I finally got annoyed enough to write to my MP about the Digital Economy Bill. Please do the same!

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Dear Clare Short,

I wrote to you recently about EDM 700 (concerning the transparency of ACTA to the Commons) which you were among the first to sign. I am writing now to ask you to do what you can to combat the Digital Economy bill.

Despite the phenomenal work by activists - and yourself - to raise the profile of ACTA and alert the public and their representatives to this appalling piece of legislation, their work will have been for nothing if the Digital Economy Bill passes into law.

I have a few reasons for asserting this:

The consultation that was undertaken before the bill was drafted sets a new bar for what has become a word referring to a one-sided, prior-goal-seeking, good-press-grabbing process.

The all out attack on the constitution in the form of the granting of numerous ill-defined, open ended powers to the Secretary of State; almost all of which give the Secretary of State the power to impose sanctions, against which members of the public have little or no legal recourse.

My belief that the future of Britain's economy lies in our well educated workforce and our ability to change faster than the rest of the world. The extra value the decaying dinosaurs of the media industry will add to UK plc having been propped up by this bill will in no way reimburse us for the amount this bill will cost us by handicapping our ability to adopt new business models.

I would ask that if I have not convinced you this is a bad bill that you investigate the Open Rights Group before the bill enters the Commons.

Yours sincerely,

Jon Knight

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It's probably more enraged than coherent, but hey-ho.