SOPA To Be Resurrected After Blackout Protests

With growing opposition against the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), an imminent blackout protest to kick off tomorrow, and a postponed vote on the legislation, it seemed as though SOPA was close to being dead. But that's not the case, reminds the legislation's creator and House Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith. In a press release today, Smith said he expects the committee to continue marking up the bill in February.

The temporary hold up on SOPA is partially due to the upcoming Republican and Democratic retreats, which will take place over the next two weeks. Markup on the bill will resume in February to move it out of committee and into the House and Senate. The most controversial part of the bill, DNS blocking of rogue sites, will be removed.

The announcement comes just hours ahead of a major blackout digital protest that will include Wikipedia, Reddit, Mozilla, BoingBoing, and Google, among others. Wikipedia announced yesterday that its English site will shut down for 24 hours, displaying only a message urging against SOPA, while Reddit will shut down for 12 hours and Google will add a link to its homepage that expresses its opposition to SOPA.

For more background on SOPA and its sister bill PIPA, make sure to check out our SlashGear 101 post on the matter.

[via ReadWriteWeb]