Never Give Up, Never Surrender

Regarding proposed new online copyright regulations, quoting from the Electronic Frontier Foundation:

"Right now, the U.S. Copyright Office is collecting information on the use of "standard technical measures" to address copyright infringement, as part of a longer effort that, we fear, will lead to filtering mandates."

That is, the state is considering expanding something like Content ID to mandatory use across the Internet, making it way harder to engage in art and community online without facing steep fines and possibly even jail time for work deemed copyright-infringing. You can see the full EFF statement here.

They need people to submit formal comments to the USCO, a process which does not take much time but does require a little more care than the usual email to your reps. This is the form, and please note the two links immediately under the header: "Read Agency Guidelines | Commenter's Checklist." Please be very sure to follow those requirements! Even so, a short comment is better than no comment.

Please also note that the form asks you for your phone # and address -- these are not required, and they may be posted publicly if you include them. I would recommend adding only your name and, if you like, your state, and leaving it at that.

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This is the comment I left; please feel free to use it as a (loose! so it doesn't get thrown out!) template.

"Copyright enforcement should be relaxed, not tightened. Expanding Content ID-type filters across the whole of the Internet will stymie creativity and ensure that corporate interests control what content is possible to make and share on the Internet. I would be very sad to see communities of artists, fans, critics, and performers disappear due to draconian and anti-artist rules. As a fan of classical music, I know that these automated content filters often remove perfectly valid performances by classical musicians on Facebook, restricting their ability to share their art and my ability to enjoy it, because they do not understand context or nuanced interpretations. They will make it harder for individual musicians, new musicians, and marginalized musicians to share their art, because those people simply cannot compete with copyright holders on the scale of YouTube. Though that very scale may make those companies seem like the primary victims of copyright infringement, the people who are hurt most, and most unfairly, are individuals simply trying to share their art without receiving fines or even jail time due to the misunderstandings of a piece of code. I strongly urge you to foster creativity and art among the public, rather than fostering ever-tighter corporate control of the arts."

This is an environmental and Indigenous-rights set of actions.

Thacker Pass/Pee'hee Mu'huh is sacred and historically significant land to the northern Paiute and the Shoshone. It is unceded, but currently managed as public land by the Bureau of Land Management. It is vital habitat for many endangered flora and fauna, some endemic to only this region. Due to Trump-era environmental deregulation, it is also the proposed site of a giant lithium mine run by Canadian company Lithium Americas.

Lithium Americas says this is a "green" mine, meant to provide batteries for electric cars, but the impact would be environmentally devastating. Lithium mining means open-pit mining and the chewing up of mountaintops in the refining process, such that producing one ton of lithium will require strip mining and processing between ~110 and 500 tons of Earth. Alongside the lithium, the process produces hundreds of tons of sulfur waste, including sulfuric acid. It will also burn enormous quantities of diesel and suck up hundreds of thousands of gallons of water -- in Nevada. All this quite aside from the fact that it will require eating up more than 5,000 acres of sacred and irreplaceable land, threatening the wider watershed, cutting off its relationship to its originary stewards, and truncating a critical wildlife corridor.

How I heard about this was because Lithium Americas is 49% owner of Minera Exar, a South American company accused of misleading and violating principles of free, prior, and informed consent of Indigenous communities in the vicinity of their mine in Argentina. This is only part of the horrific abuses against Indigenous peoples living around lithium mines in the Andes, and you'd better believe the same will happen in the U.S.

All this to say, it must be stopped, and people are working to stop it.

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Protect Thacker Pass/Pee'hee Mu'huh - Protestors, including Paiute and Shoshone tribal members, are constructing an encampment at Thacker Pass. Learn more about the project and donate to help with construction, travel, and living fees.

Sign a petition to the Department of Interior, crafted by the Fort McDermitt Paiute & Shoshone.

Indigenous Women Hike - Originally founded to help Indigenous women (Paiute, Navajo, and other nations) heal their ancestral connection to Nüümü and Newe territory through hiking and activism, IWH is currently involved in the Thacker Pass action. Check the link in their bio to learn how to donate directly to them or support them through merch.

Text PCLPBP to 50409 to get ResistBot to send Biden a letter telling him to tell the DOI to revoke Lithium Americas' permits.

And then email the DOI ([email protected]) and the Nevada chapter of the BLM ([email protected]) directly, using more or less that same script.

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( ResistBot and DOI/BLM text (also usable as a phone script) )

Early this winter and spring before COVID reached the U.S., the University of California ASE union, UAW, organized graduate student worker actions at all nine campuses to agitate for better wages and housing relief in the face of overwhelming rent burden. UC Santa Cruz was at the forefront of the COLA movement, and its students faced the harshest (illegal) retaliation.

Carlos Cruz, a first-generation grad worker, is the only graduate student across the UC still facing discipline for his participation in labor action in Spring 2020. While all other workers have won reinstatement, Carlos is still facing a two-year suspension. Suspension in the midst of a deepening pandemic is effectively firing and deprives Carlos of healthcare through the university. The preponderance of police testimony used against Carlos, meanwhile, suggests racialized targeting.

After 11 hours of hearings and testimony, the UCSC student board had decided to drop the two-year suspension meted out to Carlos Cruz--but in an unprecedented move, a campus administrator overruled this board. Associate Vice Chancellor Sue Matthews, not party to the hearing, decided that she “did not support” this finding.

The UAW 2865 grievance against the use of student conduct to discipline labor actions is still ongoing. In addition, there is another chance for ASEs and allies to take action to protect Carlos: a final appeal in the student conduct code, to UCSC Chancellor Cythia Larive. UAW is requesting that supporters write an email or a letter to Chancellor Larive demanding that she use her authority responsibly and bring a speedy resolution to this saga by dropping all charges.

You can find addresses and a script here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1qwAge-378ZZha5nGk7fE_Bgqkn0Q0-pGJn2wVlPe4x4/edit