response 91 of 316:

Jun 21 23:59 UTC 1999

Okay, here's my draft.  Mary made some suggestions which I've
incorporated.  It's actually a fairly extensive re-write.  As I was
thinking about it, ideas kept occurring to me...  

I made a description of Grex the first paragraph, and the lawsuit the
second.  But I see Mark's point.  The first and second paragraphs could 
interchanged almost verbatim.  That might be better.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Cyberspace Communications is a Michigan non-profit corporation, based
in Ann Arbor, with a charitable, community-outreach mission.  It runs
an online system called Grex, in operation since 1991, accessible via
the internet and the world wide web, whose primary purpose is to
provide a wide range of discussion forums allowing free exchange of
information on any topic. There are forums on music, the arts,
writing, consumer information, living with disabilities, men's and
women's issues, and many other subjects.  Grex itself does not create
content, but simply provides a platform on which others may excercise
their right of free speech to share information with others.  Grex
does not charge any fees to use its system, and anyone with internet
access may read and post text, anonymously if they wish.  Funding
comes almost entirely from donations by users.  The technical staff
that maintains the system is volunteer and unpaid.  Grex displays no
advertising on its site.

Together with several other plaintiffs, Cyberspace Communications has
filed suit to block Michigan Public Act 33 of 1999, which provides
criminal penalties for providing "sexually explicit" material via the
internet which is harmful to minors.  The Act is scheduled to go into
effect on August 1st, 1999.  We have filed the suit because we believe
that this law would have a chilling effect on constitutionally
protected free speech, making it impossible for Grex to fulfill its
community-service mission and continue operations in its present form.

The Internet provides prospects for communications which the world has
never seen before.  It is now commonplace to discuss politics with
people in foreign countries and to meet people with disabilities that
would otherwise keep them from interacting.  Despite operating on a
shoestring budget and being maintained by an entirely volunteer,
unsalaried technical staff, Grex has been enormously successful at its
mission to provide a platform for communication, attracting thousands
of users world-wide.  The forums currently contain about 42 million
words of text, about five times the number in a typical 20-volume
encyclopedia.  Roughly 200 new messages are posted to the forums every
day; Grex also has a live-chat area in which over 5000 short messages
are posted daily. Although the core of most active users is largely
Michigan-based, Grex has roughly 29,000 users from all over the world.
Grex does not require users to provide identification and does not
pre-screen messages posted to the forums or censor them after the
fact; doing any of these things would be inconsistent with our
free-speech mission.  The legitimacy and value of this mission was
recently recognized by the Internal Revenue Service in granting Grex
501(c)3 tax-exempt status.

Public Act 33 would make it impossible for Grex to continue to provide
the kind of free-speech forum to which people are constitutionally
entitled.  The law is broad enough that "sexually explicit" material
may include discussions of rape, AIDS, safe sex, pornography laws,
prostitution, and other topics which people are entitled to discuss
openly and frankly.  The law encompasses even clinical discussions of
sexual issues.  In order to avoid prosecution under this act, Grex
would have to authenticate all users and censor sexually explicit
material.  As a user-supported non-profit organization, we do not have
the resources to do the either, nor should we have to in a society
that is protected by First Amendment freedoms.  It is also important
to realize that outlawing one area of speech inevitably
affects all forms of communication.  People will avoid getting close
to a topics that might get them in trouble, which would have a
widespread chilling effect on free speech.  For all of these reasons,
we oppose Public Act 33 and believe it, like the Communications
Decency Act that was struck down by the Supreme Court, to be
unconstitutional.

Readers are invited to visit Grex's web page at
http://www.cyberspace.org and learn about the system for themselves.
The on-line discussion about joining the lawsuit is accessible at
http://www.cyberspace.org/cgi-bin/bt/peek:coop:98.

For further information, contact Mary Remmers at ###-###-####.

response 93 of 316:

Jun 22 00:03 UTC 1999

By the way, I think it's important that anything that's released to the
press should have some sort of blessing from the board.  The board
meeting next Monday may be too long to wait for that, so I've emailed
all the board members asking them to follow this discussion so that we
can at least take a straw vote online.

(Mark's #92 slipped in. Not sure what he's referring to.)

response 95 of 316:

Jun 22 00:56 UTC 1999

Nitpick - the double use of "others" in lines 9 & 10 of the 1st paragraph
seems like it could be improved upon.  My inclination would be to change
it to "...a platform from which individuals may...". 

response 97 of 316:

Jun 22 07:45 UTC 1999

I just had to do an emergency trip to Downtown Detroit during the time I
thought I was going to spend on writing something.  I have no idea if I can
come up with anything coherrent at this point.

Having skimmed John's press release, I think his first paragraph starts it
off very wrongly, in that anybody skimming press releases for interesting
stories is going to get bored and move on to something else before they find
out what the press release is about.

response 99 of 316:

Jun 22 10:25 UTC 1999

I like that version a whole lot, Steve.  Very nice.

response 101 of 316:

Jun 22 15:48 UTC 1999

I just had a call from Michael Steinberg of the ACLU. They're filing
today, with Cyberspace Communications as the lead plaintiff. They don't
yet know what judge will be hearing the case. (As previously noted, they
decided not to hold a press conference.)

There are nine other plaintiffs, listed below.  Some are based in
Michigan, some are not.  The suit has an "interstate commerce" component
-- under this clause of the constitution, Michigan has no authority to
regulate interstate commerce.  This gives standing to non-Michigan
sites.

The other plaintiffs are:

    Arbornet (http://www.arbornet.org/) - 
    Art on the Net (http://www.art.net/) - a web art gallery
    The National ACLU (http://www.aclu.org/)
    Web Del Sol (http://webdelsol.com/) - a literary site
    Lit Line (http://www.litline.org/) - another literary site
    Alt-X (don't know the URL, but it's a literary site)
    AIDS Partnership of Michigan (don't know the URL)
    Glad Day (http://www.tiac.net/users/gladday/) - Gay & Lesbian
      online bookshop
    SexEd.Org (http://www.sexed.org/) - sexuality discussion site

response 103 of 316:

Jun 22 16:04 UTC 1999

Just got a call from Mary.  Tom Shram of the ACLU called her at work to
let her know that the suit is being filed and to ask for a quote from
her that they could include in the ACLU's press release.  She didn't
have time to give me the detailed quote over the phone, but I imagine
we'll be reading it later.

response 105 of 316:

Jun 22 19:02 UTC 1999

I'll attempt a combination of the three drafts.

response 107 of 316:

Jun 22 20:48 UTC 1999

The suit will be filed *tomorrow* (Wednesday) according to Steinberg's
office.  The lawyers were still working on it at 2:00, and figured
it was too late to file today.  So it goes...

response 109 of 316:

Jun 22 20:59 UTC 1999

You can look at http://www.prnewswire.com for lots of examples of press
releases.

response 111 of 316:

Jun 22 21:04 UTC 1999

(Steve slipped in.)

response 113 of 316:

Jun 23 05:09 UTC 1999

OK, here it is - sorry it's taken me so long.  I thought about it and broke
down our reasons for opposing the law into 3 arguments:

1) The law is too broad - it covers lots of things that are not about
titillation at all.

2) THe law would require validation and censorship, which infringes upon
people's First Amendment rights.

3) The law would put grass-roots organizations like Grex out of business, and
that will leave only large corporations hosting discussion forums.

Argument 3 is the weakest one, though according to Marshall Widick (the ACLU
lawyer who gave us advice on the declaration) it's very important, legally.
After all, if you put all the institutions which allow free speech out of
business, then you've essentially curtailed the speech itself.

Anyway, the first paragraph tells what happened (that we joined the suit).
The second paragraph has a one-sentence description of Grex, followed by short
summaries of the arguments.  Jennifer (my ex-journalist friend) said it's
important to put the important information right up front, and not make
reporters go hunting for it.

After that, each argument gets a couple of paragraphs.  (There are subheadings
between the sections, which I don't know if we should leave in or not.)  The
last paragraph is about Grex.  Jennifer told me that's the standard form for
a press release.  It repeats some of the information from earlier, but I think
that's OK.

response 115 of 316:

Jun 23 05:13 UTC 1999

                                        Cyberspace Communications, Inc.
                                        P.O. Box 4432, Ann Arbor, MI 48103
                                        Contact: Mary Remmers (734) ###-####
                                                 mary@cyberspace.org

PRESS RELEASE

For release June 23rd, 1999

Cyberspace Communications Joins ACLU to Block Censorship Law

ANN ARBOR, MICHIGAN -- Cyberspace Communications, Inc., an Ann Arbor-based 
non-profit corporation that operates the online community "Grex" 
(www.cyberspace.org), has joined a suit to block the implementation of 
Michigan Public Act 33 of 1999 (The Child Online Protection Act), which makes 
it illegal to transmit "sexually explicit" material to minors.  The Act is 
scheduled to go into effect on August 1st, 1999.  Other plaintiffs in the suit 
include the American Civil Liberties Association, Art on the Net, Web Del Sol, 
and the AIDS Partnership of Michigan. 

Grex is an open-access online community, with a charitable mission and an all-
volunteer staff, which hosts electronic discussions.  It opposes the new law 
because the law is too broad (it would criminalize transmission over the 
Internet of many scenes which are shown on broadcast television), and it 
erodes the First Amendment right to free speech.  It would also require all 
sites on the Internet which host discussions to validate the identities of all 
participants and censor any material visible to minors which is "sexually 
explicit."  Validation and censorship would stifle a lot of healthy 
discussion, beyond what the law is meant to cover.  And small "grass roots" 
organizations such as Grex, which cannot afford to pay validators or censors, 
would be forced to shut down. 

THE LAW IS TOO BROAD

"It is an understandable desire to want to protect children from what some
people see as unhealthy influences," says Mary Remmers, spokesperson for 
Cyberspace Communications.  "We have existing laws about pornography and 
obscenity to do that.  This law, however, is broad enough that 'sexually 
explicit' material may include discussions of rape, AIDS, safe sex, 
pornography laws, prostitution, and other topics which people are entitled to 
discuss openly and frankly.  The law encompasses even clinical discussions of 
sexual issues, not just material designed to shock and titillate." 

"It would be bad enough if this were the only material affected, but a law to
outlaw one kind of speech inevitably affects other kinds.  People afraid of
saying the wrong thing will avoid getting close to a topic that might get them
in trouble.  The result is a widespread 'chilling effect' on free speech."

ENFORCING THE LAW WOULD REQUIRE VALIDATION AND CENSORSHIP

"In order to avoid prosecution under this act, Grex would have to authenticate 
all users and censor sexually explicit material," says John Remmers, president 
of Cyberspace Communications.  In cyberspace, unlike in person, it is 
impossible to tell who is a minor and who is not.  To comply with the law, 
open-access discussion systems would be required to collect ID from every 
participant, and then to censor areas which are accessible to minors. 

"One of the ways Grex fosters lively debate is by encouraging any and all to
participate and share their point-of-view," says Mary Remmers.  "Insisting 
participants first register, then wait for an ID check, then submit their 
comments to moderators who would filter for content, would clearly limit 
participation and stifle discussion."

"It's well-established legally that free speech isn't really free unless it 
can be made anonymously," says Mark Conger, a Cyberspace Communications board 
member.  It is against Grex policy to censor content or to insist that people 
identify themselves.  "We have found time and again that the best answer to 
speech you don't agree with is to rebut it, not to censor it." 

VALIDATION AND CENSORSHIP ARE NOT FEASIBLE

Even if censorship were an acceptable solution, it would not be feasible for 
an organization the size of Grex.  Grex is a "grass roots" institution run 
entirely by volunteers.  Its 1998 income was approximately $8200, which came 
almost entirely from donations.  (The IRS has designated Cyberspace 
Communications a 501(c)3 charitable institution, so donations are tax-
deductible.)  Almost all of that money goes to pay utility bills to keep the 
system running.  Grex has no money to pay censors or validators, and yet it 
has 29,000 users who post about 200 long messages and 5000 short ones every 
day.  It would be logistically impossible to get volunteers to do the work of 
censoring that material and validating the 200 people who create accounts 
daily.

Putting organizations like Grex out of business has long-range implications 
for free speech.  "One of the great advantages of the Internet is that an 
organization like Grex with a shoestring budget can be home to a community of 
thousands of people," says Mary Remmers.  "If only large organizations with 
lots of resources could afford to host discussion forums, then all discussion 
would be limited by the biases and agendas of those organizations.  Pressure 
from advertisers and shareholders might influence their censorship decisions.  
Under those conditions, speech is no longer free." 

---------------------------------------

Cyberspace Communications is a 501(c)3 charitable institution founded in Ann 
Arbor, Michigan in 1991.  Its mission is to run the online system Grex (which 
means "group" in Latin) in order to foster free speech and community, and give 
Internet access to people who cannot afford to pay for it.  Grex hosts forums 
on such topics as music, the arts, cooking, writing, consumer information, 
finance, small businesses, philosophy, living with disabilities, men's and 
women's issues, and games.  Anyone with a computer and modem or access to the 
Internet can use Grex for free, anonymously if they wish.  Funding comes 
almost entirely from donations, which are tax-deductible.  Grex gets no money 
from advertising.  Because Internet bandwidth is limited, users are not 
allowed to store pictures on Grex. 

For more information on Grex, visit http://www.cybersace.org.