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URGENT ACTION ALERT: TELL CONGRESS "NO DEAL ON TELECOM
IMMUNITY"! Recent intelligence indicates that high-ranking
Republicans and Democrats are hoping that a "compromise"
foreign intelligence surveillance bill can be rushed
through both the House and the Senate before the July 4th
holiday -- maybe even next week.

The drafting process has been secretive, but one thing is
clear: the "compromise" is almost certain to contain
blanket immunity for phone companies that assisted in the
NSA's warrantless wiretapping program and prevent any court
from ruling on whether they broke the law.

We've stopped telecom immunity in its tracks before, but
the empty "compromise" rhetoric surrounding this bill makes
it extremely dangerous. Please contact your Senators and
Congressperson to remind them that we're watching, and that
we won't accept any false compromises on immunity for
lawbreaking telecoms!
http://www.eff.org/action/no-false-compromises

* IN ANOTHER BATTLE AGAINST ABUSIVE DMCA TAKEDOWNS, EFF has
asked a federal court to protect the free speech rights of
an animal welfare group after its video critiques of animal
treatment at rodeos were removed from YouTube due to sham
copyright claims. The Professional Rodeo Cowboys
Association (PRCA) filed takedown demands for 13 videos
from the group Showing Animals Respect and Kindness
(SHARK), claiming that the videos infringed their
copyrights -- even though the PRCA has no copyright claim
in live rodeo events. The lawsuit is part of EFF's No
Downtime for Free Speech Campaign, a response to increasing
misuse of the DMCA to demand that material be removed from
the Internet without providing any proof of infringement.
http://www.eff.org/press/archives/2008/06/09-0

* EFF WELCOMES LEADING INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY ATTORNEY
MICHAEL KWUN, who brings years of copyright, trademark, and
patent litigation experience to EFF's legal team. A
long-time geek, Kwun worked on early DMCA cases and, as
Google's litigation managing counsel, defended Google in
copyright cases about YouTube, Google Book Search, and
Google Image Search; trademark cases about Google AdWords;
and patent cases in connection with a wide variety of
Google products.
http://www.eff.org/press/archives/2008/06/09