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Censorship The Internet

Go Daddy Reverses Course On SOPA 330

Posted by Soulskill from the done-and-done dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Go Daddy has relented in the face of public pressure and will no longer support SOPA. 'Fighting online piracy is of the utmost importance, which is why Go Daddy has been working to help craft revisions to this legislation—but we can clearly do better,' Warren Adelman, Go Daddy's newly appointed CEO, said." Go Daddy was put under a tremendous amount of pressure from around the internet; a boycott had been organized for Dec. 29th, and several major sites threatened to pull their domains from Go Daddy, including Stack Overflow and I Can Has Cheezburger. The U.S. House Judiciary committee posted a list of companies who support SOPA (PDF).
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Go Daddy Reverses Course On SOPA More

Go Daddy Reverses Course On SOPA

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  • Obligatory (Score:5, Interesting)

    by dch24 ( 904899 ) on Friday December 23, 2011 @02:14PM (#38474382) Journal
    <nelson>Ha Ha!</nelson>

    In an effort to eliminate any confusion about its reversal on SOPA though, Jones has removed blog postings that had outlined areas of the bill Go Daddy did support.

    Busted!

  • New Record? (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward

    The story of GoDaddy supporting SOPA is still on /.'s front page, and now this....

    • Re:New Record? (Score:5, Funny)

      by tqk ( 413719 ) <s.keeling@mail.com> on Friday December 23, 2011 @02:55PM (#38474948)

      The story of GoDaddy supporting SOPA is still on /.'s front page, and now this....

      Funniest thing I've seen in ages. :-)

      From the looks of things, this's just multiplied the Drop GoDaddy boycott by the Steisand Effect.

      Funny as hell. And I thought they'd lost any thinking customers once the elephant shoot hit the headlines.

      Yuk, yuk, yuk, ...

  • Too late? (Score:3)

    by QX-Mat ( 460729 ) on Friday December 23, 2011 @02:16PM (#38474394)

    I've already transferred my domain and cancelled the auto renewal on another. Ha.

    • Ditto. Too late.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by RzTen1 ( 1323533 ) *
      Yep, moved all 18 of mine. I've been unhappy with their service for some time, and this finally gave me the little extra push needed.

    • Re:Too late? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by jaymz666 ( 34050 ) on Friday December 23, 2011 @02:35PM (#38474718)

      I have been transferring all my domains, it just takes forever with some of them. Since I had been intending to move them from godaddy anyway, this is the perfect excuse to do it.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by LighterShadeOfBlack ( 1011407 )

      I've already transferred my domain and cancelled the auto renewal on another. Ha.

      Why only cancel the auto-renew on one? It's worth pointing out (in case this is your reason) that you won't lose your current registration time by transferring to a new registrar. Usually transferring to the new registrar involves paying for a 1 year renewal but this 1 year will be added on to your existing registration, not replacing it. For instance I had domains with Godaddy that expired in 2012 and 2013, now I've transferred to internet.bs they expire in 2013 and 2014 respectively.

    • Re:Too late? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by AngryDeuce ( 2205124 ) on Friday December 23, 2011 @02:57PM (#38474966)

      Yeah, turns out that the vast majority of people that maintain websites are against SOPA. Which is totally obvious considering the demographic. One really wonders what the fuck GoDaddy thought was gonna happen here. This stupid SOPA shit is so totally stacked against anyone that isn't a Huge Media Conglomerate or MAFIAA fuck that they should have expected this response.

      Besides, everyone knows they're not sincere with this reversal. They just don't want to lose their customer base. Probably should have thought before they backed legislation that directly harms their customer base, though...

    • Re:Too late? (Score:5, Interesting)

      by galaad2 ( 847861 ) on Friday December 23, 2011 @03:31PM (#38475352) Homepage Journal

      from https://twitter.com/#!/jimmy_wales/status/150287579642740736 [twitter.com]

      I am proud to announce that the Wikipedia domain names will move away from GoDaddy. Their position on #sopa is unacceptable to us.

      Let's see if wikipedia continues the move or not after this 180 turn

      • Re:Too late? (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Bob9113 ( 14996 ) on Friday December 23, 2011 @04:46PM (#38476158) Homepage

        this 180 turn

        This is not a 180 degree turn. It is a grudging submission to their customers on one issue. A 180 degree turn would be for them to oppose SOPA and to challenge the notion that imposing traditional copyright onto this new and incompatible medium is the only possible way to promote the progress of science and the useful arts.

        This is maybe a 60 degree turn, and I'm being generous.

  • Believe it when I see it. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 23, 2011 @02:17PM (#38474412)

    "Not supporting SOPA" isn't the same as "taking a stand against SOPA."

  • Too little, too late. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 23, 2011 @02:17PM (#38474414)

    I want to see them actively lobbying against it now, instead of just taking back what they said. Then maybe I'll have some respect for them. I still plan on transferring away from them as soon as I can.

    • "As soon as I can" is - quite frankly - bullshit. If you're like most people, you can do it now. You may not feel like it, but you can.*

      I just auto-renewed my domains with them last month, but I took the hit and transferred away.

      If you have the money to do it, do it. If you wait until it's convenient, it'll fade like yesterday's news always does, and you won't be as motivated to actually do something about it.

      * the only exception I can think of - other than those who legitimately can't afford it or have

  • Just Goes To Show ... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Baby Duck ( 176251 ) on Friday December 23, 2011 @02:17PM (#38474416) Homepage
    Voting with your dollars works!

  • Too little too late (Score:5, Interesting)

    by LighterShadeOfBlack ( 1011407 ) on Friday December 23, 2011 @02:21PM (#38474468) Homepage

    Already transferred my domains away today. Reversing their position doesn't really change anything at this point. They supported it and would've continued to if it hadn't been for the backlash.

    And even besides that, their advertising schemes have been creepy from the start and Bob Parsons is now and always will be a cunt. SOPA support was just the straw that broke the camel's back for me.

  • .... wait .... they were since 5-6 years ago ....
  • GoDaddy has shown it's true colors. When they saw their business tanking they got scared and changed their mind, but we know where their heart lies now. I'm no longer going to support them.

    • Re:Too Late. You've shown us your heart. (Score:5, Interesting)

      by CMiYC ( 6473 ) on Friday December 23, 2011 @02:25PM (#38474554) Homepage

      How else would you expect a company to respond? How many times have people used the phrase "Vote With Your Dollars!"? This is exactly an example of that.

      Go Daddy supported something. Its customers voted (or threatened to vote) with their dollars. Go Daddy re-evaluated what that meant and changed its stance.

      Isn't that what you would want to see a corporate entity do?

      • Re:Too Late. You've shown us your heart. (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Vanderhoth ( 1582661 ) on Friday December 23, 2011 @02:32PM (#38474664)
        Not really. I'd rather see them do the right thing in the first place. Instead of them being ass hats and only after they've pissed on enough customers make a superficial about face. Just so they can survive just long enough for most people to forget what they did and preform another ass hat move.

        • And barring that, I'd like to see them do the right thing now... which, given the visibility they have with congress, is NOT to quietly sit in the back row and remove their blatant pro-SOPA propaganda... it's to go in and tell congress "We're losing all our business just on the THREAT of SOPA passing. I think we may want to kill this thing and come up with something that doesn't negatively affect everyone who uses web sites." Then to start lobbying in that direction, and start speaking out against the ways SOPA is harmful.

          This isn't how I expect GoDaddy to respond, but this is the only way they'd gain my respect.

      • Re:Too Late. You've shown us your heart. (Score:4, Insightful)

        by Y_Slide ( 1564671 ) on Friday December 23, 2011 @02:32PM (#38474676)
        What I'd like to see is a change in behavior. If you are constantly evil, an apology won't cut it. What can correct this is changing your behavior and not being constantly evil.

      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by Anonymous Coward

        Go Daddy re-evaluated what that meant and changed its stance.

        Isn't that what you would want to see a corporate entity do?

        It didn't change its stance. It dropped support for the bill, but still claimed that 'fighting online piracy is of the utmost importance'. So it's still not a company anyone should be dealing with.

      • Isn't that what you would want to see a corporate entity do?

        What most smart, knowledgeable people want to see this corporate entity do is crash and burn, and for its executives to be out begging on the street. The former probably won't happen, of course, and the latter definitely won't happen, but we can dream.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by mwvdlee ( 775178 )

        Indeed it is.
        Maybe their competitors will think BEFORE they act.
        Let GoDaddy be a lesson to their competitors.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Surt ( 22457 )

        This is really a case of character revelation. There's no reversing course when it is revealed you have bad character. Any claim of reversal is now tainted by the knowledge of your bad character, and will be for many years, until contrary actions convince the public of your change. So if GoDaddy wants this business back, they need not only state a reversal of course, they need to be seen actively lobbying and spending significant money fighting SOPA and similar laws. For years.

  • I think the bigger news here is... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Sepultura ( 150245 ) on Friday December 23, 2011 @02:22PM (#38474500)

    Stack Overflow used GoDaddy?? WTF?

  • several major sites threatened to pull their domains from Go Daddy, including Stack Overflow and I Can Has Cheezburger

    ICHC is a major site? By what measure?

  • Of which, 24% are law firms... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by kfsone ( 63008 ) on Friday December 23, 2011 @02:27PM (#38474582) Homepage

    ... who stand to profit from the implementation of SOPA.

    (Referring to the list of supporters)

  • Fuck GoDaddy - switch anyway. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by blind biker ( 1066130 ) on Friday December 23, 2011 @02:28PM (#38474592) Journal

    Don't let laziness prevent you from doing the right thing. In the long run, most of the anti-SOPA registrars offer even cheaper services, so it makes sense even financially, if your ethical sense is underdeveloped.

    • I agree. I switched away from GoDaddy a few years ago, back when they started working with Microsoft to artificially inflate IIS's market share. I moved all of my domains to 1 if I still had any domains on GoDaddy, I would be in the process of switching away right now.

      This just proves that I made the right choice.

  • Not good enough... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by seebs ( 15766 ) on Friday December 23, 2011 @02:28PM (#38474602) Homepage

    I am not interested in doing business with a company sufficiently clueless about the Internet that they would ever have supported that bill.

    If they are that unclear on what the Internet is or why it matters, they can go be clueless without me.

    I think we've reached the point where it's time to remember that the purpose of copyright is not to ensure absolute and perfect control, it's to give good enough control that people can figure out a way to make money doing creative work. You know what? People are making money doing creative work. We're done. The "problem" of piracy isn't a problem, any more than the expiration of copyright was a problem.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Kenja ( 541830 )
      But you where OK with doing business with a company whos TV adds made their domain hosting service look like a soft core porn site?

      • What's wrong with softcore porn sites? I mean, might as well do it right and go hardcore, but they're working with what they can get away with in the US TV market... :D

  • This is a typical GoDaddy scam (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Arrogant-Bastard ( 141720 ) on Friday December 23, 2011 @02:42PM (#38474800)
    We've seen the same thing with their treatment of spammer domains. It works like this:

    We notice some spam. We report it to them. They ignore the reports.

    We notice some more spam. We report it to them. They tell us it didn't come from their network/their customers/their affiliate/their anything.

    We notice some more spam. We report it to them. They forward the reports to the spammers, who either list-wash us or send us more spam or send us nasty notes, sometimes with threats.

    We notice some more spam. We report it more widely, and other people start taking notice. Eventually a number of people concur that yes, it's spam, and yes, it's GoDaddy's responsibility, and yes, they ought to do something.

    When the chorus gets loud enough, GoDaddy finally does something -- like forcing the spammers to move their domains elsewhere. They announce this as a major blow against spam thanks to their own hard work and diligence. They trumpet their anti-abuse policies, pat themselves on the back, ignore the people who actually did the research, forget all about how long the abuse went on, and claim the whole thing as yet another win for themselves.

    Process repeats.

    So there is no doubt whatsoever in my mind that this is just the latest variation of that scam. GoDaddy is only allegedly changing its mind because of the money involved. It's not on principle, because they have none. I guarantee you that -- behind the scenes -- they're still doing everything they can to support this bill.

    So, please, everyone: don't be naive and stupid enough to fall for this scam. Remember: if GoDaddy was REALLY against this bill, they could have said so yesterday. Or last week. They didn't.

  • These assholes... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by RoknrolZombie ( 2504888 ) on Friday December 23, 2011 @02:53PM (#38474910) Homepage
    ...aren't going to stop pulling this bullshit if they backpedal every time a threat is made. BoA, Netflix, and now GoDaddy seem to be playing these types of games pretty regularly. I've been looking for a decent replacement registrar since seeing the original article this morning and I think that, despite their backpedaling, I'm going to pull my account from them anyway. You know, there's a saying that "it's easier to ask for forgiveness than permission"...these assholes seem to want us to "forgive" them every time they threaten to take our rights away. It's abundantly clear that they aren't interested in preserving Freedom, so fuck them. Flame on...

  • Go Daddy is (Score:3, Funny)

    by ancient_kings ( 1000970 ) on Friday December 23, 2011 @02:56PM (#38474962)
    this month's internet bitch! Congrats to the GoDaddy executives and Bobbby Peason for being such wussies. You follow quite well in the standard neocon's shoes....

  • https://twitter.com/#!/jimmy_wales/status/150287579642740736 [twitter.com]

    It'll take a week or two at least to go into effect (it's holidays!), but there you are.

  • ... time to switch to ... ... wait a minute... ... Visa, Inc is also in :-(

    • So is Mastercard but not American Express. Wonder if they just took a neutral position or there's some back story to it?

  • FTA


    "Fighting online piracy is of the utmost importance, which is why Go Daddy has been working to help craft revisions to this legislation - but we can clearly do better," Warren Adelman, Go Daddy's newly appointed CEO, said. "It's very important that all Internet stakeholders work together on this. Getting it right is worth the wait. Go Daddy will support it when and if the Internet community supports it."

    - Sucking up to the wealthy IP industry?
    Check!
    - sticking your tongue up two asses at the sam

  • The Amazing Shrinking List of Supporters (Score:3, Interesting)

    by eddy ( 18759 ) on Friday December 23, 2011 @03:44PM (#38475492) Homepage Journal

    There been some shrinking of the "Judiciary Committee’s list of SOPA supporters", perhaps due to cold water? Compare this list [digitaltrends.com] (439 entries, dec 21) with the 'official' list [house.gov] (142 entries, dec 23).

    Beyond the law firms that have complained [techdirt.com], I can't help but note that Electronic Arts aren't in the PDF.

    Also, every time some actor tweets [twitter.com] anti-SOPA sentiment, make sure to point out to them that the Screen Actors Guild are official SOPA supporters according to the judiciary.

  • Amazing how many non-affected companies are listed (Score:4, Interesting)

    by rklrkl ( 554527 ) on Friday December 23, 2011 @04:03PM (#38475702) Homepage

    The PDF list is by far the most interesting thing of this article and you'd expect it to be all media/software companies (since it's online piracy that the bill is concerned with). Surprisingly, there's a fair number of non-media/sofware companies who don't seem to have anything to do with online piracy at all - here's some:

    Concerned Women for America (is there a Concerned Men for America too?)
    Congressional Fire Services Institute
    Coty / Estee Lauder Companies / L'Oreal / Revlon (why so many cosmetics companies?!)
    International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers
    Pharmeceutical Research and Manufacturers of America
    Pfizer, Inc.
    Tiffany & Co.

    Not to mention a slew of slimebag lawyers who might stand to profit from any future legal action taken as a result of SOPA. About a third of the list includes conpanies that don't produce anything online to pirate and therefore, should never have been on the list on the first place (their presence is simply lobbying and not actually justified). I wonder how many boycotts we're going to see other than the frankly awful Go Daddy (who were terrible even before supposedly briefly supporting SOPA).

    Being based in the UK, I wonder if a UK version of SOPA would result in a list of companies being released that supported the act - I don't know if companies in the UK publicly admit their support for legislation (or at least admitted in a way that a Freedom of Information Act request could reveal).

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by Shatrat ( 855151 )

      The companies like L'Oreal and Pfizer support SOPA because they want to be able to take down sites advertising counterfeit versions of their product.
      Some of the others aren't as readily obvious but I'm sure silver has crossed palms at IBEW.

  • Not of Utmost Importance (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Bob9113 ( 14996 ) on Friday December 23, 2011 @04:20PM (#38475844) Homepage

    'Fighting online piracy is of the utmost importance

    No, it isn't. Fighting online piracy is a nice-to-have, not a mission-critical.

    The ability to transmit information quickly and reliably around the world -- that is of utmost importance. Promoting the progress of science and the useful arts is of utmost importance. Protecting this one particular, possibly outmoded, approach to funding science and the arts is something that we should do if there is a cost effective way to make it happen.

    We have not found a cost effective way to do so. The past 15 years of copyright law have cost us far more than they have paid, even in the short run, and their long-run impact in denying or delaying new forms of art, let alone new means of information distribution, is impossible to measure. It is time for us to stop defending and losing ground. This little industry that represents less than 5% of the U.S. GDP is taking far too much away from the other 95% that is absolutely dependent on information distribution. It is time to roll back these hasty and flawed laws that hinder information distribution to protect one small sector of our economy. We need to find ways to enable creators to profit that do not damage the entire rest of the economy. We need to challenge the unsubstantiated belief that this one archaic mode of funding is "of utmost importance."

  • GoDaddy CEO interview with TechCrunch (Score:5, Informative)

    by microbee ( 682094 ) on Friday December 23, 2011 @04:22PM (#38475866)

    http://techcrunch.com/2011/12/23/godaddy-ceo-there-has-to-be-consensus-about-the-leadership-of-the-internet-community/ [techcrunch.com]

    Especially this piece:

    Adelman couldn’t commit to changing its position on the record in Congress when asked about that, but said “I’ll take that back to our legislative guys, but I agree that’s an important step.” But when pressed, he said “We’re going to step back and let others take leadership roles.” He felt that the public statement removing their support would be sufficient for now, though further steps would be considered.

    It's clear that they just want to hide in the shadow instead of taking "leadership" role in supporting SOPA now. Surprise!

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