Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. - The First Amendment of the Constitution

Back in March, the U.S. government announced that it would relinquish control over ICANN, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers. This is the organization that is responsible for managing how domain names are assigned on the internet, and until now, it has been under fairly tight supervision from the Commerce Department.

Today, the FCC voted on a new proposed rule that governs how the internet, with respect to service providers and their ability to set prices, will be regulated. The hearing came down to a vote of 3-2 down party lines in support of the proposal, whith Republicans siding against the rule. After a court decision earlier this year that struck down previous net neutrality standards but preserved the FCC’s authority over internet regulation, the agency has been struggling to come up with rules that don’t make absolutely everyone angry. As in the case of most compromises, this has been a dismal failure.

UPDATE 6-5-2014: In their continuing efforts to ruin all that is good and decent in the world, the Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles has sent cease and desist letters to two car service companies, Uber and Lyft, operated through mobile apps. While these services provide safe, efficient, and affordable options for people to get from point A to point B, the DMV apparently thinks it is more important to protect the oligopolies of cab companies, not to mention their own revenues, than to allow consumers to buy services they overwhelmingly enjoy.

FreedomWorks has signed onto the following coalition letter supporting the ECPA Amendments Act:

During the upcoming Cyber Week, Congress may vote on numerous so-called cyber security bills. Here are details on several bills that Congress may be debating soon:  Cyber Security Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA) 

The issue of how to handle sales conducted remotely over the internet has been a thorny one for lawmakers, as they struggle to adapt policies to rapidly advancing technologies. Nine states currently collect sales tax on out-of-state, online transactions, but a new bill dubbed the Marketplace Fairness Act of 2013 would expand this to a national mandate. The argument behind such legislation is that local retailers are placed at an unfair disadvantage, because their prices must include sales tax whereas out-of-state vendors are under no such compulsion.

The FreedomCast: Episode 13: Seton Motley on Internet freedom and CISPA

Largely drowned out by media coverage of the State of the Union address Tuesday night was the simultaneous release of an executive order entitled “Improving Critical Infrastructure Cybersecurity.” In a nutshell, the order paves the way for an information sharing program between government and private industry, in order to assess and address threats to cybersecurity.

The American people stopped Congress from passing disastrous so-called cybersecurity bills that would infringe on the free speech and privacy of internet users. Nothing short of amazing happened when Congress tried to ram through CISPA, SOPA, and PIPA. The defeat of these bills showed the power of grassroots activism as countless activists rose up and took action by calling their congressmen and spreading the word on social media.