Right now, the US Congress is debating a law that would give them the power to censor the world’s Internet — creating a blacklist that could target YouTube, WikiLeaks and even groups like Avaaz!

To all Members of the US Congress:

As concerned global citizens, we call on you to stand for a free and open Internet and vote against both the Protect IP Act and the Stop Online Piracy Act. The Internet is a crucial tool for people around the world to exchange ideas and work collectively to build the world we all want. We urge you to show true global leadership and do all you can to protect this basic pillar of our democracies worldwide.

Under the new law, the US could force Internet providers to block any website on suspicion of violating copyright or trademark legislation, or even failing to sufficiently police their users’ activities. And, because so much of the Internet’s hosts and hardware are located in the US, their blacklist would clamp down on the free web for all of us.

The vote could happen any day now, but we can help stop this — champions in Congress want to preserve free speech and tell us that an international outcry would strengthen their hand. Let’s urgently raise our voices from every corner of the world and build an unprecedented global petition calling on US decision makers to reject the bill and stop Internet censorship. Sign now and then forward as widely as possible — our message will be delivered directly to key members of the US Congress ahead of the crucial vote.

Sign the petition: http://www.avaaz.org/en/save_the_internet/

Link to article: Save the Internet

I’ve also had to disable comments, due to amazing amounts of spam. You can comment, but only if you have an account. I’m not wading through tons of crap only to find that the vaguely genuine comments are just flogging websites and shoes.

Link to article: Downtime and comments

Women’s screams and cries as police mace them in captivity

Along the loud but peaceful march to Union Square in downtown Manhattan on Saturday, Day 8 of the Occupy Wall Street rights demonstration, police penned behind orange mesh barricade a number of female protesters and then maced the captive women as they peacefully stood in the pen. The women’s screams and cries can be heard in videos of the incident showing some of them dropping to the ground in pain after which police began constructing a net pen around all protesters in the square according to alerts on Twitter.
“The women were peaceful and unarmed. They were secured by barricade with an overwhelming police presence. And they were then sprayed directly in the face with pressurized mace,” the WeAre99Percent reporter stated.

The New York Times has mocked the occupation and what is being touted as the American Revolution II.

The Times reported Friday, “The group’s lack of cohesion and its apparent wish to pantomime progressivism rather than practice it knowledgeably is unsettling in the face of the challenges so many of its generation face — finding work, repaying student loans, figuring out ways to finish college when money has run out.”

“But what were the chances that its members were going to receive the attention they so richly deserve carrying signs like ‘Even if the World Were to End Tomorrow I’d Still Plant a Tree Today’?

According to mainstream news so far on Saturday, it is indeed paying little attention so far to the some 3,000 demonstrators who marched to Union Square with police escort on Saturday, chanting “They got bailed out, We got sold out.”

“WeAreTheOther99 continues to peacefully occupy lower Manhattan to begin a dialogue with the Top 1% with the goal of a peaceful transition of power back to the People,” the reporter stated.

“This can no longer be stopped. But be advised, this will not be televised,” the reporter wrote, quoting Gil Scott Heron’s rap song written in 1970 in his “The Soul of the Black Panther Era Vol 1″ album.

There have been some 96 arrests and more are expected according to a Tweet earlier on Saturday.
“#NYPD overheard: ’88 arrests to one precinct, 8 to another. We expect more.’”

A mass arrest occurred at 13th near 5th Avenue earlier on Saturday, filling at least one bus. (See: Breaking news: 96 arrests, 1000s Occupy Wall Streeters fill Union Sq, Day 8)

“We’re chanting to the cops in the van ‘you are the 99%, we love you’, Tweeted #occupywallstreet.

By approximately 4:30, the situation changed.

CalFireNews Tweeted, “ALERT! #NYPD IS SURROUNDING PEACEFUL PROTESTERS WITH A CONSTRUCTION NET!”

Link to article: Screams as police mace captive women, Occupy Wall St. Day 8

Warner Bros studios in Hollywood. Film studios have won a landmark UK high court ruling that forces BT to block access to file-sharing website Newzbin2. Photograph: Kevork Djansezian/AP

Hollywood film studios won a landmark UK high court ruling on Thursday forcing BT to block access to an illegal file-sharing website accused of operating “on a grand scale”.

The Motion Picture Association, the trade body whose members include Warner Bros, Fox, Disney and Paramount Pictures, has been granted an order requiring BT — the UK’s biggest internet service provider — to block its customers’ access to the website Newzbin2.

Thursday’s verdict will be viewed by the creative industries as a landmark that could set a precedent for the widespread blocking of illegal filesharing websites by ISPs, helping to stem the flow of digital piracy in the UK.

“In my judgment it follows that BT has actual knowledge of other persons using its service to infringe copyright: it knows that the users and operators of Newzbin2 infringe copyright on a large scale, and in particular infringe the copyrights of the studios in large numbers of their films and television programmes,” said Justice Arnold in his ruling at the high court in London.

“[BT] knows that the users of Newzbin2 include BT subscribers, and it knows those users use its service to receive infringing copies of copyright works made available to them by Newzbin2,” Arnold added.

BT had argued that forcing it to ban its 6 million UK customers from accessing a website would usher in a new wave of online censorship.

However, the creative industries claim website blocking could save them hundreds of millions of pounds in illegal downloads.

The MPA said that Newzbin2 makes unlawful copies of television programmes and films, and receives in excess of £1m a year from its 700,000 users.

“This ruling from Justice Arnold is a victory for millions of people working in the UK creative industries and demonstrates that the law of the land must apply online,” said Chris Marcich, MPA managing director for Europe, the Middle East and Africa. “This court action was never an attack on ISPs, but we do need their cooperation to deal with the Newzbin site, which continually tries to evade the law and judicial sanction.”

The film industry’s fight to block Newzbin stretches back to March last year, when the high court ordered the site to take down all of its pirated material and pay damages to the studios.

The three men behind the Newzbin Ltd – Chris Elsworth, Thomas Hurst and Lee Skillen – sold all of their shares in the company to David Harris shortly before the trial. Newzbin Ltd went into administration shortly after the ruling and avoided the huge payouts.

Months later a clone site appeared operating anonymously from Sweden. Rights holders said they had no choice but to force BT to block UK users’ access to the website, saying all other legal avenues had been exhausted.

Simon Milner, director of group industry policy at BT, said the latest judgment means rights holders will now have to prove in court that a website infringes copyright before it is blocked.

Milner added that the judgment puts the Digital Economy Act voluntary blocking scheme, drawn up at industry roundtable meetings earlier this year with Ed Vaizey, the culture minister, in an uncertain position.

“[The judgment] is actually helpful and we welcome it because it clarifies a complex area of law and shows that rights holders can use the copyright laws in this country. It means they have to prove a site is infringing before [a] court and get a court order,” he said.

Milner declined to reveal how much it will cost ISPs such as BT to block infringing websites.

Link to article: High court forces BT to block file-sharing website

Copy/pasted from http://pastebin.com/RA15ix7S

Hello thar FBI and international law authorities,

We recently stumbled across the following article with amazement and a certain amount of amusement:

http://www.npr.org/2011/07/20/138555799/fbi-arrests-alleged-anonymous-hackers

The statements made by deputy assistant FBI director Steve Chabinsky in this
article clearly seem to be directed at Anonymous and Lulz Security, and we are
happy to provide you with a response.

You state:

“We want to send a message that chaos on the Internet is unacceptable,
[even if] hackers can be believed to have social causes, it’s entirely
unacceptable to break into websites and commit unlawful acts.”

Now let us be clear here, Mr. Chabinsky, while we understand that you and
your colleagues may find breaking into websites unacceptable, let us tell
you what WE find unacceptable:

* Governments lying to their citizens and inducing fear and terror to keep
them in control by dismantling their freedom piece by piece.

* Corporations aiding and conspiring with said governments while taking
advantage at the same time by collecting billions of funds for
federal contracts we all know they can’t fulfil.

* Lobby conglomerates who only follow their agenda to push the profits
higher, while at the same time being deeply involved in governments around
the world with the only goal to infiltrate and corrupt them enough
so the status quo will never change.

These governments and corporations are our enemy. And we will continue to
fight them, with all methods we have at our disposal, and that certainly
includes breaking into their websites and exposing their lies.

We are not scared any more. Your threats to arrest us are meaningless to
us as you cannot arrest an idea. Any attempt to do so will make your
citizens more angry until they will roar in one gigantic choir. It is our
mission to help these people and there is nothing – absolutely nothing – you
can possibly to do make us stop.

“The Internet has become so important to so many people that we have to
ensure that the World Wide Web does not become the Wild Wild West.”

Let me ask you, good sir, when was the Internet not the Wild Wild West? Do
you really believe you were in control of it at any point? You were not.

That does not mean that everyone behaves like an outlaw. You see, most
people do not behave like bandits if they have no reason to. We become bandits
on the Internet because you have forced our hand. The Anonymous bitchslap rings
through your ears like hacktivism movements of the 90s. We’re back – and we’re
not going anywhere. Expect us.

Link to article: Dear government

UK media cartels are trying to set up a great firewall of Britain against copyright infringement, according to a confidential document seen by Slightly Right of Centre (SROC).

The eight-page document, entitled “The Potential for a Voluntary Code”, reveals that the Premier League, the Publishers Association, the British Phonographic Institute, the Motion Picture Association and a number of other groups have formed a coalition to lobby minister for communications Ed Vaizey for changes to the UK’s copyright enforcement policies.

The most worrying thing about the proposed changes is that they call for a web site blocking scheme that is fast enough to deal with time sensitive copyrighted material, such as live events. The problem with this is that a faster process would mean circumvention of the standard practices of law and could lead to unfair action, without the proper protocols for allowing legal defence.

Another glaring issue is the fact that the proposals were discussed with Vaizey, copyright holders and ISPs last week in a closed-door meeting, to which rights groups were refused entry. The Open Rights Group (ORG) said that it knew of the event beforehand and applied to be present, but was rejected, despite calls in the document for a consumer representative to participate.

The executive director of ORG, Jim Killock, told SROC, “This is a dangerous and ill-thought out proposal. Worse still, rights holders have tried yet again to hide their ideas away from public scrutiny, in order to sneak them forward without democratic debate. We need to take action to protect ourselves from these destructive censorship plans.”

James Firth of SROC heavily criticised the document, saying it could inadvertently target legitimate web sites that do not facilitate piracy and that the proposals are anything but voluntary, since they would effectively force ISPs to cooperate.

He also slated the document for its vague wording and its lack of detail on costs associated with the project, highlighting the £6m set-up costs for the three strikes policy from the Digital Economy Act as an example of just how expensive the pursuit of potential copyright infringers could become.

Firth even revealed that Vaizey reportedly said, “If it’s a voluntary scheme, go and do it.” In other words, stop pestering the government and get the relevant bodies to agree on things between themselves. While that might be handy for the government in washing its hands of any involvement, it’s worrying that it would want to turn a blind eye to such proposals, which are unlikely to get voluntary support.

Link to article: UK media are trying to set up a copyright firewall

Right now, EU law makers are introducing an important bill which would impose strict pollution standards on car and lorry fuels and would effectively ban tar sands fuel, the world’s most filthy and environmentally destructive transport oil. But shockingly, the UK is opposing it.

Our government is bending under pressure from the oil industry and the Canadian government, who stand to make billions if they can get an ally to water down the law and remove the clause that bans tar sands. We can expose these dirty dealings, and demand the government support the law and protect the climate.

Tomorrow, campaigners will meet with Transport Minister Norman Baker. Let’s show him the British public is united against any attempt to undermine this critical legislation — sign below, then send this to everyone:

http://www.avaaz.org/en/crude_politics/

Tar sands fuel is nasty stuff. Oil companies destroy and degrade millions of acres of pristine Canadian forest and displace indigenous communities just to reach the unrefined bitumen. Refining it spreads cancerous heavy metals and sulphur through the air and leaves a barren, toxic landscape. The US Environmental Protection Agency says refining tar sands causes at least 82% more carbon pollution than refining conventional oil. But for Canada and the oil companies, the returns are lucrative — oil giants recently announced a $379 billion investment in them.

The EU wants to help stop this catastrophe, but the UK is standing in the way. The EU’s proposed Fuel Quality Directive would set a binding 6% climate pollution reduction target for Europe’s transport fuels by 2020. We need to make sure that our government – which likes to parade green credentials – doesn’t cave to tar sands oil interests.

Our political leaders should be securing a cleaner energy future for us and our children, not caving in to polluters that bring oil spills and climate change. Time is short — we need to convince the transport minister by June 23rd. Let’s tell the UK government to keep dirty fuels out of the EU. Sign the petition now, then forward this email to friends who want clean air:

http://www.avaaz.org/en/crude_politics/

In a world with a safe and stable climate, using energy will not come at the expense of our natural environment. Canada’s tar sands are an out-dated approach to energy, where profit outweighs pollution. We have a chance to make a change now. Together, we’ve influenced international climate summits, world leaders and our parliaments — now let’s take another decisive step towards a cleaner future.

With hope,

Alex, Maria Paz, Morgan, Iain, Ricken, Stephanie, Giulia, Pascal, Benjamin, Luis, and the rest of the Avaaz team

Link to article: No tar sands in Europe

Dislikers of awesome television might want to look away now.

Link to article: Prequel to A Good Man Goes To War (Doctor Who)

As food costs spike for the second time in three years, an international aid agency predicts the price of some staples such as corn will double in the next 20 years amid a permanent crisis caused by rising demand, flat crop yields and climate change.

The report by Oxfam released Tuesday said the demand for food will grow 70 to 90 per cent by 2030, without factoring in the impact of climate change. Increasingly frequent droughts, floods and changes in agricultural patterns from global warming will add pressure to what the agency calls an already broken system.

“The food system is buckling under intense pressure from climate change, ecological degradation, population growth, rising energy prices, rising demand for meat and dairy products and competition for land for biofuels, industry and urbanization,” Oxfam said in its report, “Growing a Better Future.”

It said 925 million people — one out of seven — are hungry, and the figure is likely to surpass 1 billion by the end of this year.

“If you think we have a crisis here, in 30 years it will be a cataclysm if the status quo remains,” said Gonzalo Fanjul, a policy adviser for Oxfam.

The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization says food prices are higher than they have been in the last 20 years, surpassing the 2008 price spike that set off food riots in cities around the world. Instability fueled by high oil prices is likely to continue, the Rome-based FAO said.

“Prices will never come back to the levels of the 90s, but there will be ups and downs,” said Fanjul.

Oxfam’s report assigned part of the blame to commodities traders, saying three companies control 90 per cent of the trade in grain. It urged greater regulation of speculation in the international food market.

But the system that controls global food production and requires reform is far broader, it said. It includes large-scale landowners in poor countries, farm lobbies and seed manufacturers in wealthy countries and high-carbon industries blocking action on climate change.

“For too long governments have put the interests of big business and powerful elites above the interests of the 7 billion of us who produce and consume food,” Oxfam’s executive director Jeremy Hobbs said in a statement.

The report called for building a multilateral system of food reserves, ending biofuel subsidies so more crops go toward edibles, and more investment in the 500 million small farms in developing countries that support 2 billion people.

The long-term problem is that the growing number of people on Earth and their increasing demand for an animal-based, Western-style diet is outstripping the growth in agriculture. Oxfam said global crop yields grew an average 2 per cent between 1970 and 1990, but then dropped to 1 per cent and are still declining.

“The dramatic achievements of the last century are running out of steam,” it said.

Link to article: As food prices spike again, aid agency warns cost of staples will double in 20 years

Experts all agree that the most sensible policy is to regulate, but politicians are afraid to touch the issue. In days, a global commission including former heads of state and foreign policy chiefs of the UN, EU, US, Brazil, Mexico and more will break the taboo and publicly call for new approaches including decriminalization and regulation of drugs.

This could be a once-in-a-generation tipping-point moment — if enough of us call for an end to this madness. Politicians say they understand that the war on drugs has failed, but claim the public isn’t ready for an alternative. Let’s show them we not only accept a sane and humane policy — we demand it. Click below to sign the petition and share with everyone — when we reach 1/2 million voices, it will be personally delivered to world leaders by the global commission:

http://www.avaaz.org/en/end_the_war_on_drugs/

For 50 years current drug policies have failed everyone, everywhere but public debate is stuck in the mud of fear and misinformation. Everyone, even the UN Office on Drugs and Crime which is responsible for enforcing this approach agrees — deploying militaries and police to burn drug farms, hunting down traffickers, and imprisoning dealers and addicts – is an expensive mistake. And with massive human cost — from Afghanistan, to Mexico, to the USA the illegal drug trade is destroying countries around the world, while addiction, overdose deaths, and HIV/AIDS infections continue to rise.

Meanwhile, countries with less-harsh enforcement — like Switzerland, Portugal, the Netherlands, and Australia — have not seen the explosion in drug use that proponents of the drug war have darkly predicted. Instead, they have seen significant reductions in drug-related crime, addiction and deaths, and are able to focus squarely on dismantling criminal empires.

Powerful lobbies still stand in the way of change, including military, law enforcement, and prison departments whose budgets are at stake. And politicians fear that voters will throw them out of office if they support alternative approaches, as they will appear weak on law and order. But many former drugs Ministers and Heads of State have come out in favour of reform since leaving office, and polls show that citizens across the world know the current approach is a catastrophe. Momentum is gathering towards new improved policies, particularly in regions that are ravaged by the drug trade.

If we can create a worldwide outcry in the next 72 hours to support the bold calls of the Global Commission on Drug Policy, we can overpower the stale excuses for the status quo. Our voices hold the key to change — Sign the petition and spread the word:

http://www.avaaz.org/en/end_the_war_on_drugs/

We have a chance to enter the closing chapter of this brutal ‘war’ that has destroyed millions of lives. Global public opinion will determine if this catastrophic policy is stopped or if politicians shy away from reform. Let’s rally urgently to push our hesitating leaders from doubt and fear, over the edge, and into reason.

With hope and determination,

Alice, Laura, Ricken, Maria Paz, Shibayan and the whole Avaaz team

Link to article: 72 hours to End the War on Drugs