...And some of them highlight just how steep a hill it is to bring tech matters to the general public's attention:
No where on that first page does it say "SOPA", "PIPA", or anything about censorship. I think the use of bigger, bolder text would've gotten the message across better than the more aesthetically-pleasing splash page they have now. Imagine how much more backlash there'd be if it had a look more inline with that have http://smbc-comics.com
It comes off as an issue that Wikipedia cares about, but doesn't explicitly tell me why I should care about it.
Half of them seem to be angry at Wikipedia for taking away their free reference material the day before their papers are due, rather than angry at the government for putting a lot of time and money into destroying the internet.
There's only one sentence at the end of the paragraph explaining why: "For 24 hours, to raise awareness, we are blacking out Wikipedia. Learn More"
The more page has a very detailed explanation in a FAQ format, but noones going to read this much text to figure it out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:SOPA_initiative/Learn...
Here's a saner stream of tweets: https://twitter.com/#!/search?q=%23wikipediablackout
Take this as evidence of the generic divide between "I care about this issue" and "I will pick up a phone and call my representative about this issue."
If you find a way to bridge that divide, you will have solved society.
I understand the point of that twitter account is to be funny (and it is) but I do think it holds value as proof of:
A) The public unawareness of this legislation
B) The potential public outrage were it to pass
Based on those tweets it appears that the vast majority of them are still unaware of the legislation and the outrage has been directed everywhere but at SOPA/PIPA. Hell some of the most tweeted responses are about how Obama is ruining America and now he's taken down Wikipedia to boot.
Hopefully this is just a microcosm of the people who have been affected by the Wikipedia outage and most of them have made an attempt to contact their representative or at least talk about SOPA in a more intelligent manor with someone around them.
https://twitter.com/#!/search?q=%23wikipediablackout
But there is now an awareness on this matter. I hope this gets more viral when people ask about it in school etc.
The whole blackout day shows one thing. Never rattle the wrong cage or make the "nerds" angry. Creative people will get their voice heard. Tech Companies can reach more people in less time than any other group on this planet and this was just one of many battles to come.