Cyberprotest on Free Speech Continues

By LINDA DAILEY PAULSON

SAN FRANCISCO, Dec. 15 (UPI) -- Representatives of online services said Friday they have not relented in prodding Congress to drop "indecency" language that could regulate free speech in cyberspace from the telecommunications reform bill.

The ripple instigated by the San Francisco cyberspace protest spread across the country. In addition to Thursday's San Francisco protest, attracting 500 people, actions were staged at the Seattle Public Library and New York's Cyber-Cafe.

Add Austin, Texas, to the list. A protest is slated there Tuesday. According to activist groups, the momentum continues to build nationwide.

"The feelings of the online community have registered in Washington, " said Todd Lappin, organizer of the San Francisco protest. "The Internet community is now mobilized and aware they have to take action."

Voter's Telecommunications Watch, a New York-based watchdog group that monitors telecommunications and civil liberties legislation, attempted to track telephone traffic into legislative offices as the week unfolded.

"The message count peaked in the late afternoon Tuesday at over 70 per minute" said Steven Cherry, Voter's Telecommunications Watch board member. "Many of those were from people who called several offices.... By Wednesday morning, the count was over 18,000.... So all told, our very rough guess is there were well over 50,000 phone calls and faxes made on the one day."

Some of those calls came in on toll free lines established by the Christian Coalition, which is pushing the issue based on protecting children from pornography. Parents supporting the First Amendment say they should screen material for their children rather than allow the government to regulate it.

Several software "screening" packages with names like CyberSitter and NetNanny exist to block objectionable and inappropriate information from coming into computers. Also Thursday, American Online, in response to the Capital Hill debates, announced a new "parental control feature" on its software.

Some people have been reserved in pronouncing the events of the past week a success. "It looks like this legislation is going to go in and no one's going to contest it," said Henri Poole, president, vivid studios, a San Francisco-based web developer. "I'm going to continue to make calls. I'm going to let the politicians hear that this issue is extremely important to me."

Poole says that individuals in companies like his, involved in the national economy by creating and maintaining jobs in the new media products and services sector, are an active voting bloc who will remember the politicians who did not support free speech at the polls.

As the debate continues, several organizations with World Wide Web sites have posted information about the pending censorship legislation. These include: American Civil Liberties Union; Electronic Frontier Foundation; Electronic Privacy Information Center; and Voters Telecommunications Watch.

And still other websites contain reports on the San Francisco First Amendment rally, including: MediaCast; and vivid studios (http://www.vivid.com/).

Copyright 1995 The United Press International

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