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HN itself? No

All the startups/sites that everyone on here runs? Absolutely

You don't even have to go 100% dark, you can just have a splash telling your users about SOPA. You need to realize

Show, don't tell.

For most viewers, just showing a notice explaining SOPA will be too abstract. Shutting down your site or service, while putting up a notice, has a higher chance of bringing the point home.

I think you got it backwards. Just displaying a notice is "telling." Actually shutting down is "showing" by doing.

In case it wasn't clear from my previous post: we're in agreement. Show, by taking content and services down. Tell, by putting up an explanation of SOPA and what folks can do to stop it.

Perhaps on that day, HN blacks out all normal content and instead just features a list of all the sites that have gone black in protest? Could let users submit URLs to be added to the list.

Agree with that. Besides featuring the list of sites gone black in protest, HN could also display pointers to effects of SOPA (for non-regular HN visitors), contact info for Congress representatives.

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