Sneak Peek: SaveTheInternet.com -- National Coalition Launches Monday.

This just came out this afternoon:

SaveTheInternet.com Coalition

PRESS ADVISORY
Monday, April 24, 2006

Contact:
Trevor Fitzgibbon, 202-246-5303
Alex Howe, Fenton Communications, 202.822.5200

***RSVP Required -- MONDAY: National Conference Call -- 1:00pm EST ***

Strange Bedfellows Unite to Save the Internet

"Father of the Internet" Vint Cerf joins Gun Owners of America, librarians, consumer groups and others to announce SavetheInternet.com Coalition

On Monday, diverse coalition launches national campaign to stop Congress from gutting Network Neutrality -- the First Amendment of the Internet

WASHINGTON - The SavetheInternet.com Coalition will hold a national conference call Monday to announce a campaign to defend the free and open Internet from a bill being voted on in the House of Representatives beginning next week.

On Monday, April 24, at 1:00pm, Vint Cerf -- the "father of the Internet" -- will join Gun Owners of America, Consumer Federation of America, American Library Association, Public Knowledge, major public interest groups and others to announce this diverse grassroots coalition. The coalition is spearheaded by Free Press, a national, nonpartisan group focused on media reform and Internet policy issues, and the Web site is already up at www.SavetheInternet.com

To RSVP for the call, please email Alex@Fenton.com. Space is limited.The call-in number will be 800.362.0571 - conference ID is "Save the Web"

Congress is currently rewriting our nation's telecom laws. The SavetheInternet.com Coalition will mobilize public pressure to force Congress to resist a multimillion dollar lobbying effort by Internet providers like AT&T and Verizon to gut Network Neutrality, the Internet's First Amendment.

"Network neutrality is the First Amendment of the Internet," said Timothy Karr, campaign director of Free Press. "It ensures that the public can view the smallest blog just as easily as the largest corporate Web site by preventing companies like AT&T from rigging the playing field for only the highest-paying sites and services. Net neutrality is the reason why the Internet has driven economic innovation, democratic participation, and free speech online -- and the public demands Congress not dismantle it."

Without Net Neutrality, issue organizations would essentially have to pay protection money to dominant Internet providers or risk that their Web sites were not as fully functional as corporate sites.

"Gun Owners of America opposes any attempt to limit or curtail political speech," said Craig Fields, director of Internet operations for Gun Owners of America. "Without statutory network neutrality, there is nothing to prevent big telecom companies from injecting political bias into the very skeleton of modern communications. If the telecoms believe they can frame opposition to their power grab as a liberal or anti-free-market attack, they are sadly mistaken."

WHAT: National conference call -- launch of SavetheInternet.com Coalition’s national campaign to protect Net Neutrality

WHEN: Monday, April 21, 1 p.m. EDT / 10 a.m. PDT

WHO:
Vinton Cerf, "Father of the Internet"
Craig Fields, Gun Owners of America
Gigi Sohn, Public Knowledge
Mark Cooper, Consumer Federation of America
American Library Association

*** To join the call, dial 800.362.0571 - conference ID is "Save the Web"***

Charter members of the SavetheInternet.com Coalition include: Vint Cerf ("Father of the Internet"), Professors Larry Lessig of Stanford University and Tim Wu of Columbia University ("Fathers of Net Neutrality"), Free Press, Gun Owners of America, right-of-center Instapundit blogger Glenn Reynolds, MoveOn.org Civic Action, Consumers Union, Consumer Federation of America, Public Knowledge, Common Cause, the American Library Association, U.S. PIRG.

As early as next week, the House Energy and Commerce Committee is expected to vote on the "Communications Opportunity, Promotion, and Enhancement Act of 2006," a major overhaul of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. The current version of the bill -- sponsored by Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas), Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.), Rep. Charles Pickering (R-Miss.), and Rep. Bobby Rush -- includes no meaningful protections for network neutrality.

"The future of the free, open and innovative Internet we have all enjoyed through the years is not guaranteed," said Gigi Sohn, president of Public Knowledge, a public interest group working on technology and intellectual property issues. "If the bill before the House Commerce Committee gives control of the Internet to the telephone and cable companies, the Internet we have come to appreciate could well cease to exist, and it will be almost impossible to get it back."

For more information, visit www.SavetheInternet.com

If this coalition gets noticed, what a great impact it should have.  We need to press on with this for preserverance.