Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian is leading a grassroots fund-raising campaign to place a "Don't Mess with the Internet" billboard in the home district of Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Tex.), a sponsor of the stalled-in-committee Stop Online Piracy Act. Read More

It appears that the federal government in Germany will delay ratification of the controversial Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, a sweeping international treaty that includes provisions about intellectual property and online copyright infringement along with stifling the flow of counterfeit goods and pharmaceuticals, according to reports in Der Spiegel and elsewhere. The German government will not act on ACTA until European Parliament makes a move on the treaty, according to reports. Read More

TechPresident's editorial director, Micah Sifry, will be speaking this afternoon on a panel at Harvard University called "Power Politics in the Age of Google," alongside Susan Crawford, Nicco Mele, Elaine Kamarck and Alexis Ohanian. The panel will be moderated by Harvard Shorenstein Center Director Alex Jones, and will be live-streamed here. Read More

German Chancellor Angela Merkel's political party is split internally over a recent statement in support of controversial American anti-piracy legislation — and the fight is playing out on Twitter. Two officials in Merkel's conservative CDU Party recently released a statement with a title that translates from the German as "The American SOPA-legislation points in the right direction." Then, several members of the same party took to Twitter to voice their disagreement with the statement. The statement references the Stop Online Piracy Act, legislation stalled in the U.S. House, and related legislation in the Senate, called the Protect IP Act and further shortened to PIPA in favor of an even longer and more unwieldy name. Those bills were put on hold last week after widespread protest spurred by a nationwide coalition of online businesses. Read More

The Pew Research Center on People & the Press notes today that young adults followed the battle over the Stop Online Piracy Act more closely than any other news story, according to new survey results. A survey conducted Jan. 19-22 among 1,002 adults by the Pew center found that while 26 percent of all respondents were interested in news about a cruise ship that ran aground off the coast of Italy and only 7 percent were interested in online piracy legislation, the figures were drastically different for adults age 18-29. Read More

Public Knowledge legal director Harold Feld says, in a statement, that Congress should start from scratch on anti-piracy legislation to replace a now-stalled pair of bills in the Senate and House. Earlier today, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid announced that Senate legislation would be delayed, and Rep. Lamar Smith, Republican of Texas, House Judiciary Committee chairman and the key sponsor of related House legislation, also agreed to postpone movement on his bill, too. House Speaker John Boehner had previously called for "consensus" on the bill before bringing it to the floor. Read More

Motion Picture Association of America Chairman and CEO Chris Dodd just released a statement calling the delay of controversial anti-piracy legislation a "failure to act" but, at the same time, seeming to ask Internet industry back to the table. "With today’s announcement," he said, per the statement, "we hope the dynamics of the conversation can change and become a sincere discussion about how best to protect the millions of American jobs affected by the theft of American intellectual property." Read More

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's office is circulating a statement today in which the Democrat of Nevada announces he will delay action on controversial anti-piracy legislation until the bill can be changed. Read More