July 13th, 2025 Meeting: Difference between revisions
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Legislation | Legislation | ||
* We | * We endorse ''An Act relative to protecting Massachusetts residents against federal government surveillance ([https://malegislature.gov/Bills/194/H2687 H.2687])'' | ||
Section 230 | |||
* Jamie wrote a draft statement of support for maintain section 230. We discussed this at our last meeting, but didn't formally endorse. | |||
* We voted to adopt the statement. | |||
Revision as of 21:02, 13 July 2025
Meeting to be held via video conference: https://communitybridge.com/bbb-room/mass-pirates-member-meeting/
Recording:
Reports
Decisions/Endorsements
United States Pirate Party Issues?
Projects/Events
2025 Voter Outreach
Leader: Jamie
Based on Mass. Election Division data, we have 721 voters. Alec is contacting all of the municipalities that have not fulfilled our public records request.
2026 Campaigns
Leader: Jamie
Jamie and Alec drafted a 2026 Campaign Plan for review and approval.
Suggest we schedule Organizers Check-Ins where organizers can discuss issues they are having, help they need and share ideas. They will be on-line on the following dates:
- July 22nd, 2025 Organizers Check-In
- August 4th, 2025 Organizers Check-In
- September 4th, 2025 Organizers Check-In
- September 8th, 2025 Organizers Check-In
- September 23rd, 2025 Organizers Check-In
Going forward they would be scheduled on weeks alternating with member meeting weeks and would be on different weekdays, including Monday, Tuesday and Thursday. Time is to be determined.
Also, suggest adding the first or last 15 minutes of a meeting be an organizers check-in. It would be time limited unless members choose to give the discuss more time.
Pirate News
Leader: Joseph
- Pirate news recording scheduled for every other Sunday, 7pm with go-live at 7:30pm. Unless changed
Commonwealth Bills to Review
- An Act to promote transparency of facial recognition and driver's license photos ([https://malegislature.gov/Bills/194/S1731 S.1731))
- An Act to implement the recommendations of the special commission on facial recognition technology (H.1946/S.1053)
- An Act relative to unmanned aerial systems (H.3749 / S.2438)
- An Act relative to protecting Massachusetts residents against federal government surveillance (H.2687)
- Dignity Not Deportations Act (H.1588 / S.1122)
- Right to Repair Bills:
- Decrim Sex Work Bills from https://bswac.org/. Emailed Rikki and Desmond their thoughts on them as they are the most up to date on the issue:
Here is an etherpad for people to offer suggestions.
Bills We Decided On
- An Act to provide accountability in the use of biometric recognition technology and comprehensive enforcement (H.96/S.36)
- Civil Asset Forfeiture reform (H.1953)
Federal Bills to Review
- Senators working on a bill that would repeal Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. Section 230 is the primary reason we have freedom of speech on the Internet. See this explainer. We have long supported Section 230 implicitly, but we never wrote up a statement why. Including why we support free speech seems important right now, as well. Possible statement:
Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (CDA230), specifically section 230(c) which reads:
(c)Protection for “Good Samaritan” blocking and screening of offensive material
(1)Treatment of publisher or speaker
No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.
(2)Civil liability
No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be held liable on account of—
(A)any action voluntarily taken in good faith to restrict access to or availability of material that the provider or user considers to be obscene, lewd, lascivious, filthy, excessively violent, harassing, or otherwise objectionable, whether or not such material is constitutionally protected; or
(B)any action taken to enable or make available to information content providers or others the technical means to restrict access to material described in paragraph (1)
is the reason we have user shared content on millions of sites around the Internet. It is what protects the comment sections of our site and all others on the Internet.
Efforts to tamper with Section 230 have made people worse off and harmed our 1st Amendment rights. With FOSTA and SESTA, Congress excluded consensual sex work from Section 230 protections. The resulting law has made consensual sex work more difficult and more dangerous for sex workers while not stopping sex-focused human trafficking.
The Massachusetts Pirate Party categorically opposes efforts to exclude any human activity from Section 230 protections or to limit or expire Section 230 protections in whole or in part.
- Anti-File Sharing bills:
- Foreign Anti-Digital Piracy Act (H.R.791) - ...more
- American Copyright Protection Act (Not yet posted) ...more)
- ... more on the bills at https://torrentfreak.com/fears-of-overblocking-unite-critics-of-u-s-pirate-site-blocking-bill/
- Kids Online Safety Act (S.1748)
- Pro Codes Act (H.R.4009 ...more
- American Music Fairness Act (H.R.861)
A reconsideration of Member Meeting Articles
We haven't adhered to our Articles of Agreement's Member Meetings section strictly since we have existed, specifically the [ https://masspirates.org/wiki/Articles_of_Agreement#4.2_Form Form] and Time sections. Meetings have met weekly and bi-weekly (our current form) and not twice a year each over six weeks.
Rework them to:
- Have a section on conferences (possible spring/fall, at least one a year)
- Rework the member meetings to be on-line at least once a month
- Set when elections for the pirate council is and that we can elect people at a conference or on-line by secret ballot
Working on a draft document at https://etherpad.pp-international.net/p/MAPPRevisedMemberMeetingsArticles
Other To Do
Upcoming Events
Participants
- Alec
- Jamie
- Steve
Observers
- Phyn
Summary
We found someone who was interested in running for mayor in Weymouth (non-partisan election). They've decided not to run this year.
Eli was elected auditor of the USPP. No other USPP news. Could use one other USPP rep from Massachusetts.
2025 voter outreach
- Have been following up on public record requests from 221 cities and towns that have registered pirates. We have to contact them and request their voting lists.
- Generally going well. Hope to finish soon.
- Haven't heard from Boston; they're stalling in response to our public records request.
2026 campaigns
- Have a bare-bones campaign plan for 2026.
- Will start scheduling on-line organizer checkins. These are for information and resource sharing, updates, etc. Will bounce around to different days to accommodate schedules.
- Most towns have elections during the spring. MA state elections are in Nov. Most may elections (about 60%) are still uncontested, which is an opportunity for us.
- Objectives are to identify, train, and support candidates for 2026 elections.
- Where candidate are located in geographically similar areas, may be additional options for resource sharing.
- Need updated organizer guide, how to run for office, pirates guide to local government
- https://runforsomething.net/ may be a useful resource.
Pirate News
- Suggest sunday July 20th, 7pm
Legislation
- We endorse An Act relative to protecting Massachusetts residents against federal government surveillance (H.2687)
Section 230
- Jamie wrote a draft statement of support for maintain section 230. We discussed this at our last meeting, but didn't formally endorse.
- We voted to adopt the statement.
