Thread by @fightfortheftr

This is our first statement on the #JCPAct, a looming disaster for the right to share online.

If you think fake news is bad now, just wait—#JCPA creates a monopolistic pipeline to put Facebook $ into Fox News hands & limit who can share news online.

Rupert Murdoch is drooling.

The #JCPAct speeds up the decline of journalism+rise of disinfo, while pretending to do the opposite. Under it, online platforms would pay big news orgs for linking to them or using their content in some undefined way.

Funneling internet $ to rich propagandists like Murdoch.

The premise of #JCPAct is that News Corp, Fox News, all the biggest peddlers of disinfo in news, need a special law to link up and collude more with Facebook, the biggest peddler of disinfo online—using their power to crush local journalism in the process.

So the #JCPAct’s math is basically:

Facebook & Google $$
+
Fox News disinfo
+
News Corp having a bigger monopoly

= less disinfo & more local independent journalism

Yeah, right. 🙄

The effects of the #JCPAct fine print are as disastrous for the internet as a special Big Tech-Murdoch circle-jerk.
This law as-written could lead to the end of fair use of news content online—it could even make posting a link to a news story a copyright violation.

Fair use is what lets @iamjohnoliver mock Tucker Carlson using footage from Fox, what lets you make a meme of a news reporter getting attacked by a seagull. #JCPAct could undermine fair use by making users or platforms pay for a license before they even can quote a headline.

Some groups think #JCPAct is a “pound of flesh” from Big Tech, when really it’s pounds of cash for the monopolistic corporations pushing the bill.
It is government mandated payouts to share content online—in other words, a link tax.

#JCPA
IS
A
LINK
TAX

Bc lobbyists are trained to bark at "link tax," to be clear #JCPAct doesn’t impose a “per link fee” like a toll that is paid every time a link is clicked—it just turns internet news into Spotify, where corrupt law gives the biggest actors all the $$$$ and lets the rest starve.

How does all this harm smaller, independent news orgs? It lets the News Corps of the world get even bigger and collude with Big Tech under a special antitrust exemption—that’s right, under #JCPAct News Corp can become a BIGGER monopoly.

Adding insult to injury, the act's fantasyland nondiscrimination clause completely discounts how negotiations work—especially the power the biggest news outlets hold. #JCPAct leaves independent news out in the cold, creating a closed system where only massive corps can negotiate.

Media coverage of #JCPAct so far is pure lobbyist talking points parroted by the same monopolistic news orgs that stand to benefit most from squashing the competition and getting free money from Big Tech.

We need to kill this bill, but it’s going to be an uphill battle.

We’re gearing up to raise hell about #JCPAct because it is a threat to a free and open internet, and independent journalism everywhere.
If you’re ready for us to spray Zuck and Murdoch with a firehose, RT and help us pay the water bill at fftf.link/donatejcpact