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One of the co-authors of the Protect IP Act (PIPA) in the U.S. Senate has said that he will make a manager's amendment to the bill to strike out the section where Internet Service Providers will be required to block a foreign website found to be infringing on copyrighted content. The bill's sponsor, Sen. Patrick Leahy (D - Vt.), said yesterday that the DNS blocking portion of the bill may be stricken before it comes to a vote on the Senate floor Jan. 24. While this could be a big win for SOPA/PIPA opponents, there is still plenty in the bill that is detrimental to the Internet ecosystem.

The next phase of Reddit's war against the Stop Online Privacy Act (SOPA) will begin next week when the social news community will black out its website for a period of 12 hours. In place of Reddit's user-ranked news and lively conversations will be commentary and information about SOPA, as well as video of congressional testimony about the proposed legislation.

This is just Reddit's latest strike against SOPA, a topic that has been front-and-center on the site for months now. Its community of users have turned the discussion into a type of digital activism, launching a successful boycott campaign against GoDaddy and rallying support for candidates running against pro-SOPA politicians.

Last week, the Spanish government enacted a law containing provisions that allows copyright holders to have allegedly-infringing websites shut down within days of a complaint. The legislation, which sounds like a more extreme version of the controversial Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) being debating in the U.S., had actually already been passed, but wasn't implemented until Spain's new, notably more conservative government took control.

The Sustainable Economy Law, which contains the anti-piracy provisions, was enacted in part to help encourage investment by U.S.-based media and technology companies. Today it was revealed that American interest in the law being enacted may have been more than casual. Spain was actually threatened by the US with being put on a trade blacklist if the law wasn't passed, according to cables released by WikiLeaks.

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).

Just as SOPA opponents in the United States prepare for round two in their battle against far-reaching anti-piracy legislation, it appears that their Spanish counterparts just lost theirs. On Friday, the Spanish government approved the Sustainable Economy Law, (SEL) which enables rights holders to have infringing websites shut down within 10 days after a complaint is filed.

Once a complaint is made, a judge can order ISPs to block access to sites that host copyrighted material or have them shut down entirely. The law, which was officially passed early last year but never implemented, was approved by Spain's new, more conservative government last week and will now be enacted as planned, much to the delight of the film and music industries, as well as other media companies.

Domain registrar Go Daddy's support for the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) was the last straw for many of its already disgruntled customers. After a Reddit-powered boycott sparked a mass exodus, the registrar tried to backpedal. Go Daddy has been removed from the official list of SOPA supporters, but the damage was done. Thousands of domains have since been moved to other registrars.

Namecheap, one of Go Daddy's shrewd competitors, has taken advantage of the situation by announcing Move Your Domain Day on December 29. The announcement doesn't call out Go Daddy by name, noting only that "some of our competitors support SOPA." Namecheap unequivocally does not. On December 29, using the coupon code SOPASucks, Namecheap will allow transfers at $6.99 each. For every transfer on that day, Namecheap will donate $1 to the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

If SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) passes, artists online will be at risk - especially if Big Media has anything to say about it.

Under SOPA, websites can be blacklisted and removed from the Internet if they appear to be infringing on intellectual property or distributing copyrighted works. This is especially troublesome for artists whose work depends on fair use law and resides at the intersection of art, mass media critique and appropriation.

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 what-if scenario few in the tech world want to consider - What happens if the Stop Online Piracy Act passes into law? - may be fixed by something as simple as a browser extension.

Forbes and the Atlantic Monthly are both reporting that coders are already developing work-arounds. A developer calling himself Tamer Rizk launched DeSopa, a Firefox add-on that would allow users to visit sites blocked by the proposed copyright protection measures proposed under SOPA.