Announcements

USPP applauds FCC rules on Net Neutrality and Community Broadband

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

The United States Pirate Party is overjoyed that both Net Neutrality and Community Broadband measures passed the FCC today.

The Net Neutrality proposal comes from almost 8 years of wrangling with the FCC, starting from research in 2007 that showed Comcast to be interfering with people attempting to use the BitTorrent protocol, regardless of content. This research, conducted by US Pirate Party Chairman Andrew Norton for the news site TorrentFreak was later verified by both the Associated Press, and the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

These provisions make for a stronger step forward for citizens of the US,” states Norton. “Despite the plethora of lies and misrepresentations by the major players in the Internet Service Provider (ISP) industry, the FCC has today ruled to take away their ability to fleece consumers and line their pockets at the public trough without consequence.

The votes strengthen not just protections for consumers, but their ability to build their own community networks where they feel unserved, an activity pre-emptively banned by state laws, prompted by anti-competitive suggestions by incumbent ISPs.

With these two votes, the FCC has ensured that monopoly ISPs will not stifle competition or prevent small businesses and new startups from accessing the Internet on the same terms as the previously-established companies,” stated Vice-Chair Lindsay-Anne Brunner.

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About the United States Pirate Party

The United States Pirate Party is is the only political party in the US with the objective of defending the Internet as an open resource for all. The US Pirate Party ran four candidates for state elections in 2014, receiving up to 18% of the vote. It is identifying and training candidates to run in the 2016 Congressional and state elections. State Pirate parties are active in Massachusetts, Wisconsin, Georgia, New York and other states.

For More Information

United States Pirate Party
Email: captain@uspirates.org
Phone: (+1)352-658-3824
Web: uspirates.org
Twitter: @uspirates
Facebook: facebook.com/uspirates

1 comment on “USPP applauds FCC rules on Net Neutrality and Community Broadband

  1. Robert Mallet

    Here in Aledo, TX, we have our own community broadband network known as Aledo Broadband: http://www.aledobb.com

    It has been here for many years, and my family uses its services (as you can see by my email domain). I’m not sure if state laws in Texas pre-emptively banned such startups, but if they did, we sure haven’t been notified. We have been using Aledo Broadband since around 2008, and we have been loyal customers. Thank goodness the FCC has put measures in place to ensure other communities will have the same opportunities that we have here in Aledo. And thank you, Pirate Party, for bringing to light the censorship of websites by Comcast.

    Thanks from a Republican,
    Robert Mallet.

    P.S. I’ve been researching your party for a project for US Government class at school. I read that the Pirate Party movement in the US was started because of the success of the Pirate Party in Sweden. Does that party respect Mojang’s keeping Minecraft’s source code closed-source, as well as other game studios’ games’ source code being closed-source, or do they insist on even video games being open-source?

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