( A number of spectacular video links in Comments )
Proposed Canada-EU trade agreement threatens Canada's procurement policies and public services
http://www.policyalternatives.ca/newsroom/updates/proposed-canada-eu-trade-agreement-threatens-canadas-procurement-policies-and-publi?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+ccpa-updates+(Canadian+Centre+for+Policy+Alternatives+-+res
The third round of negotiations for the Canada-EU
Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) are taking place in Ottawa April 19-23.
A new CCPA analysis of the proposed agreement warns that it poses a serious threat to Canada’s procurement policies and a broad range of public services.
According to the analysis—which draws heavily on leaked documents including the draft negotiating text—the proposed CETA would have an adverse impact on public services, such as waste, drinking water, and public transit. The proposed rules would entrench commercialization, especially public-private partnerships; prohibit governments from obliging foreign investors to purchase locally, transfer technology or train local workers; and make it far harder for governments to reverse failed privatizations.
Click here to read the full report.
Leaked draft of the anti-counterfeiting agreement
Negotiations on the
Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) resume today in Wellington, New Zealand, with Canada, the United States, the European Union, and a handful of other countries launching the eighth round of talks. While even the most optimistic ACTA supporters do not expect to conclude an agreement before the end of the year, the next five days may prove to be a pivotal point in the negotiations since over the past several weeks, there have been two major leaks that could dramatically alter the still-secret discussions.
The first leak was an internal Dutch government document chronicling the positions of each ACTA participant on treaty transparency. The level of ACTA secrecy is highly unusual for an agreement focused on intellectual property issues, leading to a steady stream of parliamentary resolutions and political demands for transparency coming from around the globe.
US insists on keeping treaty secret
The standard response to transparency criticisms from many governments (including Canada) was to claim that they favoured releasing the ACTA text to the public, but that other unnamed countries did not. Since there was no consensus, the text could not be released.
The Dutch leak succeeded in blowing the issue wide open by identifying precisely which countries posed barriers to transparency. The document identified the U.S., Singapore, South Korea, and a trio of European countries as the remaining holdouts. Once publicly identified, the European countries quickly reversed their positions. The E.U. now unanimously supports the releasing of the text alongside Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, and Switzerland. With the outing of the transparency issue, it will fall to the U.S., which is widely viewed as the critical stumbling block, to justify its insistence on keeping the treaty secret.
Maintaining support for secrecy also faces a second pressure point -- the second major leak was a copy of the draft agreement itself. In other words, while countries maintain official positions of treaty secrecy, a draft is readily available for anyone with Internet access. Because the text has not been officially released, however, government officials have refused to comment on substantive provisions revealed by the leaked document.
Identifying the opposition to transparency may have been welcome news, but the availability of the leaked text was more bittersweet. On the one hand, ACTA watchers were grateful for the opportunity to see first-hand what has been discussed behind closed doors for the past three years.
Three strikes and you're out?
On the other, the text confirmed many fears about the substance of ACTA. If adopted in its current form, the treaty would have a significant impact on the Internet, leading some countries to adopt three-strikes-and-you're-out policies that terminate subscriber access due to infringement allegations, increasing legal protection for digital locks, mandating new injunction powers, implementing statutory damages provisions worldwide, and engaging in widespread data sharing across national borders.
Moreover, ACTA may live as an institution that potentially replaces some of the responsibilities currently performed by the United Nations'
World Intellectual Property Organization. Canada drafted the institutional chapter, which envisions an oversight council, secretariat, dispute resolution, and technical assistance to developing countries.
While some countries insist ACTA will not change their domestic laws, the leaked text suggests that this is very unlikely since there remains considerable disagreement on some provisions. In fact, the New Zealand round of talks may mark the first time countries seriously begin to bargain on key provisions, setting up a week that may go a long way to determine the future scope of the treaty.
Now is your last chance to tell the FCC to protect the our collective political voice and the free flow of information online. A few weeks ago, we told you how big telephone and cable companies are trying to take control over what you see and do on the Internet. The Federal Communications Commission can stop them, and they want to hear what the public thinks — but they're only taking comments until Monday.
More than 35,000 other ColorOfChange members have asked the FCC to keep the Internet free from corporate censorship and control. Can you help us get to 50,000? It takes only a moment to add your voice:
http://www.colorofchange.org/opennet/?id=1975-916411
Below is the original email we sent, if you want to learn more.
Thanks and Peace,
-- James, Dani, William, Gabriel, Milton, Micah and the rest of the ColorOfChange.org team
April 23rd, 2010
The Internet has made amazing things possible, like freeing the Jena 6, electing President Obama, even creating ColorOfChange. None of it could have happened without an "open" Internet: one where Internet service providers are not allowed to interfere with what is seen and by whom.
Now, Comcast, AT&T, and Verizon — the most powerful broadband providers — are trying to fundamentally change the way the Internet works. They're seeking to make even bigger profits by acting as gatekeepers over what you can see and do online. If they succeed, the Internet would be more like radio and television: a few major corporations would control which voices are heard most easily, and it would be much harder for grassroots groups, individuals, and small businesses to compete with large corporations and well-funded special interests.
The FCC wants to do the right thing and keep the Internet open, but the big providers have been attacking their efforts, with help from Black leaders who have financial ties to the industry. And a court ruling yesterday just made the FCC's job even tougher1. If the FCC is to preserve an open Internet, they will have to boldly assert their authority and press even harder. It's why they need to hear directly from everyday people, especially from Black folks, about the importance of an open Internet, now.
Can you join us in sending a message to the Federal Communications Commission supporting their effort to preserve an open Internet? It takes only a moment:
http://www.colorofchange.org/opennet/?id=1975-916411
The FCC is working to create rules that would protect "net neutrality," the principle that protects an open and free Internet and which has guided the Internet's operation since it began. It guarantees that information you put online is treated the same as anyone else's information in terms of its basic ability to travel across the Internet. Your own personal website or blog can compete on equal footing with the biggest companies. It's the reason the Internet is so diverse — and so powerful. Anyone with a good idea can find their audience online, whether or not there's money to promote the idea or money to be made from it.
For Black folks, this is crucial. For the first time in history we can communicate with a global audience — for entertainment, education, or political organizing — without prohibitive costs, or mediation by gatekeepers in government or industry. That’s how ColorOfChange became successful: because of the low cost of starting up online, we could start small and grow without spending a lot of money. The strength of our ideas, not the size of our budget, determined our success. In television, radio and print, this can't happen, because access is determined by big media corporations seeking to turn a profit.
AT&T, Comcast, and Verizon are spending millions of dollars lobbying to create a new system where they can charge large fees to speed up some data while leaving those who can’t afford to pay in the slow lane.2 Such a system could end the Internet as we know it — giving wealthier voices on the Internet a much bigger megaphone than poorer voices, and stunting the Internet's amazing equalizing potential.
Buying the support of Black organizations?
President Obama strongly supports net neutrality, and so do most members of the FCC. With so much at stake for Black communities, you would expect Black leaders and civic organizations to line up in support of an open Internet.
But instead, a group of Black civic organizations is challenging the adoption of net neutrality rules. Some of the groups are nothing more than front groups for the phone and cable companies. Others, however, are major civil rights groups — and all of them have significant financial ties to the nation’s biggest Internet service providers.
For example, AT&T donated half a million dollars last year to the NAACP and led a drive to raise $5 million more,3 and boasts of donating nearly $3 million over the last ten years to a number of Black-led organizations.4 Verizon, meanwhile, recently gave The National Urban League and the National Council of La Raza a $2.2 million grant.5 Comcast is one of the National Urban League’s “national partners” (Comcast Executive Vice President David Cohen now sits on the NUL’s Board of Trustees),6 and the NUL’s 2008 annual report notes that Comcast donated over $1 million that year.7 Many of these groups have now filed letters with the FCC opposing or cautioning against net neutrality,8,9,10,11 and the Internet service providers are using the groups' support to promote their agenda in Washington.12,13
The main argument put forth by these groups is that net neutrality rules could limit minority access to the Internet and widen the digital divide. They say that unless we allow Internet service providers to make bigger profits by acting as gatekeepers online, they won’t expand Internet access in under-served communities. In other words, if Comcast — whose broadband Internet business was recently earning 80 percent profit margins 14 — can increase its profits under a system without net neutrality, then it will all of a sudden invest in expanding Internet access in our communities.
This argument has been debunked15, 16 — it doesn’t make any sense from a business or economic perspective, and it doesn’t reflect history. Expanding access to high speed Internet is an extremely important goal, and we are fully in support of it. But allowing the phone and cable companies to make more money by acting as toll-takers on the Internet has nothing to do with reaching that goal. Businesses invest where they can maximize their profits, period. Internet service providers are already making huge profits,17 and if they believed that investing in low-income communities made good business sense, they would already be doing it. The idea that making even more money is suddenly going to make them care about our communities is ridiculous.
When we’ve asked civil rights groups to back up their arguments against net neutrality, not a single one has been able to explain how they make any sense, without appealing to discredited, industry-funded studies.18 And no one can offer any evidence for the claim that protecting net neutrality will hurt efforts to expand Internet access.
Some of these civil rights groups are quick to say that they don’t really oppose net neutrality, they only intend to raise questions or concerns they deem important. But the “concerns” raised by these groups sound so similar to talking points from the Internet service providers that both the FCC and the news media19 have interpreted them as against net neutrality. And these organizations have done little or nothing to clarify the record.
We don't enjoy being in opposition to organizations like the NAACP, the Urban League, and the National Council of La Raza, organizations that have a history of doing great work that benefits our communities. But in this case, we don't have a choice. The digital freedoms that are at stake are a 21st century civil rights issue.
We’ve privately contacted each of the above organizations, and we’ve publicly called for them to explain their positions, twice.20,21 In each case, we've gotten nowhere.*
Now it's up to you
The FCC wants to do the right thing and implement net neutrality rules. FCC commissioners know, as we do, that the anti-net neutrality arguments coming from civil rights groups are bogus. But they don't want to appear to be on the wrong side of Black interests.22
We need to demonstrate that there's support among Black folks and our allies for protecting an open Internet. Please join us in telling the FCC that we support net neutrality.
You can add your voice here:
http://www.colorofchange.org/opennet/?id=1975-916411
Thanks and Peace,
-- James, Dani, William, Gabriel, Milton, Micah and the rest of the ColorOfChange.org team
April 6th, 2010
Help support our work. ColorOfChange.org is powered by YOU — your energy and dollars. We take no money from lobbyists or large corporations that don't share our values, and our tiny staff ensures your contributions go a long way. You can contribute here:
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/5?akid=1438.707732.lIgouO&t=6
____________________________
* We reached out to National Council of La Raza through a partner twice. We reached out directly and through a partner to the National Urban League. We did not get a response from either group. We had several conversations with senior leadership at the NAACP, who explained that they wanted to be “neutral” on net neutrality. However, the NAACP has signed on to two letters warning the FCC about adopting net neutrality rules, and several NAACP chapters and state conferences have sent letters to the FCC that carry the industry message even more blatantly (see refs 8,10, and 11). The only public statement regarding the NAACP's "neutral" stance was a "tweet" on February 8th, after they were already under pressure, that stated: "A note to our friends in the blogosphere: The NAACP is NEUTRAL on net neutrality." The tweet was followed by no formal announcement, and nothing has been put into the public record to counter any of the anti-net neutrality filings or letters. We were in conversation with the NAACP for more than two months. We were told that the NAACP wanted to set the record straight, and were told of the concrete steps they planned to take. None were ever taken and eventually our attempts to follow-up went unanswered.
References:
1. "The Courts Can’t Take Away Our Internet," Save the Internet, 4-06-2010
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/190?akid=1438.707732.lIgouO&t=8
2. "Threats to an Open Internet," Save the Internet
www.savetheinternet.com/threats-open-internet
3. "NAACP Near Fund-Raising Goal with AT&T Campaign Leadership," AT&T, 7-16-2009
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/171?akid=1438.707732.lIgouO&t=10
4."AT&T Launches 28 Days Campaign During Black History Month to Encourage, Inspire and Empower African Americans," AT&T, 2-1-2010
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/172?akid=1438.707732.lIgouO&t=12
5. "VERIZON FOUNDATION INVESTS $2.2 MILLION IN PARTNERSHIP WITH NATIONAL COUNCIL OF LA RAZA AND NATIONAL URBAN LEAGUE TO CREATE AFTER-SCHOOL EDUCATION PROGRAM USING THINKFINITY.ORG," National Council of La Raza, 10-7-2008
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/173?akid=1438.707732.lIgouO&t=14
6. “National Urban League and Comcast Announce Comprehensive Partnership Aimed at Improving Communities”, Comcast, 11-15-2007
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/174?akid=1438.707732.lIgouO&t=16
7. “National Urban League 2008 Annual Report,” National Urban League, Retrieved 4-5-2010
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/175?akid=1438.707732.lIgouO&t=18
8. Letter to the FCC signed by 20 Civil Rights Groups, 10-19-2009
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/176?akid=1438.707732.lIgouO&t=20
9. FCC Filing signed by 16 Civil Rights Groups, 1-14-2010
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/177?akid=1438.707732.lIgouO&t=22
10. Letter to the FCC signed by 23 Civil Rights Groups, 1-14-2010
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/191?akid=1438.707732.lIgouO&t=24
11. Letters from NAACP local units to FCC opposing net neutrality
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/192?akid=1438.707732.lIgouO&t=26
12. Email from US Internet Industry which uses the positions of civil rights groups to justify opposition to network neutrality, 12-3-2009
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/178?akid=1438.707732.lIgouO&t=28
13. “AT&T Asks Employees To Oppose Net Neutrality,” Consumerist, 10-20-2009
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/179?akid=1438.707732.lIgouO&t=30
14. "When Is the Cable ‘Buy’ Set to Come?" Wall Street Journal, 4-3-2008
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/180?akid=1438.707732.lIgouO&t=32
15. "Why Consumers Demand Internet Freedom," Free Press, 5-2006
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/181?akid=1438.707732.lIgouO&t=34
16. “Finding the Bottom Line: The Truth About Network Neutrality & Investment,” Free Press, 10-2009
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/182?akid=1438.707732.lIgouO&t=36
17. "AT&T’s Earnings Rise 26%, Driven by Wireless," New York Times, 1-29-2010
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/183?akid=1438.707732.lIgouO&t=38
18. "The 'American Consumer Institute' Doesn't actually represent consumers..." Broadband Reports, 8-22-2006
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/184?akid=1438.707732.lIgouO&t=40
19. "Minority and Civil Rights Groups Slam Net Neutrality," Big Government, 1-25-2010
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/185?akid=1438.707732.lIgouO&t=42
20. "Why Are Some Civil Rights Groups on the Wrong Side of Net Neutrality?" The Huffington Post, 1-28-2010
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/189?akid=1438.707732.lIgouO&t=44
21. "Push-polling net neutrality," The Huffington Post, 2-10-2010
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/187?akid=1438.707732.lIgouO&t=46
22. Ibid.
Mistreatment of Slaves: The KKK As Using Google To Undermine History
http://current.com/news/92393975_mistreatment-of-slaves-the-kkk-as-using-google-to-undermine-history.htm
Arizona Nazi Imigration Law Passed
http://current.com/news/92394715_arizona-nazi-imigration-law-passed.htm
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Time to lift the embargo on Cuba - We are hurting innocents in Cuba and ourselves in US
http://current.com/news/92394745_time-to-lift-the-embargo-on-cuba-we-are-hurting-innocents-in-cuba-and-ourselves-in-us.htm
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Report: Sprint Makes Multibillion Dollar Bet on the iPhone
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