The Internet protests to the proposed anti-piracy bills SOPA and PIPA, including the ‘blackouts’ by sites like Wikipedia, and protest-filled homepages of sites like Craigslist, have had a real impact. So real, in fact, that the status of SOPA and PIPA is that they are now effectively dead.

If you are wondering whether Wikipedia is down – and you find yourself wondering this on January 18, 2012, then Wikipedia may indeed be down, but it is a planned Wikipedia blackout, to protest SOPA (even though it has been killed) and PIPA (which will hopefully suffer the same fate).