Whenever the people are well informed, they can be trusted with their own government, reads the motto to Killswitch, taken from Thomas Jefferson.

 

A collage-style activist documentary, Killswitch tells the story of the ongoing, multifaceted battle for the Internet by exploring two high-profile figures of the recent years – Aaron Swartz and Edward Snowden – through a combination of news footage and interviews. Democracy is not only fought over in public squares worldwide; it is also constantly being disputed on the web’s virtual maidans and redefined for the digital age, as pointed out by academic activists such as Lawrence Lessig, Tim Wu, and Peter Ludlow. Freedom is embedded in technology; therefore we must protect our technology to protect our freedom. The decentralization of information is fundamental for democracy: in today’s complex digital environments, one must be able to use the dynamic and disruptive nature of the Internet, argue the speakers included in Killswitch, who touch on urgent issues such as the regulation of the internet, the monopolies attempted by elite power structures, or the copyright systems built for the physical world rather than for the digital one. Drawing on the cases of Swartz and Snowden, the film gradually turns into a manifesto which urges viewers to fight for the right to free information and to use of technological knowledge for advancing the public good.

 

The documentary has been "adopted" by The Sponge.