It’d make sense for American companies that make their living online to oppose the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA). Opponents argue that the bill, which was recently delayed, would drastically hinder Internet users’ freedom of speech.
However, domain hosting company GoDaddy is just the opposite. In an op-ed supporting the copyright act, the company applauded the bill and called anyone who opposed it “myopic.”
It’s a welcome step in the right direction, and we at GoDaddy.com applaud the leadership in the House Judiciary Committee, the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Intellectual Property, Competition and the Internet and the Senate Judiciary Committee, for taking decisive, bicameral and bipartisan action.
Now, GoDaddy’s (former) customers are protesting the corporation. Thousands are organizing on Reddit to transfer their hosted domains en masse.
It began when the original poster, selfprodigy, transferred his 51 domains from GoDaddy to another hosting site—an arduous, not automatic, process.
“I’m suggesting Dec 29th as move your domain away from GoDaddy day because of their support of SOPA. Who’s with me?” he asked.
A lot of people, apparently. It’s currently the top post on Reddit’s front page, with nearly 4,000 upvotes. Redditors vowed to transfer their domains and, if they didn’t have any, to write to suggestions@godaddy.com to express their dissatisfaction.
“This makes me feel good. I only have 10 domains out of 100 or so left in Godaddy,” wrote ShrimpCrackers.
An anti-SOPA hosting service, NameCheap, even began offering discounted hosting to redditors with the code BYEBYEGD.
Just to be safe, several redditors transferred their domains out of the country.
“See, and just like that, SOPA and Protect IP are killing American jobs,” quipped Giraffasaurus_Rex.