Form a group, pick a person in a 'safe' seat, preferably a senator as those are pretty much the safest seats out there, and get them unelected over this issue. Ensure the issue gets media coverage as to your group.
Anything else will do pretty much nothing. In two years get someone else unelected.
Diane Feinstein would be a perfect target, she represents the valley, has been in the Senate forever, and won the last election by a HUGE margin. If you could get her unelected you would put everyone else on notice.
The reality of the situation is that this won't happen. There is no permanent solution because everything is triangulated and marketed so well that it's virtually impossible to change it. People pass this legislation because no one cares and whatever negative ads get run during the 30 days before the election matter far more than anything else and quite frankly most people will be more upset about THEIR pet issue than YOUR pet issue.
If you could get Google or Wikipedia, etc to focus solely on getting ONE person unelected then it would show clout. But they won't because it would cause such a shitstorm of unimaginable proportions because 1/3 of their user base votes for her party no matter what they do, and 1/3 dislikes both parties and something about keeping politics free from corporate influence, which is something both parties agree on unless that influence comes in the form of campaign contributions, PACs, lobbyists, etc.
You've got a political system in which no one cares about habeas corpus. If they don't care about that then they aren't going to give a shit about dismantling the internet. Bread and circuses my friend.
Well, this is a "democracy" (in irony quotes), so there's no permanent solution to anything, as there will always be elections.
Perhaps a better and more sustainable solution would to galvanize this energy around SOPA into a culture of activism. After calling our senators and representatives, we should move on to talking the media and call them out when they broadcast misleading statements from the MPAA/RIAA (like the oft-cited $770 billion(!) lost to piracy every year). This would help us build a base.
Also, this fatalist attitude of things doing nothing is
a) wrong
and b) just gives you an excuse to give up.
For example, remember the anti-war protests during 2003? Those were the LARGEST PROTESTS IN HISTORY. Yet they did not to stop the war. Luckily, everyone did not adopt the attitude of "protests do nothing, we need to do X". And those who did adopt the "protests do nothing, we need to do X" attitude were proved wrong yesterday.
We did something yesterday. While it did not go as far a some people hoped, we did do something. And that is a victory we can build on.
Well, Wikipedia is a non-profit and is limited in the political action it can take. We're also non-partisan, and endorsing particular candidates is bad.
Choosing to unelect a single candidate has nothing to do with non-partisanship, you're choosing to unelect a single candiate similarly to how you chose to oppose a particular piece of legislation.
Wikipedia could be non-partisan and not endorse a particular candidate and still do a whole tonne of damage to Diane Feinstein's run for the Senate.
Opposing her election would have nothing to do with which party she's affiliated with and everything to do with her support for SOPA which you already oppose. You wouldn't even have to endorse a candidate just run a huge banner ad repeating a statement damaging to Diane Feinstein's candidacy.
Maybe something like a big picture of a burning american flag a picture of Feinstein and the words "Diane Feinstein hates free speech." Turn it into a speech issue and get the ACLU to make a BFD out of it via Streisand effect as she tries to sue wikipedia for violation of CFR rules. Then the next week run an image saying "Diane Feinstein thinks wikipedia should be shut down". Then go edit her page and put all the horrible factual things she's doing to wikipedia via the lawsuit.
Maybe election season could be the new donate to wikipedia season.
I'm not saying that it's particularly good idea for wikipedia as an org. just that if there was the desire to send a message to politicians that it could be done.
But it won't because of the aforementioned shitstorm it would cause. If people took on a little more of a scorched earth policy they could get a lot more done.
Anything else will do pretty much nothing. In two years get someone else unelected.
Diane Feinstein would be a perfect target, she represents the valley, has been in the Senate forever, and won the last election by a HUGE margin. If you could get her unelected you would put everyone else on notice.
The reality of the situation is that this won't happen. There is no permanent solution because everything is triangulated and marketed so well that it's virtually impossible to change it. People pass this legislation because no one cares and whatever negative ads get run during the 30 days before the election matter far more than anything else and quite frankly most people will be more upset about THEIR pet issue than YOUR pet issue.
If you could get Google or Wikipedia, etc to focus solely on getting ONE person unelected then it would show clout. But they won't because it would cause such a shitstorm of unimaginable proportions because 1/3 of their user base votes for her party no matter what they do, and 1/3 dislikes both parties and something about keeping politics free from corporate influence, which is something both parties agree on unless that influence comes in the form of campaign contributions, PACs, lobbyists, etc.
You've got a political system in which no one cares about habeas corpus. If they don't care about that then they aren't going to give a shit about dismantling the internet. Bread and circuses my friend.