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October 04, 2007, 05:22 PM ET
Educause Joins a Call to Fight for Free Speech Online
The Open Internet Coalition, an alliance of online businesses and advocacy groups, yesterday sent a letter to several influential members of Congress calling for legislation that would “guarantee freedom of speech in the digital world.”
The coalition — whose members include Educause, the higher-education technology group — also asked senior members of the House Committees on Energy and Commerce and on the Judiciary and the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation to convene hearings examining whether telecommunications companies are blocking protected speech online.
The letter cites several recent incidents in which telephone and cable providers have been accused of censorship. Last week Verizon briefly refused to let NARAL Pro-Choice America send text messages about its abortion-rights campaigns. (The company quickly reversed its decision.) A short while before, AT&T drew fire for censoring remarks critical of the Bush administration from a live Webcast of a Pearl Jam concert.
“The recent patterns of anticonsumer activities demonstrated that the telephone and cable companies should not be trusted to safeguard our basic Internet freedoms,” the letter reads. “Now, more than ever, the open Internet is increasingly threatened by telephone and cable companies who enjoy the public rights of way to provide Internet access to consumers’ homes.”
Educause officials endorsed the letter in a separate statement released today. —Brock Read
Categories: Legal-Troubles, Company-Watch
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