WASHINGTON, DC – Today, TechFreedom launched an online campaign to build grassroots support for the restoration of Internet Independence: the freedom to create, express, and innovate online without asking for permission. The website allows visitors to sign a petition in support of the principles of Internet independence, including permissionless innovation, unfettered competition, and privacy. The declaration will be sent to the signers’ representatives in Congress.
The Declaration of Internet Independence reads:
The Internet is the greatest free-market success story in history. What began as a government-funded research project took off only when private entrepreneurs were freed to invest and innovate. … Internet independence brought us unprecedented prosperity and freedom, but we can’t trust the FCC to write the next chapter. Tell Congress to restore Internet Independence!
The petition also lays out the six principles of Internet independence:
- Permissionless Innovation: The freedom to create, express, and innovate online without having to ask for permission.
- Competition: The ideal way to ensure consumers get the best prices, speeds and services from Internet access providers.
- Consumer Protection: Keep us safe from truly harmful practices online without giving regulators a blank check to smother innovation before it happens.
- Access: Encourage the investment needed to bring Internet access to the four billion people who don’t yet have it — and to keep upgrading it for everyone everywhere.
- Separation of Net & State: Cut red tape at the federal, state and local levels to allow private providers to cheaply deploy fiber and other new Internet access technology.
- Privacy: Quit snooping on the innocent! Government surveillance must require a warrant, probable cause and due process.
“With Internet business plans and practices under the microscope of regulation and ‘advisory’ reviews, consumers may never know the innovations they miss out on,” said Daniel Berninger, an Internet architect and VoIP pioneer. “Restoring Internet independence means restoring the environment that enabled trillions of dollars of economic growth and the proliferation of apps and services we enjoy in our daily lives.”
###
We can be reached for comment at media@techfreedom.org.
TechFreedom leads a group of investors and entrepreneurs intervening against the FCC in pending litigation in the DC Circuit. The “Internet Independence Intervenors” include cloud service provider CARI.net and entrepreneurs Scott Banister, Jeff Pulver, Daniel Berninger, Charles Giancarlo, David Frankel, and Wendell Brown — all of whom all harmed by the FCC’s radical re-interpretation of the Communications Act to claim sweeping new powers in the Open Internet Order issued in February.
Join us Friday, July 17th to hear from entrepreneurs, advocates, and policy experts who want to restore Internet Independence. Meet the innovators whose products and business models hang in the balance of the FCC’s discretion, and learn what an Internet dependent on government will mean for consumers. The event will also be livestreamed (stay tuned for details).
About TechFreedom:
TechFreedom is a non-profit, non-partisan technology policy think tank. We work to chart a path forward for policy-makers towards a bright future where technology enhances freedom, and freedom enhances technology.