As an Internet user, no doubt you’re hearing a lot about the proposed Stop Online Piracy Act and the Protect IP Act in the U.S. Congress. Many sites around the web today are protesting against these two bills because of the grave potential for unintended consequences. The bills—lobbied by Hollywood special interests—are meant to curtail piracy of entertainment content such as movies, TV shows and music.

But they go too far. The proposed legislation would require sites to actively monitor and remove links to other sites that could contain copyright-infringing material. Think about it. If there’s an unlicensed use of an image on a Tumblr blog, Google can’t link to Tumblr.com. In fact, an app like DesignScene could not exist under such conditions because it would be impossible for us to manually censor each image and link, or even algorithmically do that.

We live in a world today where there is open and free exchange of ideas and creativity on the Internet. Through sites like Brand New we can check out identity design from around the world. Through Design*Sponge we can get Grace Bonney’s take on what’s unique and beautiful. And through supersonic electronic, we can discover wild and crazy illustrators. None of those blogs would be viable should SOPA or PIPA is made into law. All of the U.S.-based art and design sites we feature in our DesignScene app could easily be shut down by copyright holders claiming infringement. DesignScene couldn’t exist.

Help stop this non-sense and fight for the Internet’s freedom from censorship.

One of the most requested features we’ve had since launching DesignScene has been Instapaper support. Instapaper, for those of you among the uninitiated (lucky you!), is a terrific service for saving web pages to read later. Sure there are other bookmarking services, but Instapaper then lets you read the page in a readability-style interface in native iPad and iPhone apps, so you can just focus on the reading the content. And now it’s a great way to save/favorite things you discover in DesignScene.

Say that you’re exploring in DesignScene, getting inspired, and spot an interesting blog post by Steven Heller. But you don’t have time to read it now. Just tap the sharing button and then the Instapaper icon. If you’re not already logged into Instapaper, you’ll be able to do so. Otherwise, the post will immediate be saved to Instapaper. That’s it. Read the post later in the Instapaper app or on the Instapaper site.

Of course, if you’re already an Instapaper user, you’re probably already familiar with this pattern from other apps. And if you’re not an Instapaper user, well, today’s a great day to learn more and sign up!

And to celebrate the launch of Instapaper support, for this weekend only, DesignScene is half price! Get it for a steal by the end of the day on Monday.

It’s been about two weeks since we launched DesignScene app for iPad. The reception so far has greatly exceeded our expectations and we’re very grateful that it is getting such a good response. To everyone who has purchased the app already and have supported us, we say thank you!

We are currently working on some bug fixes that we hope to release soon. We are also beginning work on a new feature that a lot of our users have been asking for. Look for this soon.

In the meantime, please check out DesignScene if you haven’t already. If you’ve already purchased it, please tell your friends!