Since its early days, the Internet's worldwide web was established on one fundamental principle.
Freedom.
Freedom in connecting humanity.
Much like the printing press crafted egalitarian revolutions, the Internet has become the
flagship of 21st century freedom of speech.
People, bloggers, activists, use the Internet to connect various movements, you know, and
it's the connections that led to a revolution.
A person protesting can face death in my country.
It's interesting to having watched the Arab Spring going on and what social media played
in that revolution.
Increasingly, every user of the Internet is not only a consumer of information, but a
producer.
The French revolution is becoming more and more modern.
So imagine the potential that the Internet represents to solve the issues of development.
It has been called the ultimate leveler, representing one playing field where everybody is free to
interact equally.
But how free are we, really, to express ourselves, to access content, to have privacy?
You're paying with your data to use a service.
That's why it's free.
Facebook, in turn, sells that data to advertisers.
It's the same with every major platform that you use.
If you're not paying for it, you're probably the product.
The ISP is able to collect all your transactional data.
Even the location of your data is being disclosed.
Company called Narus sells what's called DPI or Deep Hacket Inspection that allows all data
to be sifted, reviewed, screened and analyzed by the Egyptian government.
The Internet in Egypt is dead.
And the internet traffic has it.
This blackout, this kill switch, killed many lives.
We're taking it up with the regime.
This is not the regime.
Well, in Egypt, in Tunisia, in Syria, they turned off the Internet just to prevent
freedom of expression and access to information.
The American projects, like SOPA and PIPA, would delegate corporations to a power of censorship
and blockade that is immediately in the history of the network.
And it would affect the whole world.
So how leveled is this playing field?
Is everybody allowed to play?
And who is in control?
Who sets the game's rules?
Depending on who you ask, 90% to 97% of the Internet is controlled by private corporations.
The copyright laws were adopted by developed countries after they were already developed.
We don't think that it's fair to firstly push developing countries into a position where
they're forced to rely on piracy, and then to attack them for using pirated goods.
Freedom of expression is the right to seek and receive information of any kind, and to
impart and disseminate information and opinions through any means possible.
So access to the Internet is not a new right, but it's a necessary element within the boundaries
of human rights, of freedom of expression, of access to information, and it's also part
of the right to development.
