First of all, a huge thank you to everyone who signed the petition: There are almost 1 million of us! You're the wind in our sails that makes our fight against the Copyright Directive powerful.
Together, we made history: We managed to overcome an overwhelmingly strong lobby and convinced members of the European Parliament to stop the law in its tracks on July 5.
But the political process is not over: On September 12, the Parliament will openly debate the issue and hold another vote. We must keep up the pressure and demand that our representatives vote against upload filters and the link tax.
If they don't stop these laws, many of our posts and uploads will be filtered and removed. Freedom of speech will be restricted and how freely we can communicate online will change forever.
The proponents of upload filters and the link tax are now claiming that the protest is fake and we're all just bots.
We're not going to let that stand. Let's prove them wrong:
1. Take the protests to the streets:
This Sunday, August 26 is the SaveTheInternet Action Day! The many different organizations who oppose this law are staging protests together all across Europe – e.g. in Berlin, Paris, Warsaw, Vienna, Prague, Helsinki, Stockholm,...
Join an event near you: http://saveyourinternet.today – and bring your friends!
2. Send your representatives a protest letter:
Emails can be filtered away – but not physical mail!
MEP [First name] [Last name]
60 Rue Wiertz
B-1047 Bruxelles
Find the list of all representatives here: http://www.europarl.europa.eu/meps/en/map.html
Write that you're calling on them vote against Article 11 and 13 of the Copyright Directive on Sept 12.
Pre-made letters will be provided at our SaveTheInternet.info protests.
3. Show your face:
If you can't make it to a protest, post a selfie with the hashtags #1of1million and #NotABot to Facebook or Twitter.
Please also keep spreading the petition: Ask 5 of your friends directly and personally to sign. Every signature counts! We need as many as possible.
These strategies, together, will make it impossible to ignore us. Politicians will be forced to act on the peoples' concerns!
Thank you, dear subscriber, networker, supporter, and letter writer.
Together we WILL save the internet!
Stephan Wolligandt
and the entire team of www.savetheinternet.info