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Ever wonder what other companies are choosing for hosting, Email, DNS, etc.? As it happens, there's an app for that (so to speak) and someone put the Y Combinator companies under the microscope. With 248 companies examined, you get some pretty interesting results. If Y Combinator companies are the future, Google is looking really good for email hosting, and Amazon is doing really well for Web Hosting.

Pop quiz: The Political Action Committee for which of the following companies has given the most in donations to lawmakers who have co-sponsored the Stop Online Piracy Act and its Senate-counterpart, the Protect IP Act: Microsoft, eBay, Google, GoDaddy, Yahoo! or Amazon?

Think carefully: all six have come out in opposition to the bill, which would put tight restrictions on Internet firms in an effort to enforce U.S. copyright laws (although some firms took more convincing stands than others). At least two of the companies, Google and Amazon, have said they may go dark to protest the bill.

If you guessed GoDaddy, which had a public dust up after initially supporting SOPA, you're right. Sort of. GoDaddy's PAC leads in percentage, giving 52.9% of the $38,750 it has given during this election cycle to Representatives that have signed on to co-sponsor SOPA and Senators who are co-sponsoring PIPA.

It used to be that large companies could pretty much do as they pleased in their ongoing quest to maximize profits and please shareholders. It was only when the harm done to workers, consumers, the environment or a firm's own self image got particularly bad that anything changed. This isn't to say that all big companies do bad things, but some do and in the industrial age, they could often get away with it pretty easily.

Well, the industrial age has given way to the information age and the balance of power is shifting further and further toward consumers, especially those with actively Web-connected lives. For a telling example, look no further than the recent fiasco surrounding GoDaddy and their now former support for the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA).

One of the competitors to domain registrar GoDaddy is accusing the service of purposefully delaying domain name transfer requests. Namecheap, which stands to gain a lot of accounts from businesses and consumers switching away from GoDaddy, accuses GoDaddy of withholding WHOIS information to Namscheap, delaying the transfer process.

Update: GoDaddy has responded to Namecheap's accusations. See the statement below.

After outraging the Internet yesterday by declaring support for the Stop Online Piracy Act, Go Daddy has reversed its position in a smarmy press release. It tweeted the link to Ben Huh, CEO of the Cheezburger Network, who threatened to move his company's thousands of domains yesterday in protest.

In the statement published on its website, Go Daddy maintains that "fighting online piracy is of the utmost importance," reminding us that the company has been working on the legislation. But it admits, in the face of massive boycotts, that "we can clearly do better."

The list of companies that support the controversial piece of U.S. legislation called the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) is fairly predictable. It includes huge media conglomerates, music industry groups, pharmaceutical companies and the like. One name that stands out, however, is that of domain name registrar GoDaddy. Whereas many of the big Web technology companies have come out in opposition to SOPA, GoDaddy enthusiastically supports the proposed law.

Not unsurprisingly, this news does not sit well with many of the Internet's most vocal SOPA opponents, especially on Reddit. A thread that popped up on the site today decries GoDaddy's support for SOPA and encourages users to transfer their domains to another provider. The conversation, which has more than a few choice words for GoDaddy, has grown quite long.

• What's the most effective way to spread false political rumors? Not blogs. Not Twitter. Email. http://bit.ly/e674zt via @millermccune
• GoDaddy.com CEO kills elephant, poses with carcass, is "not ashamed". Outrage ensues. http://lat.ms/dOPADN via @latimesoutposts
• The worst jobs in the world matrix. Yep, World of Warcraft gold farmer makes the list: http://bit.ly/fSrskX via @LaphamsQuart
• The iPad isn't a product, it's a badge - a way to identify ourselves in a world in which the traditional ways of classifying ourselves by social class and mainstream religion are losing their purchase: http://ind.pn/ed9EZG via @StevenParrott
• Online 3D fire ants! http://bit.ly/evXdd5 via @BeeSpotter

Returning to a lesson we recently learned from the dancing hippie, we have to wonder if today's move by GoDaddy.com, the world's largest domain name provider, means there's more trouble in store for China and western Internet companies. According to an article in today's Washington Post, the company will follow Google's lead and cease registering websites in China.

As we learned when studying the case of the dancing hippie, it's the first follower that "transforms a lone nut into a leader."

Starting today, companies and trademark holders can start registering their own .tel domains. However, unlike most domain names, .tel domains are severely restricted by Telnic, the main registrar for these domains. Users and companies can only put up their contact information on these sites and they can only do so through Telnic's own forms.

In some respects, these domains are similar to GoDaddy's SmartSpace or Chi.mp, only that these two products are far more flexible.