Netpolicy

Public Policy Module

Purpose

What's Mozilla's Role in public policy? The Web serves as the central connection mechanism for the whole world – not just the privileged or the educated classes, but truly the entire world. The next 2.5 billion people will be coming online in this decade, and we will all receive tremendous benefits by keeping that connection open and secure.

Mozilla believes the Web should be open and available to everyone, and this openness is essential to a healthy cyber economy. We focus on advancing key characteristics of the open Web, not specific functions like social media or videos, which will always be in flux.

The strength of the Web and its economy rests on a number of core building blocks that make up its foundational DNA. Think of them as requirements to support a full range of social, business, governmental, and educational interactions and communications that underlie the importance of the Web in our lives today.

When these building blocks are threatened, the overall health and well-being of the Web are put at risk. For instance, recent attempts to change copyright through SOPA in the US and ACTA around the world undermine the distributed nature of the Web, its interoperability, security, and ultimately the rights of users themselves. Another example is attempts by network operators to block, degrade or discriminate the flow of data across their systems, which threaten to restrict access to the Web and degrade the resilience of the Internet for millions of users.

In terms of regulating the Web, the primary challenge for any legislative process is anticipating unintended consequences, given the complexities inherent in the Web, its architecture, the relationships between its many stakeholders and the pace of innovation.

The Mozilla Public Policy Module works with our community of users and developers to provide products and services that make the Web more robust, and take action when the Web’s DNA is threatened. We want to empower anyone to become a steward of the healthy Web and ensure its open characteristics remain intact for the next 2.5 billion people.

   So what do we do? We engage in public affairs matters when Mozilla can make a difference by both advancing and defending the web
   ... without compromising core code efforts
   ... when we can add differential value
   ... directly or indirectly

  How do we do it? We'll use a variety of techniques, tools and assets depending on the situation and what's at stake to express our voice when and where it matters. The action steps include:
   ... Educate and inform
   ... Organize and convene
   ... Enable and support
   ... Advocate and engage

Meetings and Mailing Lists

Mailing List

The public mailing list is here: https://mail.mozilla.org/listinfo/netpolicy

Meetings

Planning and module meetings occur on the 3rd Wednesday of each month at 8:45 am PST. All are welcome to participate. The agenda and dial-in details are as follows:

Standing Agenda

• Status of current projects and progress reports
• Review and evaluate new projects/topics
  • Understand the issue, context and interests at stake
  • Evaluate against mission
  • Can Mozilla make an incremental difference. If so how?
  • What resources/tactics are available
  • Who can we collaborate with?
• Prioritization of activities
• New Topics

Issues and activities

Current issues/questions:

• Internet Savvy for Policy Makers
• Internet Governance and WCIT
• Patent Reform
• EU Data Directive
• CISPA -
• ECPA Reform

Operational issues/tasks:

• set up form field for submissions [name]
• should we use bugzilla for issue management? [name]

Submit New Ideas

If you have policy issues or topics in this area that you think should be considered or which need support, please submit them here for consideration. [insert link to form]

New Projects Form Field: Activity: [Describe legislative or policy activity] Goal: [What would success look like?] Region/Country: What’s the Impact on the Open Internet? When: [Describe the timeline or due date] Submitted by: [optional – for continued updates and discussion, please join the netpolicy mailing list] Priority: [urgent, needs attention soon, when you get to it] Additional Information: [link to articles/websites/organizations]