Tomorrow (Wednesday, January 18th, 2012), from 8am to 8pm Eastern Standard Time, several hundred websites will choose to make themselves unavailable to all internet users as a protest against upcoming legislation.
This legislation originally included the Stop Online Piracy Act (or “SOPA”) as well as the Personal Identity Protection Act (or “PIPA”). Both measures were seen by some web entities as being against the First Amendment (Freedom of Speech), and could be a form of internet censorship. SOPA has since been abandoned, but because PIPA will be up for a vote, some sites will be “locking their doors” for a portion of the day to protest what they see as possible censorship.
Because of this protest, all internet users will be unable to access several hundred websites, including Wikipedia, Reddit, and others. You can find a list of websites at http://sopastrike.com
NOTE: EarthLink does not limit access to any sites; if a website is unavailable during the strike, it is because the individual website’s administrator chose to take part.