Lord Peter Mandelson, the UK's First Secretary of State, has introduced a bill to grant himself (and future politicians) the power to re-write Britain's core copyright legislation with almost no Parliamentary debate, using fast-track secondary legislation. If you're in Britain, call your MP now, and tell him or her that no Secretary of State should be able to rewrite copyright law on a whim!
Revelations about the secretive Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) continue to emerge, and the news is not good for technology users or digital rights. Instead of concentrating on physical fakes and fraud, recently leaked draft documents suggest ACTA will create new global regulations over the Internet and DRM. The details of these new rules remain closed to the public. Write to your representatives now to demand that Congress bring transparency to this clandestine pact.
The MPAA's crusade to control your cable set-top box is heating up again, and the FCC may be poised to give them that power. Our friends at Public Knowledge have been leading the good fight against the MPAA's "selectable output control" scheming, and they have an action alert up now. If you want to protect interoperability, consumer choice, and innovation from the grasping hands of the MPAA, head to the Public Knowledge site and take action now!
Google is planning to dramatically expand its Book Search service so that millions of books will be available for browsing, reading, and purchasing online. But in designing this new service, Google is leaving reader privacy behind. Without strong privacy protections, all of your browsing and reading history may be collected, tracked, and turned over to the government or third parties without your knowledge or consent.
You should be able to read about anything -- from politics to health -- without worrying that someone is looking over your shoulder. Email Google CEO Eric Schmidt and demand that Google Book Search protect your freedom to read privately!
