[IRP] PROTECT IP no longer coming for a vote!

Tue Jan 24 10:03:45 EET 2012

Or you may like to host the list at riseup.net groups? 

Security issues will also be dealt with then. 

Best wishes

Shahzad

From: Jillian C. York [mailto:jillian at eff.org] 
Sent: Tuesday, January 24, 2012 2:33 AM
To: Jochai Ben-Avie
Cc: raegan at accessnow.org; fatimacambronero at gmail.com; kosta at ahumanright.org;
owen.pringle at amnesty.org; gabrielle at article19.org; cci at internautas.org;
anriette at apc.org; joy at apc.org; valeriab at apc.org; aguiton at gmail.com;
aaron at avaaz.org; ot.vandaalen at bof.nl; shahzad at bytesforall.pk;
pranesh at cis-india.org; Carlos Affonso Pereira de Souza; Joana Varon;
Gunnela.Hahn at svenskakyrkan.se; r.deibert at utoronto.ca; meraszendro at gmail.com;
jeremy at ciroap.org; renata.avila.pinto at gmail.com; davidadamsegal at gmail.com;
claudio at derechosdigitales.org; alberto at derechosdigitales.org;
mbelinsky at digital-democracy.org; sam at impulsraum.org;
timo.karjalainen at effi.org; joe at mcnamee.eu; verveine.angeli at sudptt.fr;
isaac at freenetworkmovement.org; tkarr at freepress.net; mwood at freepress.net;
willems at freepressunlimited.org; ermanno at ula.ve; carobotero at gmail.com;
pimienta at funredes.org; Dixie at global-partners.co.uk; cedric at gn.apc.org;
javier at humanrightsfoundation.org; pedro at humanrightsfoundation.org;
ganesaa at hrw.org; eberto2 at palermo.edu; emily at indexoncensorship.org;
graciela at nupef.org.br; anja at internetdemocracy.in; lmcknigh at syr.edu;
irp at lists.internetrightsandprinciples.org; issa at jordanopensource.org;
jz at laquadrature.net; omarino at laneta.apc.org; Mallory at mayfirst.org;
katrin at mobileactive.org; info at movements.org; andre at nurpa.be;
hiram.melendez at upr.edu; jim at openrightsgroup.org; peter at openrightsgroup.org;
webmink at opensource.org; alexander.list at openspectrum.eu;
joseph at palantetech.com; katarzyna.szymielewicz at panoptykon.org;
clodagh.miskelly at panos.org.uk; sylvia at peoplewho.org; eric at privacy.org;
arif at progressivetech.org; delphine at rsf.org; internet at rsf.org;
jessica at smex.org; ali at tacticaltech.org; shearman at victoria.tc.ca;
arthit at gmail.com; pwolff at dijest.com; nathan at guardianproject.info;
marcin.dekaminski at gmail.com; douglas at publicsphereproject.org;
valerie.peugeot at gmail.com; fredericsultan at gmail.com; marlyntadros at gmail.com;
yvette at witness.org; sam at witness.org; mmitar at gmail.com;
moritz at torservers.net; 10com at operamail.com; cynthia at cdt.org; andrew at cdt.org;
losey at newamerica.net; team
Subject: Re: PROTECT IP no longer coming for a vote!

While I'm glad to see this effort, I highly suggest using something other
than Google Groups.  Why not a proprietary email list of some sort?

-Jillian

On 1/23/12 12:40 PM, Jochai Ben-Avie wrote: 

Dear friends and colleagues,

Over the weekend I've been doing a lot of thinking about how we can maintain
the momentum and power of all of the groups that have come together to fight
SOPA & PIPA. The scale and scope of action taken around this legislation is
unprecedented and shows the influence we can have when we work together. But
what actually made this ad hoc coalition so effective and how can we harness
this energy ahead of the next battle? Some thoughts:

1) Sharing information. I think in every political capitol, but particularly
in Washington D.C., things happen very quickly and it can be hard for
international groups to keep their finger on the pulse of what's happening.
By pooling information, it is much easier to get a complete picture of what
"the other side" is planning, allowing us to identify leverage points and
spend resources most effectively. 

2) Coordinated messaging. While there is certainly a balance to be struck
between having a diversity of voices and a unified narrative when
international human rights organizations speak out against a rights-abusing
law, there is also value in knowing what other groups are going to be doing
and saying. This enables us to avoid conflict and to position our
organizations most strategically. 

3) Common action. There are times when a chorus of opposition can be
influential (e.g., when each groups speaks out against a law individually),
but when it comes to the international human rights community, I think we
can also have a very powerful impact if we speak in one voice. We've heard
that our letters about SOPA and PIPA were particularly effective in this
regard. For example, we saw many of the talking points from our letter about
SOPA in the White House's statement on this legislation. 

This is not the last time that the international human rights community will
have to come together to defeat a particular digital rights-abusing law.
Indeed, SOPA and PIPA are likely to rear their ugly heads again sometime in
the next few weeks. And, of course, let us not forget about ACTA. While the
international human rights community can't speak out about every law that
threatens digital rights or the integrity of the internet, it's important
that we share information about what's happening around the world, taking
coordinated action when it makes sense to do so. While we're all on many
lists, I don't think there is an existing comprehensive listserv that
achieves the goals outlined above. To help in coordinating sign-on in the
previous three letters (around the eG8, SOPA, and PIPA), we've created a
list of the contact people at a number of human rights organizations
internationally (incidentally, the recipients of this email). To speak to
the goals above and make it easier for everyone on this thread to coordinate
action of the international human rights community, we've created a google
group for international digital rights organizations
(digitalrightsorgs at googlegroups.com). We've initially sent invitations to
orgs that signed one of the letters about the eG8, SOPA, or PIPA (about 100
in total), but if there are others who should be included, just let me know.

Cheers,

Jochai

-- 

Jochai Ben-Avie
Policy Director
Access | AccessNow.org
P: +1-347-806-9531 | S: jochaiben-avie | PGP: 0x9E6D805F

On Fri, Jan 20, 2012 at 9:58 AM, Jochai Ben-Avie <jochai at accessnow.org>
wrote:

Hi all, 

Just wanted to let you know that... we did it! Everyone, we did it! Senate
Majority Leader Harry Reid has postponed Tuesday's cloture vote!

Press release from Reid's office is below, but wanted to let you know that
the Public Knowledge strategy call originally scheduled for 1 PM EST (GMT-5)
has been moved to 2 PM and we'll be discussing next steps. Let me know if
you want the number.

Cheers,

Jochai

<http://democrats.senate.gov/2012/01/20/reid-statement-on-intellectual-prope
rty-bill/>
http://democrats.senate.gov/2012/01/20/reid-statement-on-intellectual-proper
ty-bill/ 

Washington, D.C. - Nevada Senator Harry Reid released the following
statement today on the Senate's PROTECT I.P. Act:

"In light of recent events, I have decided to postpone Tuesday's vote on the
PROTECT I.P. Act.

"There is no reason that the legitimate issues raised by many about this
bill cannot be resolved. Counterfeiting and piracy cost the American economy
billions of dollars and thousands of jobs each year, with the movie industry
alone supporting over 2.2 million jobs. We must take action to stop these
illegal practices. We live in a country where people rightfully expect to be
fairly compensated for a day's work, whether that person is a miner in the
high desert of Nevada, an independent band in New York City, or a union
worker on the back lots of a California movie studio.

"I admire the work that Chairman Leahy has put into this bill. I encourage
him to continue engaging with all stakeholders to forge a balance between
protecting Americans' intellectual property, and maintaining openness and
innovation on the internet. We made good progress through the discussions
we've held in recent days, and I am optimistic that we can reach a
compromise in the coming weeks."

On Thu, Jan 19, 2012 at 11:57 PM, Jochai Ben-Avie <jochai at accessnow.org>
wrote:

Hi Everyone,

Just wanted to reach out and give a brief summary of what's been happening
around PIPA and the letter you all signed on to.

As I'm sure many of you know, yesterday, more than 115,000 websites blacked
out to protest PIPA and SOPA. I spent a large chunk of the day on the Hill
and the phones in Senate offices were ringing non-stop. Senator Kirk's
office, for example, said that they had received 5,000 calls in less than 24
hours. Some are saying that this is the most calls on any issue that the
Senate has ever received.

On the offline side, the protest outside Sens. Schumer and Gillibrand's
offices in NYC coordinated by NY Tech Meetup was a rousing success, with
about 2,500 people turning out- perhaps the largest copyright protest ever.
Most of the Access Team was at the protest holding a giant 9x3 foot banner
that said "Say No to PIPA and SOPA" and then called attention to the letter
from the human rights community, listing the URL, and the names of all of
the signatories. For more details and photos, check out our blog post here
<https://www.accessnow.org/policy-activism/press-blog/pipa-sopa-internet-cen
sorship> . 

On the letter:

A group of human rights organizations (including myself) were on the Hill
yesterday pushing the issues we raised in the letter. My impression is that
a lot of Senators (and Representatives, but the focus is on the House at the
moment given the legislative calendar) are really starting to grok that this
legislation affects human rights and are pulling their support or going from
no position to opposition. The fact that respected human rights like ours
are speaking out is making it easier for Senators to wean themselves off the
"there are no first amendment concerns in this bill because it only deals
with piracy koolaid." I'll also add that the section on information location
tools in particular seemed to have resonance and didn't appear to be an
issue that staffers were familiar with. 

Today, with help from the Free Press Action Fund, one of our co-signatories,
we delivered the letter to the full Senate. It would be really great if
everyone on this list could follow up with any contacts that you have on the
Hill to make sure they see the letter. The final version of the letter can
be found at https://www.accessnow.org/pipa-letter, if you want to give a
link to download the letter as a PDF use:
https://www.accessnow.org/page/-/docs/PIPA-LETTER-FROM-HUMAN-RIGHTS-COMMUNIT
Y-FINAL.pdf. 

Access press release about the delivery of the letter can be found here:
https://www.accessnow.org/policy-activism/press-blog/human-rights-organizati
ons-rally-against-pipa-sopa. Please feel free to reuse this press release as
you wish (and change up the quotes), key thing is just to get media
attention around the letter. 

While Tuesday's vote is still a very real threat that we should be pushing
hard on, things seem to be going our way. This afternoon, I've heard that
Harry Reid, the Senate Majority Leader won't be whipping votes for the vote
on Tuesday, and Mitch McConnell (the Senate Minority Leader) has come out
against. However, if this bill passes a cloture vote on Tuesday, it's about
95% down the road to becoming law, and at that point we can only hope for
amendments to make it better. 

Complicating things a little bit is that a Kyl-Leahy brokered manager's
amendment may drop as early as tomorrow. For those not so familiar with
these names, Sen. Leahy is the Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee
and the lead sponsor of PIPA and Sen. Kyl is the Republican Whip (the second
highest ranking Republican in the Senate). For those who don't speak
American legislative lingo, a manager's amendment allows the lead sponsor of
the legislation (in this case Senator Leahy) to more or less unilaterally
rewrite the provisions of the bill, so PIPA post-manager's amendment may
look like a very different piece of legislation. Leahy's office will try and
sell this as a compromise, assuaging the concerns that opponents and
citizens of the internet have raised, but the messaging around this should
be "you don't compromise on human rights." Moreover, without seeing the
actual language of the manager's amendment (which the public probably won't
see until Monday), we're just kind of taking Leahy's at his word that
problematic elements have been removed, and there are too many BIG problems
with this bill to extend him that kind of trust. We need rhetoric like the
internet is too important an enabler of human rights to make hasty decisions
and backrooms deals about its governance. 

For those who really want to dive deep into the inside the beltway
machinations and movements around this bill, Public Knowledge (one of the DC
groups that's been leading the charge in the fight against PIPA/SOPA) is
holding a strategy call tomorrow at 1PM EST (GMT-5). Happy to pass on the
number to those interested.

If you have any questions let me know. Thanks for all your support!

Cheers,

Jochai

-- 

Jochai Ben-Avie
Policy Director
Access | AccessNow.org
P: +1-347-806-9531 <tel:%2B1-347-806-9531>  | S: jochaiben-avie | PGP:
0x9E6D805F

-- 

Jochai Ben-Avie
Policy Director
Access | AccessNow.org
P: +1-347-806-9531 <tel:%2B1-347-806-9531>  | S: jochaiben-avie | PGP:
0x9E6D805F

-- 
Jillian C. York
Director for International Freedom of Expression
Electronic Frontier Foundation
+1 415 436 9333 ext. 118 | jillian at eff.org

Become a member of EFF! https://eff.org/join 

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