[ldd-]

The internet is big, but please don't think for a moment that awareness of SOPA/PIPA is big at all . . . "normals" have absolutely zero clue about what it is . . . even many who aren't "normals" aren't aware.

As tech/internet professionals, we often forget the echo chamber we live in . . . we all read the same publications and participate in the same communities. Awareness/publication outside those communities is negligible. As an example, take a look at the blackoutsopa campaign on Twitter . . . 10,000 people (I'm one of them, by the way) out of 180 million on Twitter?? . . . the most recent claim I saw is that those 10,000 people have 20 million followers . . . in aggregate, sure . . . wouldn't be surprised if it was a net of only 1 million . . . if that.

That said, it's impressive that the anti-SOPA/PIPA campaign has had an outsized impact for its population, but there is a LONG way to go before the rest of the internet has even the slightest hint anything is even going on . . . and I do think FB/Google/Wiki/Tumblr blackouts would be needed to get there.

[substack]

> "normals" have absolutely zero clue about what it is

I was surprised to hear my relatively non-technical father ask me back in December if SOPA was as bad as he had heard. Discussion of this legislation seems to be making it out into the mainstream press in bits and pieces. NPR has done several segments on it that I know of for instance.