Add your name to "Save the Net" FB page, help the LibDems do the right thing!

Update VICTORY! Motion passed with near unanimity!

I'm delighted to report that the UK Liberal Democrats' Spring Convention have accepted the emergency motion on internet freedom, and will be debating it tomorrow morning.

The LibDems were plunged into controversy last week when two of the LibDem Lords introduced a pro-web-censorship amendment to the Digital Economy Bill (this amendment was later shown to have been written by record industry lobby group BPI). Outraged party members (including dozens of prospective parliamentary candidates) rallied to fight this shift in party direction toward curtailment of freedom on behalf of corporate lobbyists.

The outcome of that outrage is the emergency motion on internet freedom, called the "Save the Net" memo. It calls for net neutrality, proportionality and due process in copyright enforcement, an absolute rejection of web-blocking and disconnection to solve copyright problems, and other good, principled stands that I'm proud to see my party get behind.

Organisers worked around the clock all week to get the emergency motion accepted for debate. Tomorrow morning, party delegates at the Spring Convention will debate the Save the Net motion from 0915 to 0945. If you are attending the Birmingham convention (or know someone who is!), please help support this motion and get it passed -- let's send a signal to corporate schemers that British law isn't for sale.

If you're not attending the convention, you can still help by joining the Facebook fan page for the motion. If thousands -- tens of thousands! -- of people from around the country and the world show their support for this motion, it will help conference delegates understand how important and far-reaching Internet freedom is.

Laws about copyright and the Internet don't just affect how we get and use cultural works: they affect everything we do with the Internet, whether it's earning a living or staying in touch with family or reporting the news or organising your neighbours around important political issues.

UK Lib Dems: Save the Net!

• [Dewi Morgan]

  Online petitions (whether on the government site or Facebook or elsewhere) are incredibly easy to sign: it doesn’t hurt the signer or the cause to do so. So, even if it’s just a feelgood move, it’s worth doing.

  But I agree money talks louder than mouseclicks.

  So as well as adding myself to that group, I’ve also joined the Lib Dems (their MEPs impressed me with their detailed responses to my ACTA questions: no other MEPs bothered addressing them, though one of the greens had an assistant send a form letter).

  And I’ve also joined ORG. Twice, once for me, once for my wife.

• [Anonymous]

  I cite for the cause often on twitter and once and awhile on FB, but sometimes it seems one step forward is another step back or just in place. Comcast, the Gorg, AAPL censorship overlords… all are among the many threats in one way or another to internet freedom. Good luck to us one and all.

• [asuffield]

  It is worth noting that this is how the Lib Dems work: policy is decided by the members at conference. There haven’t been any new policies about the Internet in years, so this is a bit overdue, but what you see here is the system working normally, and how it is meant to work.

  The media has a tendency to play this sort of thing as a ‘revolt’ against the ‘overlords’, but it’s really exactly the opposite: the members at conference are the only authority that can set Lib Dem policy (unlike the other big parties). The only thing the party leadership gets is first claim on the schedule for matters to be debated and voted on at each conference.

• [Rider]

  These facebook petitions are lame and becoming more and more meaningless since there are about 30 new ones everyday.

• [Robbo]

  Facebook Groups, despite their proliferation (or perhaps because of them) continue to be a very effective way to help steer public discourse and awareness. Increasing use of FB groups, Twitter and online petitions are replacing the stale (and too often ignored) forms of speaking back to political and corporate actions.

  The mainstream media, always eager to prove itself relevant, continues to report on the numbers of voices that attach themselves to any given issue and the politicians and the self-appointed aristocracy of business leaders ignore these calls at their peril.

  The near instantaneous nature of “drawing a crowd” and initiating not just protest but essential public awareness of issues is not diminished in the slightest by any who tire easily of hearing about “yet another Facebook group”. If you’re so tired – just sit on the curb and make room for the rest of us to march past. See ya.

• [adonai]

  On the one hand, Facebook groups are completely useless, the modern equivalent of forwarding those email chain petitions.

  On the other, old media seems to think a Facebook group constitutes news because the Internets is serious business.

• [inktknal]

  Online petitions do work. This is just another prove!