandwidth throttling or jail time?

What's more, just because it's legal, that doesn't mean to say that it's not going to be free. There's been no official word from GGF but we do know that the Pirate Bay founders (perhaps we should forever refer to them as the Founders?) went to great lengths to ensure that their buyers had the right ethos.

If the site really does get as much traffic as they say, then it sounds like GGF can afford to run it with no subscription cost for the display advertising alone, even if they're not prepared to get any more inventive than that. So, legal and very probably free. Sounds ok to me.

You would think that the guys over at the Pirate Bay might lay low for a little while, given the on-going court case and the possibility of jail-time.

But no, their fight against (or should I say, for) copyright infringement shows no sign of relenting - in fact it is showing clear signs of accelerating with the beta release of the Video Bay.

Nothing actually works on the Video Bay at present apart from a couple of test video clips that are a little temperamental. Visitors are presented with a homescreen that states: "This site will be an experimental playground and as such subjected to both live and drunk (en)coding, so please don't bug us too much if the site ain't working properly."

Pirate Bay Spokesman Peter Sunde said it might be a while before the site is launched properly. "It will be done when it's done, in the future, in like a year or five," he said.

The Video Bay will aim to rival YouTube with streaming video content. Unlike YouTube, however, there will be no removal of content that may infringe on copyright legislation.

Considering the huge fan base that already exists at the Pirate Bay and the fact that many of these fans are tech savvy - expect the Video Bay to be huge in the near future.

Related post: Pirate Party wins two seats in the EU elections

(via TorrentFreak)