Hi all,
Earlier today, the Senate in Brazil passed the Marco Civil bill, that has
some ambiguous provisions on net neutrality. It was passed on urgent basis
in anticipation of NetMundial, a meeting on internet governance that will
be held in Brazil tomorrow and Thursday.
We have prepared an op-ed (see below) explaining how certain types of net
neutrality laws impact Wikipedia Zero, and we will try to get it published
around the closing of NetMundial. The purpose of this op-ed is to make sure
that there is an accurate portrayal of Wikipedia Zero in the net neutrality
debate, particularly in countries that are relevant to this project.
While we don't plan to take a direct advocacy position on net neutrality at
this point, we will continue to develop a position on Wikipedia Zero. We
would therefore like to hear your thoughts on this topic.
Best,
Yana
---
* Free Access to Knowledge Should Not Be a Net Neutrality Issue In recent
months, lawmakers around the world have been considering net neutrality
rules that aim to preserve the Internet's original promise as an open
forum. But certain provisions of net neutrality laws could threaten the
free spread of information in surprising ways. In particular, such
provisions could prevent non-commercial initiatives like Wikipedia Zero
from providing truly free access to the online encyclopedia in the Global
South. Legislators must be careful to avoid these unintended consequences.
Net neutrality advocates are right to be concerned that forcing users to
pay for faster data delivery could easily push small and non-commercial
publishers and content creators out of the market. Since its inception, a
key tenet of the Internet has been equal treatment of data from all
sources: Internet service providers must deliver content from blogs or
startups with the same speed as content from major media companies or huge
tech firms. Allowing Internet service providers to charge more for faster
delivery of certain kinds of content would favor players with deep pockets,
who could then muscle out smaller competitors. But to date the discussion
has largely ignored a potential pitfall: might certain provisions of net
neutrality laws unintentionally hamper the free flow of information they
seek to protect? Just consider the net neutrality law passed by the
Netherlands in 2012, sometimes presented as a model for legislation
elsewhere. The Dutch Telecommunications Act aims to enforce net neutrality,
in part, by prohibiting ISPs from charging subscribers different rates
based on the services they access, for example VoIP or instant messaging.
However the Dutch law would also prohibit ISPs from providing free access
to certain sites, as they would technically be charging different rates (in
this case, nothing) for different services. It's worth noting that not all
net neutrality rules include these provisions: the FCC's previous Open
Internet Rules, for example, simply focused on prohibiting blocking and
unreasonable discrimination against content providers. Similarly, the
current version of the pending Marco Civil bill in Brazil does not prohibit
paid or free Internet connection as long as ISPs do not monitor, filter, or
block the content of data packets. But the Dutch law, and any laws modeled
on it, might interfere with initiatives that rely on zero-rated data, like
the "Wikipedia Zero" program across the Global South, which essentially
aims to have all carriers in a given country zero-rate Wikipedia so it can
become a true public good, with unfettered access for everyone. When
carriers commit to waiving data fees, Wikipedia Zero can provide
schoolchildren with a virtual encyclopedia in places where they don't have
access to books or libraries, spread practical knowledge about agriculture,
sanitation, and wellness, and deliver outside information to people living
under repressive regimes. Eventually Wikipedia Zero will extend to free
editing of entries as well, empowering users in developing countries with a
platform for free speech. Wikipedia Zero isn't the only free service that
could suffer from specific provisions of some net neutrality laws. The
Refugees United mobile app allows victims of political upheavals and
natural disasters to find lost family members and friends free of cost,
also relying on zero-rated data. And Mobilium Africa's Smart Health app,
launched in September 2013, aims to educate Android users in Africa about
HIV, tuberculosis, and malaria, including prevention, symptoms, and
treatment, for free. These initiatives are just the beginning: as the cost
of mobile handsets falls and mobile penetration rises across the developing
world, there will be even more opportunities for creative services that
empower users, raise standards of living, and bring transparency and
accountability to government through free delivery of information. Yet all
these current and future initiatives could be undone by a few lines of
legislation - inadvertently thwarting free access to information in the
name of the free Internet. Net neutrality is undoubtedly a major concern.
As lawmakers craft new rules they must take care not to unintentionally
hinder the very cause they are trying to advance. Net neutrality rules
should focus on enshrining the "end-to-end" principle, which states that
Internet service providers do not distinguish between data flowing over the
network based on its application or content. Net neutrality rules should
not prevent the zero-rating of non-commercial initiatives, like Wikipedia
Zero, that do not pay for any preferential treatment and do not interfere
with the open Internet. *
--
Yana Welinder
Legal Counsel
Wikimedia Foundation
415.839.6885 ext. 6867
NOTICE: For legal reasons, I may only serve as a lawyer for the Wikimedia
Foundation. This means I may not give legal advice to, or serve as a lawyer
for, community members, volunteers, or staff members in their personal
capacity.
Hi all,
On June 5, the coordinators of the Necessary and Proportionate principles
are organizing an international action day to raise more awareness of
government surveillance around the world. June 5th marks the one year
anniversary of the Snowden revelations. The coordinators are encouraging
organizations and individuals to do events around the action day and blog
about the actions that will be taking place.
We're putting together a blog post about various events around the world
that will take place on June 5th. If any of you are participating in some
actions on that day or blogging about it, please let us know so that we can
include it in our blog post.
Best,
Yana
--
Yana Welinder
Legal Counsel
Wikimedia Foundation
415.839.6885 ext. 6867
@yanatweets <https://twitter.com/yanatweets>
NOTICE: As an attorney for the Wikimedia Foundation, for legal/ethical
reasons I cannot give legal advice to, or serve as a lawyer for, community
members, volunteers, or staff members in their personal capacity. For more
on what this means, please see our legal
disclaimer<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Legal_Disclaimer>
.
Hello everyone,
I was contacted by Google's Brussels policy office team today and they want
to meet with me and talk about the recent ruling by the Court of Justice of
the European Union
<http://curia.europa.eu/juris/document/document.jsf?text=&docid=152065&pageI…>
that allows users to request information about them be taken off by search
engines.
They want to discuss their approach in this matter in more detail and
answer any questions we might have.
Dooes anyone on this list have a particular question they'd like me to ask
them?
Cheers,
Dimi
Hello everyone,
tl:dr -* Wikimedia UK <https://wikimedia.org.uk/wiki/Main_Page> and Demos
<http://www.demos.co.uk/> are encouraging Wikimedians to participate in an
attempt to crowdsource a submission to a call for evidence on digital
democracy from the Speaker of the House of Commons. You can find the
consultation page here
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Connecting_knowledge_to_power:_the_future_o…>
and we look forward to hearing from you.*
The Speaker of the House of Commons, John Bercow, has established a Commission
on Digital Democracy
<http://www.parliament.uk/business/commons/the-speaker/speakers-commission-o…>.
It will report to Parliament in early 2015 with recommendations on how
Parliament can use technology to better represent and engage with the
electorate, make laws and hold the powerful to account. As part of their
work, the Commission have issued a series of calls for evidence. These are
open invitations for members of the public, either as individuals or
groups, to submit responses to a series of questions. They have attracted
responses from unions, academics, non-governmental institutions and private
individuals. The first theme was ‘making laws in a digital age’, and the
second on ‘digital scrutiny’. The Commission plans to shortly publish the
final three themes.
There is a growing sense that the growth of the Internet has not paid the
democratic dividends that it could. Turnout in formal political elections
is steadily decreasing, and trust and support in the institutions and
offices of mainstream political life are low and falling. Despite many
innovative attempts from both within and outside of Government, the daily
reality of democratic engagement for most people in the UK would be
familiar to generations of British citizens who predate Facebook or email.
The rise of the Internet has, broadly, done little to challenge
concentrations of power or structures of unequal representation
Demos <http://www.demos.co.uk/> is one of Britain’s leading cross-party
think tank and it has an overarching mission to bring politics closer to
people. They contacted Wikimedia UK to propose an experiment: can an online
community be used to source a response to this call? Can the ethos,
community and technology like that of Wikipedia be used to engage
Wikipedians to come together and collaborate to create a reply? In
particular, Carl Miller, Research Director of the Demos Centre for the
Analysis of Social Media, wrote this piece for Wired
<http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2014-05/22/digital-democracy> in which
he describes Wikipedia as a masterclass in digital democracy.
This conversation has led to what is an experimental attempt to do just
that. In theory there are many lessons that any attempt to increase
engagement with digital democracy can learn from Wikimedia projects,
especially Wikipedia. These include the participatory nature of content
development and the nature of content (and policy) being arrived at by
consensus. Wikipedians are from a wide array of backgrounds and represent a
broad spectrum of views. This could lend itself to effective drafting of
the kind of evidence that the Speaker is looking for. Wikimedia UK and
Demos would like to establish whether this is indeed the case. In
particular, we are seeking answers to the following questions:
-
How can technology help Parliament and other agencies to scrutinise the
work of government?
-
How can technology help citizens scrutinise the Government and the work
of Parliament?
-
What kinds of data should Parliament and Government release to the
public to make itself more open to outside scrutiny?
Everyone is encouraged to try to answer these questions collaboratively, in
much the same way Wikipedia articles are approached - using the space below
for content and talk page for discussion. Stevie Benton from Wikimedia UK
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Stevie_Benton_(WMUK)> and Carl Miller
from Demos will happily answer any questions on the talk page but are
equally happy to let the process take its course.
At this point there is no fixed deadline for evidence on the theme of
digital scrutiny. However, the Speaker’s Commission will be publishing
publishing a single call for evidence covering our last three themes (yet
to be announced). The conversation and crowdsourced evidence will be
reviewed at the end of June with a view to either continuing the process or
submitting as is. If there is appetite among the community, and if the
first attempt is successful, there may be further attempts to develop
submissions to the later three themes.
At the end of the process Demos and Wikimedia UK will prepare a report on
the process and the effectiveness of this kind of approach to crowdsourcing
policy and evidence. This paper will be released under an open licence. It
is a real opportunity for Wikimedians to influence the debate about digital
democracy and both Wikimedia UK and Demos thank you for engaging with this
idea.
You can find the consultation page here
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Connecting_knowledge_to_power:_the_future_o…>
and we look forward to hearing from you.
Thanks and regards,
Stevie
--
Stevie Benton
Head of External Relations
Wikimedia UK
+44 (0) 20 7065 0993 / +44 (0) 7803 505 173
@StevieBenton
Wikimedia UK is a Company Limited by Guarantee registered in England
and Wales, Registered No. 6741827. Registered Charity No.1144513.
Registered Office 4th Floor, Development House, 56-64 Leonard Street,
London EC2A 4LT. United Kingdom. Wikimedia UK is the UK chapter of a
global Wikimedia movement. The Wikimedia projects are run by the
Wikimedia Foundation (who operate Wikipedia, amongst other projects).
*Wikimedia UK is an independent non-profit charity with no legal
control over Wikipedia nor responsibility for its contents.*
Hey,
About a year and half ago we shared WMIL's legal achievement. As many new
people came and joined us, and as I figured out from the ChapConf that many
don't know about this advocacy case, I'm sharing it again :)
you can read more about that on some English press:
* Wikimedia Blog:
http://blog.wikimedia.org/2012/12/19/wikimedia-chapter-wins-victory-for-fre…
* L.A Times:
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/world_now/2012/02/israel-opens-national-pho…
* https://netzpolitik.org/2012/israelische-regierung-staatliche-werk/
Itzik
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Tomer Ashur <tomerashur(a)gmail.com>
Date: Tue, Dec 18, 2012 at 2:27 PM
Subject: [Internal-l] Israeli Government to Release its images under a free
license for public use
To: "Local Chapters, board and officers coordination (closed subscription)"
<internal-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
Hi all,
I am very proud to announce that Wikimedia Israel just won one of its main
struggles. The Israeli government has announced[1] that all imaged in which
the state is the copyrights holder and that were uploaded to the
government's websites can be freely used with the following restrictions:
1. The image will be attributed to the state of Israel (or the relevant
office)
2. The user cannot change the license (Share-alike)
3. No derivative work.
4. Each office will create a policy about commercial use (i.e., commercial
use is allowed, unless otherwise specified).
Wikimedia Israel has pushed for this change since 2010, when MK Meir
Sheetrit proposed an amendment for the Israeli copyright act. The chapter
pushed for the acceptance of this amendment by the Knesset (the Israeli
parliament). During this time, we were able to make a complete shift in the
paradigms employed by the government and government officials. From being
strong opposers to the bill, they become adopters of the changes, thus
making the bill itself, redundant.
Now, a new struggle begins - Wikimedia Israel will work to remove the ND
clause from the decision, and will make sure that all government offices
publish their policy as required. Nonetheless, this is still a huge
achievement, the government has accepted the importance of free culture in
modern world.
On a personal note, as the leader of this project, I wish to send my many
thanks to all of those who made this miracle happen. A special thanks is
due to the great people of the Israeli Internet society, the (just as
great) people of Creative commons Israel, Adv. Jonathan Klinger, Mathias
Schindler, the awsome volunteers of Wikimedia Israel and the editors of
Hebrew Wikipedia. If there's anyone I forgot by name - my apologies, I'm
still terribly excited of these news.
If you have any questions, feel free to ask them here or send me a private
email,
Tomer Ashur
Chairman
Wikimedia Israel
[1] http://www.pmo.gov.il/Secretary/GovDecisions/2012/Pages/des5268.aspx
_______________________________________________
Internal-l mailing list
Internal-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/internal-l
Hello everyone,
For those interested in net neutrality, the Federal Communications
Committee in the US has voted to allow for paid priority on the internet.
Here's a link to the Washington Post article -
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2014/05/15/fcc-approves-p…
I believe there is now a period where public views will be sought. What is
interesting is if the US does implement this change it makes it easier for
other countries to do the same.
Do any of our friends in the US have any info on how this might affect
Wikimedia projects?
Thanks and regards,
Stevie
--
Stevie Benton
Head of External Relations
Wikimedia UK
+44 (0) 20 7065 0993 / +44 (0) 7803 505 173
@StevieBenton
Wikimedia UK is a Company Limited by Guarantee registered in England
and Wales, Registered No. 6741827. Registered Charity No.1144513.
Registered Office 4th Floor, Development House, 56-64 Leonard Street,
London EC2A 4LT. United Kingdom. Wikimedia UK is the UK chapter of a
global Wikimedia movement. The Wikimedia projects are run by the
Wikimedia Foundation (who operate Wikipedia, amongst other projects).
*Wikimedia UK is an independent non-profit charity with no legal
control over Wikipedia nor responsibility for its contents.*
http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/05/europes-troubling-…
"As far as I know, this is unprecedented," Jimmy Wales, a founder of
Wikipedia who has campaigned against Internet censorship, told me. "It
is certainly shocking to have come from the EU rather than from an
authoritarian state."
Hi all,
There is a proposed copyright amendment in Spain that a reporter just
flagged to us and which may be of interest to this group.[1] The proposed
law would empower IP collection societies to collect compensation on behalf
of authors from "electronic service providers that aggregate content" when
they re-use "non-significant fragments of content" from other sites. The
law does not define "electronic service providers that aggregate content"
for the purpose of this provision.[2]
The language that is currently proposed does not allow authors to waive
their right to compensation. Local scholars argue that this provision will
allow the IP collection societies to collect compensation even for authors
who chose to CC license their content.[3]
Best,
Yana
[1]
http://advocacy.globalvoicesonline.org/2014/02/27/spain-google-tax-threaten…
[2]
http://derechoynormas.blogspot.com.es/2014/02/derecho-por-agregacion-de-con…
[3]
http://www.uoc.edu/portal/es/sala-de-premsa/actualitat/noticies/2014/notici…
--
Yana Welinder
Legal Counsel
Wikimedia Foundation
415.839.6885 ext. 6867
NOTICE: As an attorney for the Wikimedia Foundation, for legal/ethical
reasons I cannot give legal advice to, or serve as a lawyer for, community
members, volunteers, or staff members in their personal capacity. For more
on what this means, please see our legal
disclaimer<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Legal_Disclaimer>
.
Hello all,
We are considering joining the following coalitions which seek to protect
free expression and privacy by opposing mass surveillance, and we would
like to get your input. The Wikimedia community raised concerns with PRISM
and other mass surveillance programs during a discussion on the topic in
July 2013,[0] as well as in our recent consultation on our revised privacy
policy.[1] After these discussions, we looked for opportunities to take a
stance on mass surveillance that was consistent with our movement's mission
and values, and is more global in nature. We believe the following two
coalitions may meet these criteria:
Necessary and Proportionate (https://necessaryandproportionate.org) - a set
of principles on mass surveillance, based on international human rights
obligations.
Reform Government Surveillance (https://reformgovernmentsurveillance.com) -
a call for global government surveillance reform, focusing on transparency
and appropriate limitations.
We would like to join like-minded organizations and ask for reform on the
current state of mass surveillance. Privacy and free expression are
essential components of our mission to disseminate free educational
content. Your input on joining these coalitions would be greatly
appreciated.
0. https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:PRISM
1. https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Privacy_policy
--
Stephen LaPorte
Legal Counsel
Wikimedia Foundation
*For legal reasons, I may only serve as an attorney for the Wikimedia
Foundation. This means I may not give legal advice to or serve as a lawyer
for community members, volunteers, or staff members in their personal
capacity.*