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Dear Friends of MAIN:

In 1996, MAIN set out to ensure that citizens of Western North Carolina could access the Internet with a local phone call.

Today, as we enter our second decade, the challenges we face are even more complex -- and the stakes even higher. Last year at this time, we wrote to you that the freedom and openness of the Internet itself is now at risk. With the recent approval of the AT&T-BellSouth merger, the risk continues to grow. (More about this in a moment.)

Over the past 11 years, MAIN has grown from simply being a nonprofit Internet service provider (ISP), to being a content provider as well. The MAIN homepage -- chock-full of local news and information -- now receives more than 12,000 unique visitors PER DAY. And that number is steadily growing.

MAIN is increasingly recognized as one of the nation's most successful alternative media business models. MAIN was showcased twice at the recent National Conference on Media Reform, in panel discussions on "Owning Our Own Media Infrastructure" and "Envisioning the Future of Independent Media."
http://www.freepress.net/conference/=full_schedule07

Through our homepage, our Blue Ridge Web Market, and our low-power FM radio station -- WPVM-LP, 103.5 FM, the Progressive Voice of the Mountains -- MAIN is ensuring that local voices in WNC can find an audience.

But we now face a more serious challenge; indeed, it's a threat to the Internet itself. Due to Supreme Court and FCC rulings, a "broadband duopoly" -- comprised of the cable and telephone companies -- is poised to divide Internet content into a "fast lane" and a "slow lane" based on a website's willingness to pay for preferential treatment. [See "Whose Internet is it anyway?"]

Two remedies exist for this threat. First, Congress could require "network neutrality," which would prohibit preferential treatment and maintain the Internet's open, non-discriminatory architecture. Unfortunately, the lobbying power of the cable and telephone companies may well block this remedy.

The other option is to build an alternative network that bypasses the wireline duopoly. High-speed wireless is the only technology currently capable of what some economists call a "strategic market bypass."

MAIN's current high-speed wireless build-out is part of this effort. We need your help to continue this build-out. And we need your help to continue the kind of personal service you've come to expect with our webhosting service and our regional and national dial-up access.

Finally, we are proud to have the strongest privacy policy in the ISP business. We will never share your personal information in any form with any marketing or business partners, period.

Please take a moment to calculate the value in your life of having a local, non-commercial ISP and community network that values your privacy and will never sell out to a non-local, corporate owner.

Our spring "Feed the Grassroots" online fund drive is your chance to stand up and support non-commercial media like MAIN with a tax-deductible donation.

Many thanks for your support over these last 11 years! And we look forward to serving our mountain communities for another decade and beyond!

MAIN Staff, Board and Volunteers