We are the heterogeneous group of organizations behind Digital Rights in Latin America and the Caribbean and we deal with questions related to Internet regulation and governance. It’s of our interest the full exercise of human rights in the digital world, and we believe that new technologies offer opportunities to expand these rights and to increase citizen participation in public affairs. Furthermore, we see that, in Latin America, people are raising important debates for the future of the network in the region. And we do believe that we should join them.

The main objective of this initiative is to inform. We want to reach a broad community of social agents interested on these issues. As we have seen recently, network neutrality laws, regulation of copyright and responsibility of intermediaries, restrictions on expression through electronic means and data protection policies are some of the themes that are being debated in several Latin American countries. Being informed about these subjects is necessary to reach a consensus on the matter, and we want to be a useful tool for journalists, parliamentarians and activists who are interested in these topics. Moreover, we want to inform the world about what is happening in Latin America, since our region becomes very often invisible when other themes are being discussed in forums of global debate.

The newsletter will have four sections. One of them will contain regional news that reflect issues related to Latin American countries specifically or to the region in general. A second section will contain some thematic analysis on relevant topics, including those which are not part of the news flow in this particular moment. Another section will report on conferences and events in which topics of interest are being discussed. Finally, another section will recommend materials, including references to studies and research on Internet freedom in Latin America.

The Internet is a decentralized global network that makes communication, information and learning easier. Thus, the Internet surrounds us. We do not know how the network will be in the future, but we know how we want it to be: open, global, free of censorship and able to foster creativity and knowledge exchange. We understand that basic democratic practices, such as discussing matters of public interest and participating in the political process, will be increasingly related to the digital world. And the shape of this new world will define, in large part, the nature of our democracies.