Negotiations over the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement (TPP) have excluded public participation from the entire process, while allowing Big Content interests to see and direct the terms of this trade agreement. That is why the Fair Deal Coalition, of which EFF is a member, is launching an open platform to crowdsource alternative copyright proposals that reflect the broad interests of Internet users and businesses that are shut out from the talks. Your Digital Future asks citizens and businesses around the world to consider what kind of rules we need to encourage creativity, participation, and innovation. We’ll take this wide-ranging feedback and bring it directly to policymakers to make sure they listen to the Internet community’s demands.

Negotiators are rushing to close the secretive deal by this fall, despite ongoing conflicts over the terms of the copyright chapter. Some countries are resisting U.S. pressure to enact heightened digital enforcement standards, but this may come to a head if delegates are forced to make difficult compromises to bolster other industrial or agricultural sectors at the cost of Internet users’ rights. Still, all we know about this massive trade deal is from leaked documents, and delegates may sign the deal in the coming months and bind our national copyright laws to even more extreme enforcement standards that treat users like criminals.

We believe that the reason they’re holding these meetings behind closed doors is because its terms wouldn’t survive democratic oversight. This is why we need to show the stark contrast between copyright policies that are written for outmoded industry conglomerates in the dark, and policies that are written by and for Internet users, innovative tech businesses, content creators, and everyone else.

So tell us, what do you want your digital future to look like?

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The Fair Deal is a group of public interest and business organizations from across the Pacific region representing hundreds of thousands of users who will be impacted by the costly and harmful copyright enforcement rules in trade agreements. Over 15,000 people have already signed the Fair Deal petition to demand negotiators reject copyright proposals that would restrict the open Internet, access to knowledge, economic opportunity and our fundamental rights.

Members of the Fair Deal coalition include:

Affinity Bridge, Article 19, Australian Digital Alliance, Australian Library & Information Association, Association for Progressive Communications (APC), Internet NZ, BCFIPA, The Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic (CIPPIC), Consumers International, Council of Canadians, Creative Freedom, Demand Progress, Derechos Digitales, Electronic Frontiers Australia, Electronic Frontiers Foundation (EFF), Engine.is, Fight for the Future, FreePress, Gen Why Media, Hiperderecho, Library & Information Society of New Zealand, Movements for the Internet Active Users, NZRise, NZOSS, OpenMedia.org, Public Citizen, Public Knowledge, Royal New Zealand Foundation of the Blind, Scoop, Tech Liberty NZ, TechDirt, Tuanz, Tucows, TradeMe.