something that someone claims infringes copyright would mean that your site could potentially be blocked. Of course, SOPA wouldn't just harm non-profits like Wikipedia. Who would have invested in Google knowing that one link to the wrong website could shut the whole thing down? The policing and legal costs that would burden every website they did not kill off would be passed on to the consumer. Imagine if every cartographer were responsible for any crimes being committed in the places he charted -- to which he, essentially, created links. There would be a lot less exploration. That would be the online world under SOPA and PIPA. The Internet's culture of contribution and connection would be decimated. The Net would be unrecognizable, except that of course there would still be pirates. Pirates, whether they are boarding your ship and taking your pieces of eight or downloading your big-budget films and making their fortunes by selling them to others, don't obey the law (remember, copyright-protection laws already exist). Making the lives of a lot of other (admittedly sometimes seafaring) folks more constrained, litigious and generally less creative isn't going to guilt one single real pirate into suddenly becoming a decent, hard-working longshoreman. However, what might work -- if the aim of these bills is really to curtail the amount of illegally viewed films and television shows, and not to preserve outdated business models, or to allow governments more control over the Web -- is facilitating better access to more legal viewing. This