Jan. 18 (Bloomberg) -- Six U.S. lawmakers dropped their support for Hollywood-backed anti-piracy legislation as Google Inc., Wikipedia and other websites protest the measures.
Co-sponsors who say they can no longer support their own legislation include Senators Marco Rubio, a Florida Republican, Roy Blunt, a Missouri Republican, and Ben Cardin, a Maryland Democrat. Republican Representatives Ben Quayle of Arizona, Lee Terry of Nebraska, and Dennis Ross of Florida also said they would withdraw their backing of the House bill.
 Coordinated efforts to fight the proposed Stop Internet Privacy Act before Congress changed the face of the Internet today. Here’s a glimpse.
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A number of major English-language websites around the world, including Wikipedia, have blacked out their pages Wednesday, to protest anti-piracy legislation under consideration by the U.S. Congress. (Jan. 18)
The Senate bill and the Stop Online Piracy Act in the House are backed by the movie and music industries as a means to crack down on the sale of counterfeit goods by non-U.S. websites. Hollywood studios want lawmakers to ensure that Internet companies such as Google share responsibility for curbing the distribution of pirated films and television shows.
Google, owner of the world’s most popular search engine, covered the “Google†icon on its home page today with a black box and linked to a website that says the bills may spur censorship and slow U.S. economic growth. Visitors to that website are urged to sign an online petition asking Congress to reject the legislation.
Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia run by the nonprofit Wikimedia Foundation Inc., shut the English version of its website for 24 hours in protest against the bills. The home page of the English website gives visitors information about how to call their elected representatives.
Craiglist Action
Craigslist Inc., operator of the online classified ad website, steered users to a page with a black background and a message in white letters asking visitors to “imagine a world without craigslist, Google, Wikipedia.†The San Jose, California-based company provided visitors with a link to a page with online tools for contacting lawmakers to voice opposition to the Hollywood-backed legislation.
Rubio said he switched his position on the Senate measure, the Protect IP Act, after examining opponents’ contention that it would present a “potentially unreasonable expansion of the federal government’s power to impact the Internet,†according to a posting today on Facebook. Blunt said in a statement today he is withdrawing as a co-sponsor of the Senate bill.
Ross said he was withdrawing support for the House legislation in a Twitter post today. Spokesmen for Quayle and Terry said the lawmakers would no longer back the House measure. Cardin said he couldn’t vote for the Senate bill in its current form, according to a statement Friday.
The Senate bill is S. 968 and the House bill is H.R. 3261.
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