The Internet—or rather, that subsection of it called "Anonymous" that organizes through 4chan—has had it with the RIAA, MPAA, and other antipiracy outfits. This weekend, the angry masses staged a distributed denial of service attack on the sites, bringing them down for a few hours.

"Didn't realize this was so easy to do with a big enough crowd. Power to the people," wrote one Twitter user.

The attacks were organized over the last few days, first focusing on the MPAA website and Aiplex, an Indian company that does antipiracy work for Bollywood studios. The target then shifted to the RIAA yesterday, and the UK's BPI music trade group today.

The tools weren't terribly sophisticated, but they didn't need to be. Install a particular software package, enter the IP address of the target, blast out connection requests at a designated time—and repeat a few million times. All the sites targeted collapsed. (Panda Labs tracked their downtime throughout the weekend.)

"This Operation has succeeded in many things," said one of the organizers. "It has proved we can actually do something as a group, proved we can pull off successful changes in society, successful attacks on the corrupt that think THEY have power over US... We are seeking to change our way of life OUTSIDE the 'basement' we are trapped in. This is just the beginning. This is only the start."

The "changes in society" wrought by the attack appeared to be short-lived. The sites were down for a few hours but are already back up. The MPAA tells us that it "learned of the planned illegal threat on Friday and has taken measures to mitigate the effects of any denial of service attack."

The RIAA fought back, too. As the attack's organizers admitted, "we have had to switch IRC servers due to legal notices from the RIAA," though we have not been able to reach RIAA for comment yet.

Still, despite its limited effects, such an attack is a clear protest against the copyright establishment. As Panda Labs puts it, "How do you stop the collective man power of an entire Internet community? You can seize equipment, hunt down the originators of the attack, but this is a group who has prided themselves in remaining anonymous, and have done so very well through the power of the Internet. This is the future of cyber protests."

Possibly—though the unbearable drama and hyperbolic language of the attack announcement remind us that the ones doing the protesting are probably not the best advocates for anything resembling reasonable copyright reform.

"This will be a calm, coordinated display of blood," said the initial call to action. "We will not be merciful. We will not be newfags."