Wednesday, December 28, 2011

I Left GoDaddy Over Their SOPA Support

I only had one domain with them, but I transferred it from GoDaddy due to their original support of SOPA, which is a very dangerous piece of legislation. (Their reversal is too little, too late, and too obvious.) They refunded me for the unused portion of my hosting plan, too.

Also, their CEO, Bob Parsons, is kind of a jerk.

Tomorrow is Dump GoDaddy Day. If you use them, think about it. There is, though, a legitimate question of what good it will do:
BetaNews reader Mark Haus shares similar sentiment: "Moving from GoDaddy won't change whether the legislation passes. It seems to me our energy could be better used fighting sopa itself. Registrar changes can be made anytime. Focus, people". Jeremy Brownstein disagrees: "The all mighty dollar on ether side of the road has more of an impact than any vote or the current democratic system".
The thing is, who really believes Congresspeople are going to listen to some Internet people, compared to the lobbyists who fund their campaigns. It's a big problem. But you can't cancel your account with Congress and deny them your monthly dollars; but you can with your domain's host. (Not so easy with your Internet provider -- if you have a choice at all -- which is probably why few are calling for a boycott of Comcast even though they are a SOPA supporter. Makes you wonder if they would be had they not bought a majority stake in NBC Universal this past January. There's the danger of the corporate consolidation issue that gets written whenever one happens, and that people ignore as boring or brush off as only theoretical.)

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