Sonic Retro Planning SOPA Blackout Next Week?

By
Tristan Oliver
– January 12, 2012
“We already plan to,” in Response to Tweet One of the largest Sonic websites on the Internet, Sonic Retro, may be planning a blackout next Wednesday to rally the Sonic...

“We already plan to,” in Response to Tweet

One of the largest Sonic websites on the Internet, Sonic Retro, may be planning a blackout next Wednesday to rally the Sonic fan community against the controversial SOPA and PIPA legislation.  TSSZ previously reported Sega’s connection to the ESA, a trade association that supports SOPA.

Responding to a message on the website’s Twitter feed encouraging Retro to be part of the anti-SOPA blackout movement, a response indicated something was in the works.

“We already plan to,” read the Tweet in part.

To what extent that blackout may encompass is not clear, since no statement other than the one cited was made.  There are varying protest movements tied to January 18th underway, including everything from changing Twitter badges, to outright site censorship and outages.  Reddit.com gained considerable attention when it announced the website would go dark for 12 hours next Wednesday, spearheading the more extreme end of the campaign.

Because neither site founder Courtney Grimes nor any other administrator at Sonic Retro has publicly clarified what, if anything, will occur, it’s difficult to tell what the site’s staff has up their sleeves for next week.  However, given top administrators’ close ties to Sega and Sega personnel, partial censorship or an outright blackout would send a clear message to the company that any support of the legislation may damage community relations that only recently have been on the mend.

If we get clarification on the matter, we will update the story.