Remkus de Vries 10:27 am on July 6, 2017

Day of Action – Save Net Neutrality

The FCC wants to destroy net neutrality and give big cable companies control over what we see and do online. If they get their way, they’ll allow widespread throttling, blocking, censorship, and extra fees.

July 12th has been set as a Day of Action to fight for net neutrality. Even though the intentions of the FCC are affecting the United States directly, their intentions have a huge impact on the free internet as we know and would affect the WordPress Community a great deal. But frankly, every single one of us would be affected.

For anyone outside the US there’s not more we can do than raise awereness – for example with this plugin – but we musn’t rule out the impact of global awereness and action. It is with this in mind that we propose as the WordPress Community team (after being discussed in the bi-weekly Community team chat today) to send out a mass email to: a) all MeetupMeetup Meetup groups are locally-organized groups that get together for face-to-face events on a regular basis (commonly once a month). Learn more about Meetups in our Meetup Organizer Handbook. members of the WordPress Chapter on Meetup.com or b) all Meetup organizers of the WordPress Chapter on Meetup.com

Additionally, we could also send out a bigger signal by signing up to be one of the communities that subscribe to this Day of Action.
Given that we’d be sending out to thousands of people we’d we should tread lightly. This is why we’re posting about our intentions here first to ask for feedback.

Dee Teal 10:42 am on July 6, 2017

I think this is a critically important issue for all of our future and I endorse the idea of sending out this email. While I know it’s only something that immediately affects our US members, once that door is cracked open, it will only be a question of time before the pressure mounts here in Australia to allow similar destruction of neutrality. Where the US goes, Australia quickly follows.

If there’s anything we can do to help our US friends, including sending out the Cat Signal, and sharing this information in our networks, I think every opportunity should be taken to help spread the word.
Anonymous User 12:58 pm on July 6, 2017

GO!
- Anonymous User 12:59 pm on July 6, 2017
  
  💯 MeetupMeetup Meetup groups are locally-organized groups that get together for face-to-face events on a regular basis (commonly once a month). Learn more about Meetups in our Meetup Organizer Handbook. members.
Doug Stewart 1:51 pm on July 6, 2017

I’m a hearty “no”. A couple of reasons, off the top of my head:
1) I have enough trouble getting my MeetupMeetup Meetup groups are locally-organized groups that get together for face-to-face events on a regular basis (commonly once a month). Learn more about Meetups in our Meetup Organizer Handbook. members to pay attention to email notices re: MeetupsMeetup Meetup groups are locally-organized groups that get together for face-to-face events on a regular basis (commonly once a month). Learn more about Meetups in our Meetup Organizer Handbook., WordCamps, etc. Bombarding them with another email, and a highly political one at that, makes the value of all my other email solicitations take a dive. It’s counter-productive, and if a solicitation to send out an announcement to my Meetup showed up, I’d fight against it going out for that reason alone. Keep politics out of my Meetup feed, please. If you want to advocate for it during open discussion AT the Meetup, fine. That’s a great venue for it. Bombarding people with what amounts to digital pamphleteering is counter-productive, IMHO.

2) Hard as it may be to believe, there are some of us libertarian/conservative-minded folks that use WordPress and believe that Net Neutrality is precisely the wrong approach. Signing my name to this process, whether explicitly or implicitly, gets a hearty thumbs-down.
- Josepha 2:50 pm on July 6, 2017
  
  Thanks for this perspective, Doug. I’m sure you’re not alone in wanting to safeguard your community against what can be seen as spam.
Morten Rand-Hendriksen 2:29 pm on July 6, 2017

Yes, the WordPress community should be part of this Day of Action. Net Neutrality is vital for every member of the community whether they know it or not. The principle that all data is created equal is one of the cornerstones of the blogging revolution and the reason why tools like WordPress exist and have become so popular and powerful. We, as a community, must protect net neutrality to protect democratic access to publishing and consuming content on the internet.
Sherie LaPrade 2:40 pm on July 6, 2017

I absolutely believe that Net Neutrality is a critical issue for the WordPress community at large and I also think it’s important to get the issue and the July 12 Day of Action in front of as many eyes as possible. However, I’m more in favor of plan B) contact meetupMeetup Meetup groups are locally-organized groups that get together for face-to-face events on a regular basis (commonly once a month). Learn more about Meetups in our Meetup Organizer Handbook. organizers, as opposed to contacting all meetup members. My opinion is that it makes them aware of the issue but still allows them the choice whether or not to bring it to the attention of their local community, and the ability to do it in a way that would be most effective for their area, since they are the ones the know their local community best! Also, it probably will mean a lot more (and feel more personal) coming from a local organizer than it would from someone the meetup members may or may not know from the Global Community TeamGlobal Community Team A group of community organizers and contributors who collaborate on local events about WordPress — monthly WordPress meetups and/or annual conferences called WordCamps..
Heather Burns 2:57 pm on July 6, 2017

Two and a half years ago I was up at 2 AM writing a final paper for my university course about the net neutrality issue wondering “what was I thinking when I picked this topic…” Well, now I know. Briefly:

1) This is the most important political issue for the community to get involved in, and possibly the most important thing it could ever do. The endgame for the removal of net neutrality provisions is not a libertarian return to market control, it is the facilitation of censorship and the stifling of dissent, and as I said in Paris, WordPress.comWordPress.com An online implementation of WordPress code that lets you immediately access a new WordPress environment to publish your content. WordPress.com is a private company owned by Automattic that hosts the largest multisite in the world. This is arguably the best place to start blogging if you have never touched WordPress before. https://wordpress.com/ is absolutely a target of that move, as has already been seen in the UK. If we do not show up and face this, we deserve what is coming to us. I mean that.
2) That said, A8C have signed up to participate in the day of action. I am checking with them to see what their intentions are so that we do not duplicate effort.
3) Given that A8c have signed up, how would we as a community sign up? As has been said above, we cannot speak for the whole WP community. So do we form an action group? Who leads? Who is the contact person? Who coordinates? This is going to be six days of fairly intense effort: worthwhile, but intense. It can be done. It can absolutely be done.
(I’m smiling here because if you were at my talk in Paris you know what to do. I want to see who rises to the challenge of actually doing it.)
4) We start with education: what is this issue and why is it important. Facts, links, resources beyond what the campaign has provdied. Happy to pitch in on that.
5) Who wants to make a pluginPlugin A plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features to your WordPress websites. WordPress plugins are written in the PHP programming language and integrate seamlessly with WordPress. These can be free in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory https://wordpress.org/plugins/ or can be cost-based plugin from a third-party out of the Day of Action widgetWidget A WordPress Widget is a small block that performs a specific function. You can add these widgets in sidebars also known as widget-ready areas on your web page. WordPress widgets were originally created to provide a simple and easy-to-use way of giving design and structure control of the WordPress theme to the user.? https://github.com/fightforthefuture/battleforthenet-widget
(And who wants to push it to the dot com dashboard?)
Heather Burns 3:02 pm on July 6, 2017

And please, no cat signal. This is the future of the open web. Enough with the cutesy memes.
- Heather Burns 4:54 pm on July 6, 2017
  
  So a8c is sorting the pluginPlugin A plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features to your WordPress websites. WordPress plugins are written in the PHP programming language and integrate seamlessly with WordPress. These can be free in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory https://wordpress.org/plugins/ or can be cost-based plugin from a third-party and there will be a blog post Monday ish as well.
Gary Bairead 7:03 pm on July 6, 2017

Yes – the aim of WordPress is to democratize publishing.

Net neutrality is central to that.
Robey Lawrence 2:07 am on July 7, 2017

Set these email phasers to Stun!

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Day of Action – Save Net Neutrality

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