Fun_People Archive
7 Mar
Gross or Net Activism


Date: Tue,  7 Mar 95 13:33:10 PST
From: Peter Langston <psl>
To: Fun_People
Subject: Gross or Net Activism

Forwarded-by: David_Fox@intergate.rocketsci.com (David Fox)

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    CAMPAIGN TO STOP THE US COMMUNICATIONS DECENCY ACT (S. 314/H.R. 1004)

      PLEASE WIDELY REDISTRIBUTE THIS DOCUMENT WITH THIS BANNER INTACT
             DO NOT REDISTRIBUTE AFTER MAY 1, 1995
                Feb. 22, 1995
             [updated Mar. 3 to include House version's bill number]

      Distributed by the Voters Telecommunications Watch (vtw@vtw.org)
          and the Electronic Frontier Foundation (ask@eff.org)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

CONTENTS
    Introduction
    What you can do
    Contact Information
    Background
    Current status of S. 314
    Where can I learn more about the bill? (URL included)
    Where will I learn about updates to this alert?
    Current list of participating organizations

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INTRODUCTION

Dear Net Citizens:

Legislation has been introduced before the Senate which would severely
restrict your freedom of speech, halt the free flow of information on
the net, and require all telecommunications carriers to censor your
public and private communications.

The "Communications Decency Act of 1995" (S. 314), introduced in early 
February by Senators Exon (D-NE) and Gorton (R-WA), would place 
substantial criminal liability on telecommunications carriers (including 
traditional telephone networks, Internet service providers, commercial 
online services such as America Online and Compuserve, and independent
BBS's) whenever their networks are used to transmit any material 
which is deemed indecent or harassing.  In order to avoid these penalties, 
carriers would be forced to restrict the activities of their subscribers 
and censor all public and private communications.

We must act quickly to stop the progress of S. 314.  The bill may soon 
be incorporated into Senate telecommunications reform legislation, which 
is currently being drafted by the Senate Commerce Committee.  The 
telecommunications reform bill may be introduced as early as mid March, 
and is expected to be considered on a fast track.  If S. 314 is included 
in this bill, it will be extremely difficult to change or remove and 
could pass quickly.

We are asking you to join us in urging key members of the Senate to 
prevent S. 314 from being included in Senate telecommunications reform 
measures and to hold open, public hearings on the issue.

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WHAT YOU CAN DO (IN ONLY FIVE MINUTES)



1. Contact Sen. Larry Pressler (R-SD, Commerce Committee Chairman),
   Sen. Bob Packwood (R-OR) and Sen. Ernest Hollings (D-SC, ranking
   member) and urge them to keep S.314 from being incorporated into
   telecommunications reform legislation.  You'll find their addresses,
   phone numbers, and fax numbers below.

   Also, if you live in:

    AK AZ HI KY LA MA ME MO MS MT ND NE NV OR SC SD TX WA WV

   you should also contact your own Senator from the Commerce committee.
   Remember, the best and most effective means of influencing a member of
   Congress is to write a letter in your own words.

2. Write/Fax/Email them a letter or make a phone call.  Try to mention
   as  many of the points below (marked with a *) as you can fit
   politely into communication.

3. DON'T FORGET TO DROP A NOTE TO VTW@VTW.ORG to tell us who you contacted.
   We'll tally the results and feed them back to all participating
   organizations.  It's crucial we have this feedback, even if you just
   got a form letter, or a "thank you" to your phone call.

4. Feel good about yourself.  You've just participated in democracy
   without leaving your seat. 

5. (Extra bonus activism) Reproduce this alert with the expiration date
   and contact information intact to other non-Usenet places.  Fax it
   to your friends, post a copy to your local bulletin board.  Please don't
   spam it to places like rec.pets.cats, but place it in places where people
   who don't read a lot of Usenet might see it.  Non-net connected BBSs are
   great, as are physical bulletin boards.  Please don't post it to email
   lists or newsgroups not related to politics, as this will annoy people.

   Most especially, try to reach people in the larger online services,
   such as America OnLine and Compuserve and the large PC networks, such
   as Fidonet.

When writing a letter or making a phone call, try to include the following
points in your message:

*       S. 314 must not be incorporated into the Senate telecommunications 
        reform bill. 

*       The bill would force communications service providers to limit or 
        remove my access to file archives, discussion forums, and 
        electronic mail.
 
*       S. 314 would dramatically restrict the free flow of information 
        through out the online world and limit the free speech and privacy 
        rights of individual users.

*       Placing criminal liability on communications service providers 
        will force providers to censor the activities of their 
        subscribers.

*       As a user of interactive communications technologies, I am capable 
        of deciding for myself and for my children what content I wish to 
        receive.  The government should not be involved in deciding what 
        kinds of content I may access.

*       Public hearings must be held to consider possible technological 
        means and policy alternatives to government content restrictions 
        in interactive media.

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CONTACT INFORMATION

Here are the Commerce committee members.  Please contact Sen. Larry
Pressler (the Committee Chairman) and Sen. Ernest Hollings at a minimum.
If you see your state listed below, contact your own senator as well.

All addresses are Washington, D.C. 20510

      P ST Name and Address           Phone           Fax
      = == ========================   ==============  ==============
      R SD Pressler, Larry            1-202-224-5842  1-202-224-1259*
            243 RSOB                    larry_pressler@pressler.senate.gov

        *Note this is the Commerce Committee's fax number

      D SC Hollings, Ernest F.        1-202-224-6121  1-202-224-4293
            125 RSOB

      R OR Packwood, Robert           1-202-224-5244  1-202-228-3576
            259 RSOB

      D HI Inouye, Daniel K.          1-202-224-3934  1-202-224-6747
            722 HSOB

      R AK Stevens, Ted               1-202-224-3004  1-202-224-1044
            522 HSOB

      D KY Ford, Wendell H.           1-202-224-4343  1-202-224-0046
            173A RSOB                   wendell_ford@ford.senate.gov

      R AZ McCain, John               1-202-224-2235  1-202-228-2862
            111 RSOB

      D NE Exon, J. J.                1-202-224-4224  1-202-224-5213
            528 HSOB

      R MT Burns, Conrad R.           1-202-224-2644  1-202-224-8594
            183 DSOB

      D WV Rockefeller, John D.       1-202-224-6472  1-202-224-1689
            109 HSOB

      R WA Gorton, Slade              1-202-224-3441  1-202-224-9393
            730 HSOB                    Senator_Gorton@gorton.senate.gov

      D MA Kerry, John F.             1-202-224-2742  1-202-224-8525
            421 RSOB

      R MS Lott, Trent                1-202-224-6253  1-202-224-2262
            487 RSOB

      D LA Breaux, John B.            1-202-224-4623  1-202-224-2435
            516 HSOB

      R TX Hutchison, Kay Bailey      1-202-224-5922  1-202-224-0776
            703 HSOB                    senator@hutchison.senate.gov

      D NV Bryan, Richard H.          1-202-224-6244  1-202-224-1867
            364 RSOB

      R ME Snowe, Olympia             1-202-224-5344  1-202-224-6853
            176 RSOB

      D ND Dorgan, Byron L.           1-202-224-2551  1-202-224-1193
            713 HSOB

      R MO Ashcroft, John             1-202-224-6154  1-202-224-7615
            170 RSOB

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CURRENT STATUS OF S. 314

The bill was introduced on February 1, 1995 by Senators Exon (D-NE) and 
Gorton (R-WA).  It is currently pending before the Senate Commerce 
Committee (chaired by Senator Pressler (R-SD)).

No committee action has been scheduled as of February 21, 1995.

It may be included in the Senate telecommunications reform legislation, 
expected to be introduced by mid-March.

A House of Representatives version of the bill has also been introduced
with almost identical text, as H.R. 1004.

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BACKGROUND

S. 314 would expand current law restricting indecency and harassment on 
telephone services to all telecommunications providers and expand 
criminal liability to all content carried by all forms of 
telecommunications networks.  The bill would amend Section 223 of the 
Communications Act (47 U.S.C. 223), which requires carriers to take 
steps to prevent minors from gaining access to indecent audiotext and 
criminalizes harassment accomplished over interstate telephone lines.  

If enacted, S. 314 would compel service providers to severely restrict 
your online activities.  Your access to email, discussion lists, usenet, 
the world wide web, gopher, and ftp archives would be substantially 
reduced or cut off entirely. The bill would also force providers to 
closely monitor and pre-screen your electronic mail, and refuse to 
transmit any message or other content which may be considered to be 
indecent.

This bill poses a significant threat to freedom of speech and the free 
flow of information in cyberspace. The bill also raises fundamental 
questions about the right of government to control content on 
communications networks, as well as the locus of liability for content 
carried in these new communications media.  

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WHERE CAN I LEARN MORE ABOUT THE BILL? (URL INCLUDED)

The Voters Telecommunications Watch has set up a gopher page where
you can get a copy of the bill (including analyses by the American
Civil Liberties Union, the Center for Democracy and Technology, the
Electronic Messaging Association, and others).  Here's the URL:

    WWW URL: gopher://gopher.panix.com/11/vtw/exon
    Gopher command : gopher -p 1/vtw/exon gopher.panix.com

If you have difficulty getting to this gopher page, or if you don't
have access to Mosaic/gopher, drop a note to:

    vtw@vtw.org

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WHERE WILL I LEARN ABOUT UPDATES TO THIS ALERT?

We will post updates to this alert in three places:

    -On the account vtw@panix.com (finger vtw@panix.com)
    -On Usenet (comp.org.eff.talk, comp.org.cpsr.talk, and alt.privacy)
    -Through our announcements mailing list, vtw-announce@vtw.org.

    To subscribe, simply send a message to listproc@vtw.org with the
    following in the message body:

        subscribe vtw-announce Firstname Lastname

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CURRENT LIST OF PARTICIPATING ORGANIZATIONS

At this time, the following organizations have signed onto this
campaign and are receiving the legislative feedback that VTW is compiling:

 American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), infoaclu@aclu.org
 Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT), ask@cdt.org
 Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), ask@eff.org
 Electronic Frontier Foundation-Austin (EFF-Austin), eff-austin@tic.com
 (Note that EFF-Austin is not a chapter of the DC-based EFF)
 Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), info@epic.org
 Hands Off! the Net petition drive, slowdog@wookie.net
 People for the American Way (PFAW), jlessern@reach.com
 Society for Electronic Access (SEA), sea@sea.org
 Voters Telecommunications Watch (VTW), vtw@vtw.org

Note that the Voters Telecommunications Watch does not speak for these
organizations.  Any opinions contained herein are those of the author,
and not necessarily endorsed by participating organizations.



[=] © 1995 Peter Langston []