Dear Avaaz movement,
For 7 years we've fought corporate giants to save the internet, and it's looking like WE'VE WON!!!!!
First in the US, then Brazil, India and now here's what the top French official (and key swing vote) told us last week before he announced the EU law safeguarding the internet for half a billion people:
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| | "I must confess that some of these tweets and messages that I received made me emotional... people asking me to "Save the Internet" and "Stop corporate capture..." I really wanted to respond to them."
-- Sebastien Soriano, Head of French Internet Regulator ARCEP | |
Officials announcing the law showed charts of unprecedented numbers of public comments - up to 640 per minute, the overwhelming majority from Avaaz!
Corporations wanted a fast internet for the mega-rich, and a slow one for the rest of us. We fought for the principle of "net neutrality" - equal internet for all!
It was a global fight that ranged across 7 years and 4 continents:
United States - 2.5 million of us join a US Senator who threatened to block discussion by reading our signatures out from the Senate floor! The legislation dies. WIN!
India - Avaaz partners with national campaign groups, with tens of thousands of our Indian members joining a call to the Telecoms minister. WIN!
Brazil - Large numbers of parliamentarians actually join our campaign, helping to pass "the Marco Civil - the most advanced law to protect the internet in the world." WIN!
Europe - Telecoms giants launch a massive push to get loopholes in our hard won net neutrality law. We stop them. The press doesn't normally tell happy stories, but this is one they're raving about. Read about the latest victory for people power in Reuters, Tagesspiegel, Politico, EFE, Euractiv and the Wall Street Journal. WIN!
The internet is more than just another issue. It's a profound empowerment of human beings to connect us to each other. Net inequality would have channeled that power to the rich few - their websites would have loaded much faster and worked better than small businesses, bloggers, or nonprofits like Avaaz.
But we used the power of our connection to defend connection itself, and net neutrality is now the standard for the internet everywhere.
And that's a sign of hope for every challenge the world faces. Because as long as we stick together, and stay connected, we CAN build the world we all dream of.
With joy and gratitude,
Ricken, Alice, Ben, Luca, Pascal, Emma, Fatima, Wissam and the whole Avaaz team
P.S. Avaaz can only do all this because we are 100% funded by small individual donations -- no corporate, government, foundation, or large donor money. To keep our work for Internet Freedom going, chip in here: https://secure.avaaz.org/en/save_the_internet_donate/
* And a big THANK YOU and CONGRATS to all our amazing allies involved in winning these historic victories in each country, especially: Access Now, Digitale Gesellschaft, DemandProgress, EFF, EDRi, Fight for the Future, FreePress, Gilberto Gil, La Quadrature du Net, MoveOn, Save the Internet, World Wide Web Foundation, The Right to Know campaign and so many more!
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