Say the word “internet” these days, and most people will call to mind images of Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos, of Google and Twitter: sprawling, intrusive, unaccountable. This tiny handful of vast tech corporations and their distant CEOs demand our online attention and dominate the offline headlines.  But on the real internet, one or two clicks away from that handful of conglomerates, there remains a wider, more diverse, and more generous world. Often run by volunteers, frequently without any obvious institutional affiliation, sometimes tiny, often local, but free for everyone online to use and contribute to, this internet preceded big tech, and inspired the earliest, most optimistic vision of its future and place in society.

At EFF, we call this world “the public interest internet.” Over the last two decades, that promise largely disappeared from wider consideration.  By fading from view, it has grown underappreciated, underfunded, and largely undefended. Whatever you might call it, we see our mission to not just act as the public interest internet’s legal counsel when it is under threat, but also to champion it when it goes unrecognized.

When Big Tech is long gone, a better future will come from the seed of this public interest internet: seeds that are being planted now, and which need everyone to nurture them until they're strong enough to sustain our future in a more open and free society.