Yeah, this was a surprise. I left early from work to have some own time to spend in Middle Earth just to find out that servers were down (again...). Now searching the forums I see a note from Gordovan. It's just that note was written very late last night (our time) so no change to catch and read it yesterday.
Would it be possible to have these announcement published well in time so that player base knows when to expect these downtimes? Changing some texts doesn't sound like a critical bug that needs to be fixed ASAP with very short notice.
I don't know where you are on planet Earth, nor what server you play on.
But on Arkenstone, in the US Pacific time zone, there was an announcement on the launcher about today's downtime all day yesterday.
Edit: My husband points out that getting the WB and Turbine logos off all the screens may be necessary for legal reasons.