The Progressive

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A project of Common Dreams

For Immediate Release
Contact: Email:,press@fightforthefuture.org

Net Neutrality Defenders Plan Mass Online Protest 48 hours Before FCC Vote

Sites like Reddit, GitHub, Pintrest, Etsy, Imgur, Pornhub, BitTorrent, and Patreon are already helping drive calls to Congress

WASHINGTON

The unprecedented public backlash to the FCC's plan to slash Title II net neutrality protections continues to grow. After thousands of peopletook to the streets to protest last week, Internet users, websites, apps, and online forums are preparing to participate in "Break the Internet," a mass online protest that will start on December 12, two days before the FCC vote scheduled for December 14. The protest is demanding that Congress take action to stop the FCC vote.

See the announcement for the protest here: https://www.breaktheinternetprotest.org

The protest will take many forms on social media, apps, and websites across the Internet. Facebook and LinkedIn users will "break" their profiles by changing their relationship status to "Married" (to net neutrality) or adding a new "job" of "Defending Net Neutrality." Websites and apps will participate by doing something to "break" their platform and encourage their users to contact Congress.

Websites, startups, apps and businesses large and small are already helping drive phone calls to Congress using creative widgets, modals, and banners that show what the Internet might look like if ISPs can control what users do with throttling, censorship, and new fees.

Sites helping sound the alarm include Imgur, Mozilla, Pinterest, Reddit, GitHub, Etsy, BitTorrent, Pornhub, Patreon, Funny Or Die, Speedtest, Fiverr, Cloudlfare, Opera, Trello, the Happy Wheels game, DeviantArt, AnimeNewsNetwork, and BoingBoing. See some screenshots of actions sites are already taking in the lead-up to the vote here.

Fight for the Future is a group of artists, engineers, activists, and technologists who have been behind the largest online protests in human history, channeling Internet outrage into political power to win public interest victories previously thought to be impossible. We fight for a future where technology liberates -- not oppresses -- us.

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