WANT YOUR BBS AND INTERNET AND ON-LINE SERVICES TO GO DOWN?

It WILL happen unless YOU do something about it. The Feds are
trying to regulate cyberspace... out of existence.

IF S.314, the so-called "Communications Decency Act of 1995"
BECOMES LAW, IT WILL END THE INFORMATION SUPERHIGHWAY. NO MORE
BBSs, NO MORE INTERNET, and possibly no more on-line systems.

If S314 is allowed to become law, BBS sysops, on-line service
providers, and Internet Service Providers are going to have to
read EVERY SINGLE INCOMING AND OUTGOING PIECE OF MAIL AND POST
GOING THROUGH THEIR SYSTEMS TO CHECK FOR "OBSCENE" CONTENT.
EVERY FILE UPLOADED (including via FTP) to a system WILL HAVE TO
BE READ / VIEWED / RUN TO CHECK FOR "OBSCENE" CONTENT.

Remember, obscene and offensive are totally in the eye of the
beholder. There are sections of the Bible and Shakespeare that
have been judged "obscene". If the judgement of the censor
doesn't match the judgement of whichever Federal Attorney gets a
complaint, even censoring posts and E-mail won't protect the
service provider. If the government wants to shut down a system,
all it has to do is to shop around jurisdictions until it can
find a Federal Attorney willing to prosecute. Any BBS or any
other service provider can have charges filed against it in ANY
jurisdiction in the U.S., because it can be reached by phone line
from anywhere in the U.S. One San Francisco Bay Area BBS is under
indictment (under different law) from a court in Tennessee.

If anything gets missed, everyone involved with the operation of
that service provider faces 2 years of Federal jail time and a
$100,000 fine. I predict that in this event, and certainly after
the first wave of prosecutions under this act, that the majority
of BBS systems and commercial Internet Service Providers and
workplace and educational institution access to the Internet will
close down. The few remaining on-line services will be increasing
their rates drastically to pay for having censors go through
incoming and outgoing posts and mail. Should you choose to keep
using these services, your mail and posts are going to be slowed
down, it they will have to wait until somebody has a chance to
read it and approve it as suitable for you.

How long would the U.S. Postal Service or Fed Ex last if they had
to open and read every piece of private mail and every single
package looking for "contraband"? How much would it cost to send
mail in this kind of police state regime? How long would the mail
take? That's what they want to do to US on-line.

You want to get a BBS devoted to Bible study that doesn't censor
your e-mail closed down? Easy. Get an overseas friend to send you
an XXX rated e-mail or XXX rated .GIF to your account there.
Complain to the Feds. Watch as Federal Marshals seize the BBS and
take the hapless sysop to jail.

This bill is for real. (S.314 = Senate Bill 314) It was accepted
by the Senate Commerce Committee and reported to the full Senate
on March 23, 1995 by a voice vote of 17 to 2 as part of the
"Telecommunications Competition and Deregulations Act of 1995."
I've spent a lot of time and contacted a number of informed
sources to verify that the information I have on it is correct
and current before posting this file. The Senate will be voting
on this garbage sooner or later. If it passes, WE ALL LOSE.

UNLESS YOU ACT NOW AND TELL ALL YOUR FRIENDS TO ACT, IT WILL
PROBABLY PASS. CALL AND WRITE (snailmail) YOUR CONGRESSMAN, YOUR
SENATORS. Tell them if they vote for this bill, YOU will vote for
their opponents no matter what else they do or have done in their
term of office. Tell them that their stand on abortion, on a
balanced budget, on "The Contract With America", on crime no
longer matters to you. Tell them that S.314 is a personal attack
on you as a user or operator of on-line services. Tell them that
S.314 as law will make carrying on your personal affairs and your
business impossible. Elsewhere in this text file is a sample
letter, but better to write your own or at least personalize it a
bit, if a Senator gets thousands of identical letters, they don't
read them, they just tally them as individual "votes".

CALL RADIO TALK SHOWS. CONTACT YOUR LOCAL NEWSPAPERS AND TV
STATIONS AND ASK WHY THERE HAS BEEN NO NEWS COVERAGE OF S.314,
the bogus "Communications Decency Act" A BILL WHICH ATTACKS THE
INTERESTS OF THE 25,000,000 PLUS ON-LINE USERS. WRITE TO ANY NEWS
MEDIA E-MAIL ADDRESSES YOU HAVE. The more the better. Remember
the death of Clipper? It disappeared because WE forced the mass
media to get the word out. This is a hell of a lot more
important, if S.314 passes, WE WON'T HAVE ANYWHERE TO SEND E-MAIL
TO, ENCRYPTED OR OTHERWISE.

Meaningful freedom of speech, that is, speech that has a chance
to get into the public domain where it will have a chance to
influence anyone, is going to increasingly be carried over
on-line channels.

This issue will affect everyone sooner or later. Most people will
eventually have access to public on-line forums, that will allow
them to express their opinions immediately to an international
audience of hundreds of thousands. More people buy personal
computers with modems every day. Sooner or later, cable systems
will be offering set-top boxes with keyboards for e-mail and
on-line service access. If this bill passes, the only on-line
service providers will come complete with government approved
censors. People will be allowed to say ONLY what the government
approves of. Sound like America to you? It is, the America that
Senator Egon, author of this bill wants to make US live in.

The worst thing about this is that our legislators are doing this
out of ignorance. They are trying to regulate us the way
politicians back in 1900 tried to regulate cars. Ever heard of a
law that required people to walk in front of any operating car
carrying a flag to warn traffic? That law was made by politicians
who knew nothing about cars. Our politicians know just as much
about the on-line scene as the politicians back in the old days
knew about cars. We can't afford this kind of ignorance on their
parts anymore. I certainly can't, I make my living in large part
out here. We have to cure their ignorance, and we need to throw
out of office those who can't be educated.
                                          A.Lizard

INTERNET:alizard@bif.com
VirtualNET 9@1510001  Icenet  9@5077   WWIVLink  9@15050
SierraNet  9@5050     WWIVNet 9@11577  FidoNet alizard@1:161/216
What follows is description and analysis and quotes from S314:

================= original post =============================
"while the Internet is still only used by a small portion of
the population, those regulations imposed now while remain as the
internet develops into what may replace/join telephone services
and cable TV services.  A bill like S314 is the seed of a
permanent wire-tap on the entire country in the not so far-off
future.  Please read this and act."


ALERT: S314 Online "Decency Act" Threatens All Online Providers
---------------------------------------------------------------
Feb. 10, 1995

EFF is working with the Electronic Messaging Association and
others to  oppose the Exon bill, S314, the Communications Decency
Act of 1995. We believe policy makers should take into account
the ability of those using the net to avoid materials they find
offensive. There will likely be increased use of labels and
headers to help people avoid unwanted materials and guide their
childrens' use of the net in the future. Meanwhile, it is  simply
a bad idea to make it a crime to "transmit" offensive material,
especially when the "transmitter" is passive and not monitoring
the  content of "transmission".

This bill would perpetrate the online equivalent of making anyone
who  builds a street liable for the fact that you can go to the
red light  district on it. This bill if passed into law will
gravely chill the free  flow of information online and
inappropriately criminalize sysops and  sysadmins for wrongdoing
over which they have no control.

It is clear from recent discussions with Sen. Exon and his staff
that the  sponsors of the bill were apparently unaware that the
bill, as written,  criminalizes essentially everyone involved in
networking with the sole  exception of govt.-decreed common
carriers like telephone companies. The possibility of a re-write
was being considered as of Feb. 8.

Contact: David Johnson, Sr. Policy Fellow, djohnson@eff.org, +1
202 861 7700

         *** PROTECT YOURSELF!  READ THIS MESSAGE ***
Note: The original of this was a Usenet conference post intended
to get us to sign an electronic petition against S.314 to
influence the Senate Telecommunications Committee to kill this
evil bill. Since that Committee voted 17 to 2 to report it out to
the full Senate, I chose to delete the specific petition related
materials, but kept the petition language because it contains a
good short analysis of the bill. My apologies to any original
authors offended by my changes, but I regard this situation as an
emergency. A longer analysis ends this file.

                      SHORT SUMMARY OF S.314

S. 314 would prohibit not only individual speech that is

"obscene, lewd, lascivious, filthy, or indecent", but would
prohibit any provider of telecommunications service from carrying
such traffic, under threat of stiff penalty.  Even aside from the
implications for free speech, this would cause an undue - and
unjust - burden upon operators of the various telecommunications
services.  In a time when the citizenry and their lawmakers alike
are calling for and passing "no unfunded mandates" laws to the
benefit of the states, it is unfortunate that Congress might seek
to impose unfunded mandates upon businesses that provide the
framework for the information age.

>An additional and important consideration is the technical
feasibility of requiring the sort of monitoring this bill would
necessitate. The financial burden in and of itself - in either
manpower or technology to handle such monitoring (if even legal
under the Electronic Communications Privacy Act) - would likely
cause many smaller providers to go out of business, and most
larger providers to seriously curtail their services.

The threat of such penalty alone would result in a chilling
effect in the telecommunications service community, not only
restricting the types of speech expressly forbidden by the bill,
but creating an environment contrary to the Constitutional
principles of free speech, press and assembly - principles which
entities such as the Internet embody as nothing has before.

By comparison, placing the burden for content control upon each
individual user is surprisingly simple in the online and
interactive world, and there is no legitimate reason to shift
that burden to providers who carry that content.  Unlike
traditional broadcast media, networked media is comparatively
easy to screen on the user end - giving the reader, viewer, or
participant unparalleled control over his or her own information
environment.  All without impacting or restricting what any other
user wishes to access.  This makes regulation such as that
threatened by this S. 314 simply unnecessary.

In addition, during a period of ever-increasing commercial
interest in arenas such as the Internet, restriction and
regulation of content or the flow of traffic across the various
telecommunications services would have serious negative economic
effects.  The sort of regulation proposed by this bill would slow
the explosive growth the Internet has seen, giving the business
community reason to doubt the medium's commercial appeal.

We ask that the Senate halt any further progress of this bill. We
ask that the Senate be an example to Congress as a whole, and to
the nation at large - to promote the general welfare as stated in
the Preamble to the Constitution by protecting the free flow of
information and ideas across all of our telecommunications
services.

Thanks to the EFF and CDT for the excellent analysis of the bill.


******(Appendix) Analysis and text of S. 314*****

[This analysis provided by the Center for Democracy and
Technology, a non-profit public interest organization.  CDT's
mission is to develop and advocate public policies that advance
Constitutional civil liberties and democratic values in new
computer and communications technologies. For more information on
CDT, ask Jonah Seiger <jseiger@cdt.org>.]

CDT POLICY POST 2/9/95

SENATOR EXON INTRODUCES ONLINE INDECENCY LEGISLATION

A.  OVERVIEW

Senators Exon (D-NE) and Senator Gorton (R-WA) have introduced
legislation to expand current FCC regulations on obscene and
indecent audiotext to cover *all* content carried over all forms
of electronic communications networks.  If enacted, the
"Communications Decency Act of 1995" (S. 314) would place
substantial criminal liability on telecommunications service
providers (including telephone networks, commercial online
services, the Internet, and independent BBS's) if their network
is used in the transmission of any indecent, lewd, threatening or
harassing messages.  The legislation is identical to a proposal
offered by Senator Exon last year which failed along with the
Senate Telecommunications reform bill (S. 1822, 103rd Congress,
Sections 801 - 804). The text the proposed statute, with proposed
amendment, is appended at the end of this document.

The bill would compel service providers to chose between severely
restricting the activities of their subscribers or completely
shutting down their email, Internet access, and conferencing
services under the threat of criminal liability.  Moreover,
service providers would be forced to closely monitor every
private communication, electronic mail message, public forum,
mailing list, and file archive carried by or available on their
network, a proposition which poses a substantial threat to the
freedom of speech and privacy rights of all American citizens.

S. 314, if enacted, would represent a tremendous step backwards
on the path to a free and open National Information
Infrastructure.  The bill raises fundamental questions about the
ability of government to control content on communications
networks, as well as the locus of liability for content carried
in these new communications media.

To address this threat to the First Amendment in digital media,
CDT is working to organize a broad coalition of public interest
organizations including the ACLU, People For the American Way,
and Media Access Project, along with representatives from the
telecommunications, online services, and computer industries to
oppose S. 314 and to explore alternative policy solutions that
preserve the free flow of information and freedom of speech in
the online world.  CDT believes that technological alternatives
which allow individual subscribers to control the content they
receive represent a more appropriate approach to this issue.

B.  SUMMARY AND ANALYSIS OF S. 314

S. 314 would expand current law restricting indecency and
harassment on telephone services to all telecommunications
providers and expand criminal liability to *all* content carried
by *all* forms of telecommunications networks. The bill would
amend Section 223 of the Communications Act (47 U.S.C. 223),
which requires carriers to take steps to prevent minors from
gaining access to indecent audiotext and criminalizes harassment
accomplished over interstate telephone lines.  This section,
commonly known as the Helms Amendment (having been championed by
Senator Jesse Helms), has been the subject of extended
Constitutional litigation in recent years.

* CARRIERS LIABLE FOR CONDUCT OF ALL USERS ON THEIR
  NETWORKS

S. 314 would make telecommunication carriers (including telephone
companies, commercial online services, the Internet, and BBS's)
liable for every message, file, or other content carried on its
network -- including the private conversations or messages
exchanged between two consenting individuals.

Under S. 314, anyone who "makes, transmits, or otherwise makes
available any comment, request, suggestion, proposal, image, or
other communication" which is "obscene, lewd, lascivious, filthy,
or indecent" using a "telecommunications device" would be subject
to a fine of $100,000 or two years in prison (Section (2)(a)).

In order to avoid liability under this provision, carriers would
be forced to pre-screen all messages, files, or other content
before transmitting it to the intended recipient.  Carriers would
also be forced to prevent or severely restrict their subscribers
from communicating with individuals and accessing content
available on other networks.

Electronic communications networks do not contain discrete
boundaries.  Instead, users of one service can easily communicate
with and access content available on other networks.  Placing the
onus, and criminal liability, on the carrier as opposed to the
originator of the content, would make the carrier legally
responsible not only for the conduct of its own subscribers, but
also for content generated by subscribers of other services.

This regulatory scheme clearly poses serious threats to the free
flow of information throughout the online world and the free
speech and privacy rights of individual users.  Forcing carriers
to pre-screen content would not only be impossible due to the
sheer volume of messages, it would also violate current legal
protections.

* CARRIERS REQUIRED TO ACT AS PRIVATE CENSOR OF ALL
  PUBLIC FORUMS AND ARCHIVES

S. 314 would also expand current restrictions on access to
indecent telephone audiotext services by minors under the age of
18 to cover similar content carried by telecommunications
services (such as America Online and the Internet).  (Sec
(a)(4)).

As amended by this provision, anyone who, "by means of telephone
or telecommunications device, makes, transmits, or otherwise
makes available (directly or by recording device) any indecent
communication for commercial purposes which is available to any
person under the age of 18 years of age or to any other person
without that person's consent, regardless of whether the maker of
such communication placed the call or initiated the
communication" would be subject of a fine of $100,000 or two
years in prison.

This would force carries to act as private censors of all content
available in public forums or file archives on their networks.
Moreover, because there is no clear definition of indecency,
carriers would have to restrict access to any content that could
be possibly construed as indecent or obscene under the broadest
interpretation of the term. Public forums, discussion lists, file
archives, and content available for commercial purposes would
have to be meticulously screened and censored in order to avoid
potential liability for the carrier.

Such a scenario would severely limit the diversity of content
available on online networks, and limit the editorial freedom of
independent forum operators.

ADDITIONAL NOTABLE PROVISIONS

* AMENDMENT TO ECPA

Section (6) of the bill would amend the Electronic Communications
Privacy Act (18 USC 2511) to prevent the unauthorized
interception and disclosure of "digital communications" (Sec. 6).
However, because the term "digital communication" is not defined
and 18 USC 2511 currently prevents unauthorized interception and
disclosure of "electronic communications" (which includes
electronic mail and other forms of communications in digital
form), the effect of this provision has no clear importance.

* CABLE OPERATORS MAY REFUSE INDECENT PUBLIC ACCESS
  PROGRAMMING

Finally, section (8) would amend sections 611 and 612 of the
Communications Act (47 USC 611 - 612) to allow any cable operator
to refuse to carry any public access or leased access programming
which contains "obscenity, indecency, or nudity".

C.  ALTERNATIVES TO EXON: RECOGNIZE THE UNIQUE USER
    CONTROL CAPABILITIES OF INTERACTIVE MEDIA

Government regulation of content in the mass media has
always been considered essential to protect children from access
to sexually-explicit material, and to prevent unwitting
listeners/views from being exposed to material that might be
considered extremely distasteful.  The choice to protect children
has historically been made at the expense of the First Amendment
ban on government censorship.  As Congress moves to regulate new
interactive media, it is essential that it understand that
interactive media is different than mass media.  The power and
flexibility of interactive media offers a unique opportunity to
enable parents to control what content their kids have access to,
and leave the flow of information free for those adults who want
it.  Government control regulation is simply not needed to
achieve the desired purpose.

Most interactive technology, such as Internet browsers and the
software used to access online services such as America Online
and Compuserve, already has the capability to limit access to
certain types of services and selected information.  Moreover,
the electronic program guides being developed for interactive
cable TV networks also provide users the capability to screen out
certain channels or ever certain types of programming.  Moreover,
in the online world, most content (with the exception of private
communications initiated by consenting individuals) is
transmitted by request.  In other words, users must seek out the
content they receive, whether it is by joining a discussion or
accessing a file archive. By its nature, this technology provides
ample control at the user level.  Carriers (such as commercial
online services, Internet service providers) in most cases act
only as "carriers" of electronic transmissions initiated by
individual subscribers.

CDT believes that the First Amendment will be better served by
giving parents and other users the tools to select which
information they (and their children) should have access to.  In
the case of criminal content the originator of the content, not
the carriers, should be responsible for their crimes.  And, users
(especially parents) should be empowered to determine what
information they and their children have access to.  If all
carriers of electronic communications are forced restrict content
in order to avoid criminal liability proposed by S. 314, the
First Amendment would be threatened and the usefulness of digital
media for communications and information dissemination would be
drastically limited.

D.  NEXT STEPS

The bill has been introduced and will next move to the Senate
Commerce Committee, although no Committee action has been
scheduled.  Last year, a similar proposal by Senator Exon was
approved by the Senate Commerce committee as an amendment to the
Senate Telecommunications Bill (S. 1822, which died at the end of
the 103rd Congress).  CDT will be working with a wide range of
other interest groups to assure that Congress does not restrict
the free flow of information in interactive media.

[[IMPORTANT: THIS BILL WAS REPORTED OUT TO THE FULL SENATE ON
MARCH 23, 1995 BY A VOICE VOTE OF 17 TO 2.]]

TEXT OF 47 U.S.C. 223 AS AMENDED BY S. 314

**NOTE:         [] = deleted

                ALL CAPS = additions

47 USC 223 (1992)

Sec. 223.  [Obscene or harassing telephone calls in the District
of Columbia or in interstate or foreign communications]

OBSCENE OR HARASSING UTILIZATION OF TELECOMMUNICATIONS DEVICES
AND FACILITIES IN THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA OR IN INTERSTATE OR
FOREIGN COMMUNICATIONS"

   (a) Whoever--

   (1) in the District of Columbia or in interstate or foreign
communication by means of [telephone] TELECOMMUNICATIONS DEVICE--

   (A) [makes any comment, request, suggestion or proposal]
MAKES, TRANSMITS, OR OTHERWISE MAKES AVAILABLE ANY
COMMENT,REQUEST, SUGGESTION, PROPOSAL, IMAGE, OR OTHER
COMMUNICATION which is obscene, lewd, lascivious, filthy, or
indecent;

   [(B) makes a telephone call, whether or not conversation
ensues, without disclosing his identity and with intent to annoy,
abuse, threaten, or harass any person at the called number;]

"(B) MAKES A TELEPHONE CALL OR UTILIZES A TELECOMMUNICATIONS
DEVICE, WHETHER OR NOT CONVERSATION OR COMMUNICATIONS ENSUES,
WITHOUT DISCLOSING HIS IDENTITY AND WITH INTENT TO ANNOY, ABUSE,
THREATEN, OR HARASS ANY PERSON AT THE CALLED NUMBER OR WHO
RECEIVES THE COMMUNICATION;

   (C) makes or causes the telephone of another repeatedly or
continuously to ring, with intent to harass any person at the
called number; or

   [(D) makes repeated telephone calls, during which conversation
ensues, solely to harass any person at the called number; or]

(D) MAKES REPEATED TELEPHONE CALLS OR REPEATEDLY INITIATES
COMMUNICATION WITH A TELECOMMUNICATIONS DEVICE, DURING WHICH
CONVERSATION OR COMMUNICATION ENSUES, SOLELY TO HARASS ANY PERSON
AT THE CALLED NUMBER OR WHO RECEIVES THE COMMUNICATION,

   (2) knowingly permits any [telephone facility]
TELECOMMUNICATIONS FACILITY under his control to be used for any
purpose prohibited by this section, shall be fined not more than
$[50,000]100,000 or imprisoned  not more than [six months] TWO
YEARS, or both. *********** (yes, telecommunication faclity means
BBS or whatever. - A.Lizard)

   (b)(1) Whoever knowingly--

   (A) within the United States, by means of [telephone]
TELECOMMUNICATIONS DEVICCE, makes (directly or by recording
device) any obscene communication for commercial purposes to any
person, regardless of whether the maker of such communication
placed the call or INITIATED THE COMMUNICATION; or

  (B) permits any [telephone facility] TELECOMMUNICATIONS
FACILITY under such person's control to be used for an activity
prohibited by subparagraph (A), shall be fined in accordance with
title 18, United States Code, or imprisoned not more than two
years, or both.

   (2) Whoever knowingly--

   (A) within the United States, [by means of telephone], makes
BY MEANS OF TELEPHONE OR TELECOMMUNICATIONS DEVICE, MAKES,
TRANSMITS, OR MAKES AVAILABLE(directly or by recording device)
any indecent communication for commercial purposes which is
available to any person under 18 years of age or to any other
person without that person's consent, regardless of whether the
maker of such communication placed the call OR INITIATED THE
COMMUNICATION; or

   (B) permits any [telephone facility] TELECOMMUNICATIONS
FACILITY under such person's control to be used for an activity
prohibited by subparagraph (A), shall be fined not more than
$[50,000] 100,000 or imprisoned not more than [six months] TWO
YEARS, or both.

   (3) It is a defense to prosecution under paragraph (2) of this
subsection that the defendant restrict access to the prohibited
communication to persons 18 years of age or older in accordance
with subsection (c) of this section and with such procedures as
the Commission may prescribe by regulation.

   (4) In addition to the penalties under paragraph (1), whoever,
within the United States, intentionally violates paragraph (1) or
(2) shall be subject to a fine of not more than $[50,000] 100,000
for each violation. For purposes of this paragraph, each day of
violation shall constitute a separate violation.

   (5)(A) In addition to the penalties under paragraphs (1),(2),
and (5), whoever, within the United States, violates paragraph
(1) or (2) shall be subject to a civil fine of not more than
$[50,000] 100,000 for each violation. For purposes of this
paragraph, each day of violation shall constitute a separate
violation.

   (B) A fine under this paragraph may be assessed either--

   (i) by a court, pursuant to civil action by the Commission or
any attorney employed by the Commission who is designated by the
Commission for such purposes, or

   (ii) by the Commission after appropriate administrative
proceedings.

   (6) The Attorney General may bring a suit in the appropriate
district court of the United States to enjoin any act or practice
which violates paragraph (1) or (2). An injunction may be granted
in accordance with the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.

   (c)(1) A common carrier within the District of Columbia or
within any State, or in interstate or foreign commerce, shall
not, to the extent technically feasible, provide access to a
communication specified in subsection (b) from the telephone of
any subscriber who has not previously requested in writing the
carrier to provide access to such communication if the carrier
collects from subscribers an identifiable charge for such
communication that the carrier remits, in whole or in part, to
the provider of such communication.

   (2) Except as provided in paragraph (3), no cause of action
may be brought in any court or administrative agency against any
common carrier, or any of its affiliates, including their
officers, directors, employees, agents, or authorized
representatives on account of--

   (A) any action which the carrier demonstrates was taken in
good faith to restrict access pursuant to paragraph (1) of this
subsection; or

   (B) any access permitted--

   (i) in good faith reliance upon the lack of any representation
by a provider of communications that communications provided by
that provider are communications specified in subsection (b), or

   (ii) because a specific representation by the provider did not
allow the carrier, acting in good faith, a sufficient period to
restrict access to communications described in subsection (b).

   (3) Notwithstanding paragraph (2) of this subsection, a
provider of communications services to which subscribers are
denied access pursuant to paragraph (1) of this subsection may
bring an action for a declaratory judgment or similar action in a
court. Any such action shall be limited to the question of
whether the communications which the provider seeks to provide
fall within the category of communications to which the carrier
will provide access only to subscribers who have previously
requested such access.

*********************************************

NOTE: This version of the text shows the actual text oo current
law as it would be changed.  For the bill itself, which consists
ofun readable text such as:

[...]

(1) in subsection (a)(1)--

       (A) by striking out `telephone' in the matter above
     subparagraph (A) and inserting`telecommunications device';

       (B) by striking out `makes any comment, request,
     suggestion, or proposal' in subparagraph (A) and inserting
     `makes, transmits, or otherwise makes available any comment,
     request, suggestion, proposal, image, or other
     communication';

       (C) by striking out subparagraph (B) and inserting the
     following:
       `(B) makes a telephone call or utilizes a [...]

See:

ftp.eff.org, /pub/EFF/Legislation/Bills_new/s314.bill
gopher.eff.org, 1/EFF/Legislation/Bills_new, s314.bill
http://www.eff.org/pub/EFF/Legislation/Bills_new/s314.bill

************** End of Petition Statement



