http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120208/01453517694/riaa-totally-out-touch-lashes-out-google-wikipedia-everyone-who-protested-sopapipa.shtml

Well, I updated WordPress (after I found out that my hoster had a case of the stupids and was limiting my web hosting space) and nothing seems to be broken.  I guess I can continue now :)

I don’t know if you have been following the SOPA and ProtectIP debates going on around the Internet about the US bills that are trying to be pushed through the Gov’t. If you are of a ‘content-focused’ nature, this should be a huge interest as it will affect you directly in your business/blog/online dealings.

Here is a pretty good overview of what these entail:

GoDaddy was a huge supporter of SOPA. So much so that there was a ton of backlash from many, many of it customers. When it really started to hit their pocketbook, they made a statement that they no longer support it.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-31921_3-57349913-281/godaddy-bows-to-boycott-now-opposes-sopa-copyright-bill/

Being the cynic that I am, when companies do things like this, they may oppose it but when push comes to shove, they’ll cave without reservation, if the bill gets passed and some company makes its first claim to their new SOPA-powered legal rights. I just don’t trust them any more.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop_Online_Piracy_Act
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protectip
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2011/12/setting-record-straight-sopa-some-evidence-based-analysis

Like free books.

http://openlibrary.org/subjects/accessible_book

One web page for every book ever published. It’s a lofty but achievable goal.

To build Open Library, we need hundreds of millions of book records, a wiki interface, and lots of people who are willing to contribute their time and effort to building the site.

To date, we have gathered over 20 million records from a variety of large catalogs as well as single contributions, with more on the way.

Open Library is an open project: the software is open, the data are open, the documentation is open, and we welcome your contribution. Whether you fix a typo, add a book, or write a widget–it’s all welcome. We have a small team of fantastic programmers who have accomplished a lot, but we can’t do it alone!

Open Library is a project of the non-profit Internet Archive, and has been funded in part by a grant from the California State Library and the Kahle/Austin Foundation.

Definitely worth checking out.

These statues are in the embassy area.  Their perspective screws with my eyes, almoat like something is wrong with them, and technically there is.