Normally, one would think that deliberately crippling a web site and blocking users from content would be a good way to bring down traffic numbers.

In the case of Wikipedia, however, a forced outage has actually improved traffic numbers.

The crowd-sourced encyclopaedia took its English-language servers offline on Wednesday, as part of a protest against the US SOPA and PIPA legislations. Rather than access Wikipedia pages, users were taking to a special page explaining why the company was choosing to block its site for the 24-hour period.

It seems users more than noticed the protest. Traffic analysis from security firm ZScaler suggests that more people than usual are accessing the site.

According to ZScaler, total traffic numbers to the site are up, but with users spending less time on the site and accessing fewer articles, total bandwidth usage is down.

"More people are flocking to Wikipedia today, but just to see the protest page and some details on SOPA," ZScaler said.

"This behaviour could be described as 'online rubber necking'.

The blackout is part of a larger effort by web publishers to raise awareness of the controversial SOPA bills – a protest that appears to be working. After being condemned by President Obama, the bills have been pulled from vote and many of the original sponsors are beginning to pull out amid pressure from voters.

Are you tired of seeing that big fundraising banner ad at the top of every Wikipedia page? Then you have some good news coming your way.

The Wikimedia Foundation is approaching their goal, and when the ads finally do stop running you will have Sergey Brin to thank for it. The Google co-founder and his wife Anne Wojiciki have pledged $500,000 to help keep Wikipedia alive.

The donation is being made by the Brin-Wojiciki Foundation, a charitable organisation the couple founded. The grant will go to fund Wikipedia as well as other WikiMedia sites, the organisation said in a statement.

"This grant is an important endorsement of the Wikimedia Foundation and its work, and I hope it will send a signal as we kick off our annual fundraising campaign this week," Wikimedia Foundation executive director Sue Gardner said.

"This is how Wikipedia works: people use it, they like it, and so they help pay for it, to keep it freely available for themselves and for everyone around the world."

The donation could also help save Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales from incurring further embarassment. As web comic The Oatmeal points out, the foundation's banner ad uses the rather unfortunate placement of Wales' face directly above the page's subject line. Depending on the subject being viewed, this can be a bit bad for Jimmy.

Jokes aside, the money is going to a very worthy cause. Wikipedia has grown into an incredibly useful source for informal research, and as a non-profit project it relies entirely on donations from its user community. Sergey Brin might have gotten the fundraiser to its goal, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't donate a few pounds if you are able to.