FCC website crashes following John Oliver's rant
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Stephen Colbert has the Colbert Bump. This could be our first case of the Oliver Effect.
Last Week Tonight host John Oliver delivered an amazing explainer about net neutrality on Sunday. At the end of his 11-minute segment, Oliver told viewers to bombard the Federal Communication Commission's website to voice their complaints about the proposed law.
Viewers apparently listened. The FCC said its website "experienced technical difficulties" with its comment system on Monday. A spokeswoman told Variety that the site is back up and running, but added it was "unclear if the high volume was directly related to the John Oliver segment."
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With more than 700,000 views on YouTube plus another million or so viewers who watched the HBO show live, it's very possible the two were related.
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Jordan Valinsky is the lead writer for Speed Reads. Before joining The Week, he wrote for New York Observer's tech blog, Betabeat, and tracked the intersection between popular culture and the internet for The Daily Dot. He graduated with a degree in online journalism from Ohio University.