PLEASE Help Keep Internet Freedom Out of the Clutches of Giant Telecoms!!!

[Triana]

From my Inbox:

The Federal Commmunications Commission (FCC) is about to give away a huge chunk of our public airwaves to the giant telecom companies, such as AT&T and Verizon, who want to make our Internet less free.

Broadcast television channels will soon vacate a very valuable piece of the broadcast spectrum when they are required to go digital by 2009. However, the FCC has devised an auction process that is rigged to favor only the biggest of the multinational telecoms -- and will sell off the most prized part of the digital spectrum at a fraction of its potential value.

Tell the FCC -- the airwaves belong to the public, not the corporations:

http://actforchange.workingassets.com/campaign/dump_att/

After years of phone and cable company control over Internet access, the United States has now fallen to 16th in the world in high-speed Internet rankings, with few choices and some of the highest prices for the slowest speeds in the world. The broadcast spectrum that will be vacated could deliver an open Internet into your house without the need for a telephone wire or cable modem.

Not only have the big telecoms facilitated illegal Bush administration wiretapping of American citizens, but they continually lobby to stifle innovations such as Internet phone service and to destroy Net Neutrality -- the one principle that protects equal opportunity and free choice on the Web. We need to end their stranglehold and demand a better Internet for everyone.

Tell the FCC to set aside a significant part of the spectrum for open and nondiscriminatory internet access:

http://actforchange.workingassets.com/campaign/dump_att

Please share this message with everyone you know who cares about protecting a free and open internet from giant telecom companies.

Thank you for working to build a better world.

Will Easton, Manager
ActForChange.com/Working Assets

[AX10]

1. K & R!

[Triana]

2. Kick for Internet Freedom

:kick:

[jeff30997]

3. FCC=Fascist Communication Censors

Bastards!!!:grr:

[Triana]

6. My biggest fear is that the internet will end up like the lamestream media..

...TeeVee, magazines, newspapers, and radio - all "propagandized" -- unless of course we can afford to pay premium prices to get access to information that ISN'T this way - and I think that's what they're after.

[Jim Warren]

4. K&R

This should be one of the most important topics for any net user and particularly a forum such as this. The telecoms are just drooling over gaining commercial control of the net.

In my area there is an ongoing fight with a telecom over municipal sponsored wifi.

[TheWraith]

9. Technically, this isn't about control of the net at all.

It's about who gets to use certain frequencies in the 700 MHz range, in between the television stations that already broadcast there. The 700 MHz spectrum is considered prime territory, because it provides both high potential bandwidth, and a very long range with good ability to penetrate buildings and tree cover. (Basically, the lower the frequency, the more distance you get with the same transmission power.) But it doesn't really involve the internet itself.

And realistically, the only fight here is whether this spectrum is going to be allowed for any kind of wireless service (in which case some companies might end up using it for cell phone coverage) or whether it will be specifically set aside for wireless internet, the way some companies like Google and Microsoft are pushing for it to be.

[Nikki Stone1]

5. Submitted.

And :kick:

[MH1]

7. K & R

[Gabi Hayes]

8. k

r

[MH1]

10. k

again

[MH1]

11. And K again for those who missed it. Please take action! n/t