Slashdot Mirror
Million E-mail March
bmongar writes: " CNN is running a story on MP3.com planning a million e-mail march to back legislation to make it legal to keep digital copies of your music." Maybe I'm just a skeptic, but I can't imagine this actually working. How many legislators read their own mail? Lick a stamp and mail an actual letter. It's harder to ignore. All this will do is knock down mail servers (you just know some jerk is gonna write a script and spam the hell out of them).
You forget, Slashdotters can't be away from their computers for the time it takes to mail a letter, or they might miss a redundant||unverified||pointless news item from slashdot.
Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose
Good point, if I had mods I'd mod you up. It is my story submission, and I based my brief on CNN's story. I wasn't intentionally misleading :).
As x approaches total apathy I couldn't care less.
I can only hope this passes and we have a little more sanity in these laws. While email may not be the best way to get in touch with congress, we are talking about a digital format and digital media. What better way to show support. Hopefully it will all be tracked by mp3.com or better yet a third party so there is a physical record of the volume of email. That is if there are enough of us that are not so apathetic that we can't type 2 lines and hit send. Most of our generation can't be bothered to even get up and vote, yet they complain about the state of the world.
That my friends, has to change, and unfortunately it is not happening fast enough.
Ok.. I think I am done with that rant :P
On a personal level, I am very happy with mp3.com and the ways I am able to promote my music, now if they would just approve new song uploads faster, I have 2 stuck in the queue!
Shameless Plug! If you like trance, tell me what you think!!
Email is a very easy way to communicate - its far easier than every other way.
If politicians get letters, emails, phone calls or faxes (anything) about an issue, they will listen. Spamming legislators may be a good idea.
"Oh, we're getting a lot of action from the voting public via email - maybe we should listen."
While politicians are very selfish and greedy, they listen. They will be forced to listen!
I wouldn't say that it's completely ineffective to email, but having been married to a former congressional staffer, I have to agree that a typed (or better, legibly handwritten) letter carries much more weight. That said, do something. Even a less-effective email is better than bitching to your fellow SlashDot members. I can guarantee that that's useless in terms of getting things changed.
Well, that's not the way they're doing it. You type in a form and it finds the e-mail addresses for your local Reps and Senators for your state, and that's who it e-mails. It doesn't even tell you the addresses, although you could find them for yourself by searching the net.
You see, all the e-mail isn't going to the same place.
And, sure, someone could write a script to spam everyone in washington. So what. This campaign targets the congressment that represent each individual e-mailer. So my rep only gets e-mail from people in the dallas area, etc.
wish
Vote for freedom!
---
What if 1 million people sent an email connected with a $1.00 donation using paypal? Can a million dollars be ignored? Pretty nice lobby, if you ask me.
Because you can't, you won't, and you don't stop...
-Earthling
-Earthling
"I'm sorry, I had to; the irony was just too thick."
mp3.com would print out the letter and envelope, complete with the submitters home address, and mail it to the poor congressman (all at once...if done right..hehe.) This is possible. The US Postal Service is rolling out a new service called "NetPost Mailing on line". Basically, it combines printing, addressing and postage all in to one convenient system. According to their FAQ, it offers next day turn around. No idea on what the costs are going to be though.
--You will rephrase your request for me to go to hell. Goto statements are not acceptable programming constructs
The people that read the mail generally ignore mail from outside the Members district, and they also usually don't pay much attention to e-mail that doesn't contain a real, snail address that's in their district. Letters from people that can't vote for (or against) the Congressperson don't have much impact.
Thus, snail mail is by far more effective, but make sure you're writing to your own Representative.
paul
Silly Rabbit, sigs are for kids.
5 million email addresses
10 million email addresses
20 million email addresses
60 million email addresses (Are there really that many people on the internet?)
The cheeseheads who spam for Stock Tips, Porn, Make $50,000, Get out of Debt, Off shore wealth... and lots of other BS, use how many of these email addresses?
Assuming this all winds up in House email boxes (servers are NT and were crashing last time something like this happened) they will eventually read it all. (I get nice letters in the mail when I bother to include my snail mail address.) It'll take so long for the staffers to wade through it that MP3 will be long dead and buried, not from paying damages (which can be appealed) but from lack of new revenue.
--
Chief Frog Inspector
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Exactly what copyrights is MP3.com violating?
I have the right to make copies of any music I own, in whatever format I choose, for whatever personal use I see fit.
The same applies to anyone else who owns a CD, tape, or vinyl.
If I own Bubba Jones's Greatest Hits on CD, and so does my friend Joe, what is illegal about giving the MP3 that I ripped from my CD to him? He could have just as easily ripped it himself; he has the exact same media that I have. What's the difference?
This is all that MP3.com is doing. They buy one CD (according to the testimony I've read) and rip the contents. Then they make that data streamable. In addition, they keep a number of bit-sample checksums on the server to verify media. On the user end, you pop a CD in, and Beam-it compares your bit-saples to the samples they have on their end. If they match, they you're granted access to the MP3's from that CD. No unauthorized duplication, no savable data, nothing.
This space for rent. Call 1-800-STEAK4U
Even better, mail those bricks to a mason, and have them build a wall with them on a plot somewhere near the whitehouse... that would be helluva cool. That way the public can see the cumulative effect too.
Because you can't, you won't, and you don't stop...
"to back legislation to make it legal to keep digital copies of your music" Huh? At what point did this become illegal? If you buy the CD, then you are allowed to make MP3s of the songs.
"The market alone cannot provide sufficient constraints on corporation's penchant to cause harm." -- Joel Bakan
There are a few reasons for this. The fact that it is "too convenient" is one of them. Also consider the fact that the reps I elect (from Florida) don't give a rat's ass what someone in Deleware thinks they should do. And with email there really isn't anything like a postmark to give evidence that the person writing has any impact on whether you get re-elected or not. So say a representative gets 4000 letters all from his district. That says something. 4000 emails from Alaska, Hawaii, Sweden, wherever don't really say much. And of course they aren't going to be arsed to try to determine where it came from by the ISP in the return-path, unless it was threatening.
Oh, and of course there are also other reasons why email isn't going to carry as much weight as paper at least for a little while.
Fist Prost
"We're talking about a planet of helpdesks."
Fist Prost
"We're talking about a planet of helpdesks."
-Jaron Lanier
Hey all.
I volunteered as a congressional intern my junior year in high school. If I remember correctly, one of my tasks was to read through e-mails sent in, summarize them in a couple of sentences, and forward that to the congressman's Washington office. I would then file the original in a large cabinet, in case it was ever needed in the future.
Essentially, while a congressman/woman won't read each and every individual e-mail sent in, s/he will get the general idea. If a great number of constituents are concerned about an issue, a congressman -will- care.
Cynthia McKinney always sends a generic auto-reply, with no other followup. Mind you, since I'm a net taxpayer and reflect more light than she does, I'm sure I'm not terribly interesting to her (i.e., I'm not buying *anything* she's selling, so why should she bother?)
Max Cleland never responds at all. I did see him when I was running the Peachtree Road Race (he was parked by the road trying to get votes - I mean, cheering on the runners), and asked him to answer his e-mail.
Paul Coverdell used to reply, personally, to all my e-mail. He died. I've not tried writing to his replacement, Zell Miller.
668: Neighbour of the Beast
Extra know-how? How hard is it to right click, and choose "save streamed file"? Thats all I have to do to save a streamed mp3 file with my mp3 player (PM123).
moo
There are a ton of people out there who care, but don't care enough to write a letter so if you are planning to write one do this: write a petition and find everyone who won't write a letter and have them sign it. Congressional leaders react mildly to piles of mail, they react with attitude when there's a HUGE list of names they've got to deal with. This way those who won't write a letter still influnce the vote and it has an almost identical impact.
Who needs email! Just post a link to /. and /.-em! The /. effect should take care of business.
Mode (3) smart-aleck mode. Press * to return to main menu.
I realize that most legislators/ businesses/ whoever think paper means more. They are probably right in most cases. E-mails are easy fast and don't require a lot of thought. But since this is an e-topic it might be somewhat appropriate to generate e-noise over it. If you think paper is more effective, send a real letter, this doesn't preclude that, but maybe letting congressionals know the size of the internet community who have an openion on this topic might have some bearing.
As x approaches total apathy I couldn't care less.
Hmmm. I actually see an application for the CueCat here. Scan the UPC on the CD and send it to a site, say MP3.com which just happens to have a giant database of MP3's on hand. When you do this, it unlocks the MP3's on that CD for your account so that you have access to them via the net. This then somewhat proves that you have ownership of the CD.
Only one problem..."Can I borrow your 'Metallica' CD for just ONE second???"
Yes. Commander Taco is probably correct. Someone will write a script to "spam the hell out of them." The only thing is, that someone probably wouldn't even have thought about doing it if Taco hadn't mentioned the idea on Slashdot. :-)
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Comment removed based on user account deletion
If you really want your Congressional mail to be effective, handwrite it. Handwritten letters carry much more weight than typed or printed ones. (If your handwriting is basically illegible, you can attach a typed/printed transcript.)
Although it takes away the whole "marching" concept. It'd be cool to see a million web sites that we pro-MP3. Even if it were just a standard form HTML that everyone tack up on their personal web space.
:) Yoda would be proud.
Sort of a more passive resistance.
I agree with Taco that E-Mail is not the best way to do this. For instance, imagine 1 million "messages" are send out:
Method 1: Some poor congressman gets his outlook inbox flooded.
Method 2: Mail truck pulls up out front, and hauls 1 million paper letters up to the poor congressman's office (this would take a few trips back to the truck...to say the least!)
Which method would infuence you more? If I were mp3.com, I would set up a paper mailing opperation, where consumers can write their messages online. Once a message is recieved, mp3.com would print out the letter and envelope, complete with the submitters home address, and mail it to the poor congressman (all at once...if done right..hehe.)
This would cost mp3.com maybe 1/2 million dollars, unless they can figure out some form of micropayment to pay for costs. 500 grand should be chump change for the ability to make a statement like that. Plus, how can you round up the news media to watch email being delivered. I bet if the letters were to be say, dumped in from of the congress, out of a dump truck, media would show up and report on the event, if alerted to it
beforehand, other congressmen would notice, etc, etc.
When I write my representitives, I do both, email, and snail mail. I send the email first, which includes something saying I am sending a snail mail as well, as it is said to carry more weight. This a) gets my message in front of them twice, and b) lets them think about giving more weight to email.
Just my 3 or 4 cents...
-Pete
Soccer Goal Plans
...is that it isn't always possible to have a concerted mass snail-mail effort. A lot of the time, riders and amendments are tacked to bills at the last minute. In cases like that, it isn't possible to get snail mail to the guv'mint in time. E-mail is quicker, although it is more easily ignored.
Kierthos
Mr. Hu is not a ninja.
Probably less of an effect than regular letters, but definitely more impressive than just plain old email, and not a bit harder for the average joe to do.
Of course they WOULD hae to pay for something like that out of pocket, but then again, there may be a number of people interested in the law being passed who wouldn't mind sponsoring the project.
Ñ'
I worked for different politicians in several "districts" around the country. Politicians ignore email only when demographics tell them to. For example, a state assemblyman in California or North Carolina is much more likely to pay attention to pile of email, then a legislator whose allegiance is to Kansas.
"How many legislators read their own mail? Lick a stamp and mail an actual letter. It's harder to ignore"
>BR>How many Legislators have their secretary's print their e-mail and hand it to them? Have at it, I say!
Dirty Pirate Hooker
"the Internet's collective response to one well-nigh apocalyptic decision after another has unfortunately been the same as the Internet's collective response to just about everything: posts, lots and lots of posts. Discussions and cries of hypocrisy and malformed analogies have consumed megabyte upon megabyte of masturbatory rage and self-indulgent self-righteousness.
Which, of course, accomplishes exactly nothing...Lawyers rule the world. And don't you forget it."
another e-crusade, great.
Never meant half of the things I said to you. So you know, there's a half that might be true - G. Phillips
Unfortunatly, $.02 isn't the cost of producing a bag of mail to a legislator. If each letter costs $.33 and a lb. of letters is 20 individual letters (rough guess), thats $6.60 per lb. Now, lets say you've got a bag weighing in at 50 lbs. That's $330 of mail that may not even be worth anything because a legislator already has his mind made up because he has already been bough out by 'lobbiests.'
Democracy taxes the citizens. Literally. You must pay a tax on EVERYTHING. Including *attempts* to voice your opinion to lawmakers.
I've got a DAT recorder. I've been digitally reproducing my CDs for years now.
===============
All sigs are meaningless.
Tyranny =Gov. choosing how much power to give the People.
... do nothing but wait until Napster and MP3.com move to Canada?
... send emails from US-based ISPs?
... create hundreds of snail mail letters, smuggle them into the States, and mail them?
... pat myself on the back for not being American?
... whine about being forced to depend on US laws for many of my internet needs?
... make my own non-US MP3-sharing site and hope I don't get extradited?
Someone tell me what I can do. Depending on my politicians is bad enough -- and now I need to depend on politicians that I didn't elect and of whom I can't expect anything.
I can spell. I just can't type.
Email does work, but due to the volume they receive it takes longer. If you want fastest results, don't bother to call or mail your rep in Washington DC. They keep local offices in home districts which you can walk right into or call or even hand a letter to. Look em up in the phonebook.
--
Chief Frog Inspector
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
FUCK!!
This is the fifth post and it's already redundant!!
Look, see right up there in the story, where Rob suggests that you should lick a stamp and send off your letter?? Remember people posting this exact piece of advice on EVERY SINGLE political story to hit Slashdot, ever? Notice that the first thirty or so posts that got moderated up all say "why not send snail mail?"
I don't need to hear you all repeat Rob's advice like mindless drones! And, besides, it's the million email march! Women didn't generally show up to the million man march because they thought it would get the point across better!
Arrgh! You people!
"Beware he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he deems himself your master."
Actually sending the million emails may be somewhat less effective than it sounds. However, the publicity of CNN *covering* the sending of a million emails is likely to draw attention, so it is not completely ineffective.
Definately lick a stamp instead. I remember an interview with one of Washington State's congresspeople from ~ a couple years ago. (Patty Murray? I'm not sure which it was.) She indicated that in general congresspeople receive huge stacks of communication which are essentially exactly the same. These come in through phone messages (including FAX), e-mail, and paper letters. Since most stuff essentially boils down to "I'm for X" or "I'm against X" as opposed to genuinely new ideas or information your messages essentially end up as tally counts for/against topic X. When these tallys are generated, the delivering media are treated differently. At the time e-mail was relatively new - I'm sure these numbers have changed now. Essentially, they counted a real, paper letter as essentially 10 points. A phone call counted about 5. e-mail counted 1. Her justification for this: e-mail is easier to send and phones are easier to dial, therefore more people can do it. This means that you don't necessarily feel as strongly if you send an e-mail and congress treats it appropriately. ___ I know I can't spell.
My suggestion is to join the 'Million E-mail March.' Send the email, but don't send a form E-mail. Remember, they hate form letters just as much as we do. Send them a well thought out email, in your own words. Be polite, clearly state your feelings about the subject, and make it clear how you feel they should vote. Then Send them a snail mail that talks about how you feel email is not as influential as it should be. Say something to the effect of: If enough people send a letter like that we might actually bring government into the internet age.
And on this issue make sure you state that you feel the same way about books, movies, and other audio formats. It would be a shame to be allowed to make MP3 copies but not wave files.
Well, unless you want a police-state, that's as good of proof as you're going to get. Besides this method of circumvention requires repeated and obvious breaking of the law by the consumer - the consumer is more likely aware that he/she is breaking the law when giving a CD to a friend so that friend can listen to the CD on my.mp3.com These same people are not so aware they are breaking the law when they simply download a file on napster.
AZspot
Well... sense this is for the freedom of mp3s, everyone with a mic should use them to make a mp3 of them saying that they support it, and email it to the rep.... it would solve the whole "effort" thing.
Hrm loving these
Have they checked into partnering with Microsoft on this project?
Icebox
The average person will know about this action from his/her TV, not from /.
Napster and MP3 are hugely popular among people who don't even use them just because of the media attention.
However, if the action really brings down mail servers, the context of the coverage will be negative.
Unfortunately, that's the same thing. If you stream music to me, I'm downloading it, and there's nothing that says I'm not saving it to disk as well...
Well said. We've been saying this for a while: it's all about control. It's good that legislators are starting to notice this as well.
---
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
My $.02...
Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside a dog it's too dark to read. - Groucho Marx
Ummm... does anyone know where I can buy lickable stamps these days? I can only find the adhesive-backed ones now
Ok, back on topic...
Just because a lot of them were born before the transistor, doesn't mean they don't read their e-mail. In many cases their aids will print it out for them, since many are a bit old-fashioned by slashdot standards, but they'll still read it. If they get so many that they don't have time to read them all, that by itself might send a message. Any aid worth his security pass would have the brains to tell his boss that they are coming from different people. Maybe they'd send out snail-mail asking for confirmation, but hey, they do have "franking" priviledges, so if they're suspicious, they could check without terribly hassle. Don't think they'll dismiss this out of hand. Maybe one or two, but there are a lot of them who will listen. Bipartisan sponsorship always helps, too.
Note to those who may participate:
Don't just send their stock letter. Personalize it. Make sure you keep the part that actually mentions the name of the bill, but aside from that, redo it in your own style. The skeptics may be convinced if they get a million DIFFERENT e-mails. Watch out on the RIAA flaming, unless you can find a really polite way of doing it.
WARNING: there is a trojan on your
Sorry, but that idea won't accomplish a thing. Congressional staffers don't have much regard for e-mail, as anyone can send it without much work or thought.
If you wanted to send a real message, send a good-old fashioned snail mail message. From experience, nothing's more intimidating than seeing a very unusually large stack of letters from your constituents in your offices. A full mail box just doesn't have the same effect.
That being said, the idea is really a good one, just the methods are not the most effective.
Yeah, I've been sending email to my legislators, too. So far, the only "response" I have received is (obviously, since I have received the same message multiple times) an email autoresponder, and that from only one of the three (two senators, one representative). But I don't really consider it a response to my email. Here it is, in its entirety (sans header):
Gee, no really, thank you.
"I came here to kick ass and chew bubblegum. I'm all out of bubblegum." MSE USC APX AIA CSI CASp
Of course, MP3.com is involved in this... go here and write a letter to your representative and senators...
--You will rephrase your request for me to go to hell. Goto statements are not acceptable programming constructs
Come to think of it, why do we need a corporate sponsor for this? Let's just start the real letter writing petition. I'm sure slashdot readers can generate 10s of thousands of letters, anyway, if not a million.
Maybe. Dunno. But I speak highly of UAH. I should, considering the position I hold.
--
-- Geof F. Morris
How do you know what politicians like? Do you think they actually read their own mail? Get real.
I assume you're talking about handwritten letters when you say it takes longer to write letters than emails. Realistically, for letters that are to be taken seriously, most people will type them...on computers...running Windows...and print them on inkjet printers.
Browser? I barely know her!
Do we really want to send in that many letters? I rarely get passionate about anything, but the battle over MP3s makes my blood boil (I'm for MP3s, I'm one of the good guys). I think if you are interested enough to take action, take all three avenues. Write a letter, write an email (which takes no time at all), and the try to find a phone # and call while you're playing Quake 3. Imagine you're waxing your senator instead of some guy from Idaho...
"If I ever gave a fuck I'd shave my nuts, tuck my dick inbetween my legs and cluck" - Marshal Mathers
Forget the million e-mail. Slashdot the USPO.
--
Here's an idea: why not set it up so that one can go to MP3.com's web page and automatically send a fax to one's favorite legislator?
I mention this because this is the same tactic used by the ACLU, and I *always* get a reply from a fax. I can only imagine that this also generates a lot of real paper, too.
The Tyrrany Begins....
Finding God in a Dog
bmongar wrote:
And CNN wrote:These are very poor and misleading summaries. It is already legal to make digital copies of stuff that you own.
What mp3.com really wants is to make it legal to transmit a song to someone who has proved that they already own it. i.e. they want to legalize a royaltyless my.mp3.com service.
These overly-simple summaries are dishonest, IMHO, because they make it look like the new legislation would grant some very basic consumer rights that we don't already have, when in fact, it would really just grant a very subtle right that mp3.com's business model wants.
---
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
"As used in this section, the term "personal interactive performance" means the performance of a sound recording and the non-dramatic musical works embodied therein by means of a digital transmission and includes any digital phonorecord deliveries associated with such transmission, provided that the transmission is received only by a recipient who has provided to the transmitting organization proof that the recipient lawfully possesses a phonorecord of such sound recording and who has conveyed to the transmitting organization a specific request to receive the transmission of the performance."
Ther is nothing in this defenition, or elsewhere in the bill that says the user can't record the stream (although it doesn't protect it either). It also dosen't define what constitutes "proof that the recipient lawfully possesses a phonorecord of such sound recording."
Certainly though MP3.com's current method is insufficient since it only demonstrates momentary possesion.
Is there anyone here that really belives no one played their friends CDs from MP3.com?
Si vis pacem, para bellum
The only thing more annoying than a Libertarian is an (un|mis)informed Libertarian
Er... No, it isn't. It's "faxes"...
Well it certainly doesnt hurt any. You cant post computer code on the internet just because you own it. And if people are suing you for doing what you want with stuff that YOU OWN, then it might be usefull for congress to pass a law saying that you are alowed to do what you want with music you own. Then the RIAA has no grounds to sue you on.
I don't know if it's just me, but I see an alarming trend of things here on slashdot... "Evil topic! We must stop this! We need to get the people involved!", but nothing ever happens... and now when there is a clear chance to do something, and the path to take action has been mildly facilitated, we sit back and say "this isn't goign to accomplish anything."
I know, I'm probably wrong, because only the highly motivated people will actually do anything... and those people are the vocal ones... but... *sigh*
--You will rephrase your request for me to go to hell. Goto statements are not acceptable programming constructs
Great job dumbing it down, CNN. Perhaps you can tell us about an extremely dangerous program called DeCSS that allows vicious pirates to make illegal copies of DVDs?
Ñ'
Based on a few things I've read lately (including the Napster lawyer in Wired), the 1992 Audio Home Recording Act (AHRA) makes noncommercial distribution of copywritten material legal. At this point, it's mainly up to lawyers in these cases to make the right argument to a judge. If the AHRA was written well enough, the Napster lawyer should have no problem convincing a judge that they are in the right. The same argument should theoretically work for mp3.com (Of course, totally seperate issue is the fact that a lot of the judges in these big tech cases are totally ignorant of the technology that are judging, and therefore can't properly apply the law in the first case.)
On a couple of occasions I've sent my legislators e-mail (you can find the email address of your senator at http://www.senate.gov/senators/index.cf m. While I've never sent snail mail to them I can confirm that I've gotten a snail mail response back from them every time I've sent them something. It's never been in a timely manner, (the response for my inquiry about allowing local channels on sattelite tv took about 2-3 months) it was at least a response and I knew someone had read the e-mail. -Dan
I don't have a lot of time for this right now, but this needs to be said, and this topic is probably as good as it gets.
/. before how important it is to write a paper letter and not e-mail. This is the relative regard with which each type of competition is held:
/.'er to believe, and sometimes I don't believe it myself.) They have seen every effort to hack the system, and have devised appropriate responses. You will not find an easy way to get around the requirement that many different individuals from all over the country write, call and visit their individual Congressmen and Senators if you want an effective lobby.
/., but this looks like another false start. For the community, I am going to try and write a more organized, more extensive, and more lucid guide to action toward the end of the year. Hope this is helpful for now.
;)
This is how a Congressional mail operation works. There are slight variations office-to- office, but this is what you need to know in terms of influencing Congress.
An average Senate office receives approx. 2000 letters, and 500 e-mails each week. Each day mail is and sorted by interns into issue areas and then distributed to Legislative Correspondents. These LCs are usually 23-25 years old, and have a basic grounding in the issue area they are covering. It is their job to read the e-mails for nuances the interns may have missed, group them together, and write responses.
The responses are then given to a Legislative Assistant. (LAs, 25-50 yrs, (hopefully) experts on their area, usually superior in knowledge to the private sector experts who populate think tanks, universities, and lobbying firms. Most DC lobbyists and think tankers are ex-LAs. These are the people who write a vast majority of what comes out of Congress) They edit and approve them. In the mean time, the mail manager (sometimes also the SysAdmin) totals up the mail by area of concern and e-mails a report to the legislative and executive staff, including the Senator, once a week.
This is where you influence the process. If the office receives 5000 letters this week instead of 2000, the staff will tend to notice and take note of what issue the constituents are concerned with. This is combined with phone calls received, both in DC and in the State offices, to detect groundswells of interest in a particular issue. These groundswells are rarely detected. Most people just don't care enough. A well-organized and motivated group can therefore have quite an effect if they can truly deliver the numbers.
E-mails: I have stressed on
>Paper letter: The holy grail. Most offices have a strict policy of responding to every single paper letter they receive, not matter how bizarre (trust me), and losing or missing more than a handful can cost an LC their job. All letters are logged and read.
>Phone Call: You will generally get to speak to a Staff Assistant (receptionist/LC trainee). Office have one of two policies, either they tally the opinion of each caller and send it to the mail manager for inclusion in the mail report, or they take down the persons issue and information, and respond to the call as they would a letter. Very few offices will give you a call back from an LA, that's what the Staff Assistants are there for. This is partially self preservation, if the LA's were that accessible, they would never get any other work done (I know, you may like that idea, they certainly don't.)
>E-mail: Up until the last year, usually ignored. Now, maybe a third of the offices print out the e-mail and respond like a regular letter, the other 2/3 either continues to ignore them or simply tallies them like phone calls. Before you get all excited about "they print out e-mails", these people are not luddites (ed. >and no, Katz, the Luddites were not noble in any way), all mail goes out under the Senator's signature. Until we have an effective system of e-signatures not office will be able to respond officially by e-mail. That being said, there is not excuse for any office not treating e-mails as regular mail.
There is one crucial point here. Offices will only respond to their constituents (people who they represent.) It is generally always possible to tell where paper mail comes from. This is not the case with e-mail. Unless you include a full return mailing address, you will not receive a response, and you message will not be counted.
>Petitions/Post Cards: Many groups organize mass mailing campaigns with pre-printed postcards or petitions. Many rather questionable lobbies, and some that are outright fraudulent, use these methods to make their members feel that they are being heard. Other people try to make money by setting themselves up as an intermediary between themselves and Congress, vote.com is a modern, e-mail based iteration of this problem. The fact that e-mail makes it easier to prepackage this kind of contact is one of the reasons that it will take time for e-mail to be regarded on par with written communication.
Most petitions and post cards, if they are even looked at, are logged and disposed of. If they are logged, they are listed on a separate line on any mail report (ie. We have 800 letters on MP3, 500 on Social Security, and 1200 on H1-B, we also received approx 1500 postcards on the following subjects...)
The thing to remember is this, the people in Washington are not stupid (I know that may be hard for the average
A million e-mail march sounds lovely, but if it is a million e-mails, all coming from the mp3.com site, with form letter language, without names and return mailing address, the entire effort will be dashed against the rocks of a system designed to respond to only honest, organized grassroots action.
I would like nothing more than to see an organized group of techs making noise and being heard on the issues we all rant about on
A couple of other things.
don't worry about taking down a members mail server. All offices are behind a central mail server for the entire House or Senate. It would be fairly hard to take these servers down (though the SysAdmins manage to do so on a regular basis
I'm sure MP3.com has some professional DC based advice on organizing this campaign. I sure it will look quite impressive on that lobbyist/lobbying firms record. That doesn't mean it will be effective. To the average lobbyist, the ultimate effort is one that generates a lot of "sound and fury, signifying nothing." If it looks impressive, but doesn't win the day, you can bet the clients going to be back for more. It is a system that rewards a lack of progress. But more on that later...
THE YEAR WAS 2081, and everybody was finally equal...
I have some personal experience with this. A friend of mine is in PR and she had a client who wanted to really call attention to a local city issue. By recruiting as few as 100 people to write letters, call, and fax, she got the entire city council buzzing about the sudden citizen uprising. You need a surprisingly small number of people to leverage your issue to the top of the agenda.
Legislators, for the most part, do listen to their mail.
As the author states, it would get spammed by scripters -- either bored script kiddies or pros hired by the music industry to trash the process. This could do more harm than good.
Legislators need to know that the requests come from legitimate sources, in their district, that will remember their legislative support and, in retuen, support that legislator in the future. They don't want astroturf or people out of their districts.
It would be far better to *ORGANIZE*. This means getting several influential people behind it -- from a variety of backgrounds, with an eye towards a long term winning strategy for individual freedom -- not some dot com's freedom to rip people or corporations off.
This would be a many pronged attack -- through newspapers, radio, the web, etc.
Individual freedom to back up, restore, transfer and even (to a limited extent) share IP or copyrighted material, because libraries share IP and copyrighted material, as is already done in other forms of media (my family shares DVDs, videos, books all the time, the library loans it out, etc) so limited IP or copyright violations, for personal use are clearly legal. This sharing needs to expanded and protected on the net.
This is how orgs like the AMA and Sierra Club do things. They do it with forethought, strategy, publicity and big names to back it up.
That's the problem with the net -- everything is instant gratification in your face. No one considers long term strategies, alliances, etc.
To me, the EFF, FSF, ACLU should all be working together on a coherent strategy to free both code and binary content within, say, a 5-10 year time frame, placing responsibility for copyright violations where it belongs -- on the individual, not a conduit.
There should be more exposure in the main stream media to people with an interest in freedom on the net, regardless of their background. Alliances need to make sure there is a "give and take" process -- one hand needs to wash the other.
Any such plan should make it a easy 2-3 minute processs for an individual to get a web-based, persoanlized form letter emailed or displayed to them, complete with a second sheet that has the appropriate return address and target legislator address as well.
Just add a envelope and a stamp, and it's a no brainer, under 2 minute process.
This kind of thing needs a group of intelligent, relaxed, long term strategic thinkers. Not too easy to find on the web or involved in computing, but there are certainly a few jewels that could be leveraged.
Treatment, not tyranny. End the drug war and free our American POWs.
See my user info for links.
That's a great idea! I might actually start submitting stories again. Right now: no karma, no moderating your own stories, nothing. It would at least allow someone the power to say "Read the fscking article, you moron!" As long as we're asking for new features, I'd like to able to filter by moderation but not necessarily score. Like, filter all flamebait but not all 0's (since AC's are often quite funny).
Planning to be moderated ± 1: Bad Pun.
Now everyone knows if mp3.com sends music to a "listening device" that happens to be your computer, you can save it in a file just as easily as you can with Napster.
No. I didn't know that. You cannot save a streamed audio file "just as easily as you can with Napster." Sure, it can be done, but it's not part of the mechanism and would require extra know-how and effort on the part of the user. That's the whole point distinguishing My.MP3 from Napster.
I find it interesting how the article attempts to make mp3.com look like it's less of a copyright violator than Napster, when in fact Napster is not even violating any copyrights outright and mp3.com is!
Napster facilitates copyright violation by its users. MP3.Com violated copyright by its implementation of My.MP3...users of My.MP3 are not themselves (if using the service ethically) violating copyright. Please tell you can see the distinction.
Mambo dogface in the banana patch
I have emailed my representative on a number of occasions, and they do read them. The thing that I don't understand is why send a snail mail reply when they could just reply to the email. Maybe it's that whole photocopied signature thing. Can't do that on an email I guess. hehe.
-Chris
Maybe I'm just a skeptic, but I can't imagine this actually working. How many legislators read their own mail? Lick a stamp and mail an actual letter. It's harder to ignore. All this will do is knock down mail servers (you just know some jerk is gonna write a script and spam the hell out of them). I hate to break this to you but a few months back when we were all in an uproar about the Welfare Reform Act I did something I had never done before: I (and probably everyone I spammed with instructions on who and how) emailed my congresswoman. Do you know what happenned? A few days later I was pleasantly surprised to find a written response in my snailmail box. Later that day my phone rang and most of the people called and reported that they too had been recipients of a snailmail reply. Not very long after that /. runs an article to the effect of how certain rather objectionable portions of the Methamphetamine Control Act had been removed.I gotta say I felt proud when all that happenned. Don't dis the system like that because when voices speak and take action (like emailing your elected officials) things can get done. How about ecouraging the community to participate in this and discouraging the malicious ones from messing it up for all of us? /. $authors)
Note to self: IF s/N ratio>=facts(old news +
Prospecting Stinks. Stop Wasting Time on Cold Calling.
For a total of $1USD and 5 minutes (the time it takes to come up with a witty remark to this post) you can do the following:
1) Write your senator a letter supporting changing this legislation. (time=3 minutes, especially if someone sets up a form letter)
2) Print that letter and put it in an envelope with a stamp ($.33USD + $.05USDenvelope) (15 seconds, depending on printer)
3) Revise the "Dear Senator" to "Dear Congressperson" and reprint and reenvelope ($.38USD again)
4) Copy email body from Staroffice to Pine and email a copy to your senator, and email a separate copy to your congressman.(10 seconds+/- depending on your cooridination)
5) Drop the letters in a mailbox (time determined by proximity to mailbox)
And then you will:
A) Have covered both bases in case someone takes down the email server.
B) Have not had to write a whole hell of a lot.
C) Have just upped the ante on your Congressman and Senator during an election year.
From the standpoint of congressional action which led from Arpanet to Internet, his statement is essentially true, although he may have somewhat exaggerated his role.
While this may look like a massive letter writing campaign, what it really amounts to being is a DDoS attack via e-mail. Most people have size (and or message count) limits on their e-mail boxes. This "million" e-mails will likely overflow the official's mailboxes! While I fully support more freedom for MP3s, is this sort of action really justified?
Well let's see...I'm checking my Winamp, MusicMatch, Sonique and Windows Media Players...the ones used by the uncleaned masses. Nope, no "save streamed file" there.
Thats all I have to do to save a streamed mp3 file with my mp3 player (PM123).
Bully for you. Guess that puts you in the upper percentile. But even if all these players add features to save a stream and turn a transient listening experience into a stored file, its too bad you can't see that MyMP3 doesn't facilitate that archiving whereas Napster does.
Mambo dogface in the banana patch
At least he is honest about ignoring it...
You can also send faxes as well as letters... Something more visible than an Email.
Of course, totally aside from that, the flood of email is going to bring down mail servers and piss people off, which may have the opposite of the desired effect.
Unrelated to that, I find this quote from the article a little strange:
The My.Mp3.com service differs from the music-sharing Web site Napster, which faces legal challenges of its own, because it merely sends the music to listening devices, such as a computer or a wireless music player. Napster lets users download an actual computer file and make copies of it.
Now everyone knows if mp3.com sends music to a "listening device" that happens to be your computer, you can save it in a file just as easily as you can with Napster. I find it interesting how the article attempts to make mp3.com look like it's less of a copyright violator than Napster, when in fact Napster is not even violating any copyrights outright and mp3.com is! Perhaps this is an attempt to dissociate mp3.com with the "infamous" Napster...
Way I figure it, if you could convince them that they should do this to promote their "MP3 Anywhere Product", they would do the whole million all by themselves...
With email, you're going to cause a senator's secretary to hit the delete key 1 million times, or at the most, fill up their mail server's hard drive. With Mail, a million letters are going to fill up a senator's office, and make sure he sees this issue.
Remember, 0s and 1s aren't real for most people.
Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose
This is ridiculous. How I want to listen to an mp3 is my business. What if I'm on a crappy modem link? Does this mean that I'll have to put up with lower quality streaming audio? If I own it, I fucking OWN it. I don't need politicians telling me how I can or cannot use something I OWN.
NO CARRIER
I've worked on a campaign or two in my time (and I'm only 30 here people!) growning up in West Virginia - for Sen. Byrd - and what I can say is the most effective way of getting any politician's attention is (1) a real letter (do not use a form letter), and (2) play the game once in a while.
Everyone here is so bitchy and moany about the government doing this or that, that you haven't stopped to think why. You need to partake in the discussions with the elected leaders, give some time or money, show up to town hall meetings and basically be involved. There is more to life than MP3s, and Quake 3, and doing the cool things that we like to do will sooner or later will come up for a vote somewhere - so have your say and input or shut the hell up.
Sometimes the apathy here really sucks.
III.IIVIVIXIIVIVIIIVVIIIIXVIIIXIIIIIIIIVIIIIVVIII
On a couple occasions, I've written well-thought out emails to congressmen. In particular, I remember receiving an exceptional snail mail response from Rep Sensenbrenner (WI) about the U.S. policy towards Mir. I've also received a good response from Senator Gorton (WA).
Neither of these responses were form letters. I still agree that snail mail can make a more "physical" impression. If you have the time I recommend it. But don't assume that all the members of Congress are technically inept. A lot of them do get it, and enjoy the advantages of email as much as the rest of us. Sending them a thoughtful email is certainly better than no feedback at all.
Best regards,
SEAL
Burn Hollywood Burn
What a complete waste of time. How about boycotting the record industry. Start using numbers like a billion and people will pay attention.
Someone you trust is one of us.
It's all about petitions to government officials... E-The-People
So lets have these people send all the e-mails to Kurt The Pope instea.
WASHINGTON--Congressman Bud Cramer (D, Ala.) couldn't believe it. "This is scary. All these emails!" An staffer who wished to remain anonymous stated, "It's really frightening. MP3.com starts a campaign to send emails, and all of a sudden, we get all these emails from kids at UAH. They just kept on coming! It's like they had some kind of denial of service thing going on, but by email! We didn't think that many people in Alabama had computers."
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-- Geof F. Morris
The best thing anyone can do is to write an actual letter (as mentioned in the original post) and send it to your actual representitive. They only care about comments from their constituants. Make sure that you are polite, brief and "professional". If everyone were to do this it would be just as effective as any of the "Million {whatever} Marchs" that have happened.
Make it a "Million Letter March". It will have an effect.
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If I actually could spell I'd have spelled it right in the first place.
Maybe I'm just a skeptic, but I can't imagine this actually working. How many legislators read their own mail?
None. For example, take Senator Murkowski from Alaska, the senator responsible for the failed pro-spam bill you'll find quoted at the bottom of much of your spam (this is called being "murked"). Not suprisingly, he got lots of complaints about the bill.
The senator got sick of the outcry against his awful attempt at legislation. Now every single email to him goes into the bitbucket, not even read by staff.
Do you think any other legislators would react differently to complaints about their incompetence? Send them a million emails, and even if they read their email now, they won't any longer.
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..snail mail would be much more effective.
But I'd wager part of the "grandeur" of mp3.com's effort is the hilite the whole "internet" aspect of it all. I mean, how can you push a new frontier using old world habits and technologies?
I think by pushing the online methods of communication, mp3.com would hope to indicate that this whole internet thing is different, is very real, and doesn't want to be ignored.
Will it be effective? I'm not judging that. I'm just playing devil's advocate in coming up with reasons why an email rally could be a good idea.
A message- and you have to admit that the wealthy, well educated, actually capable of registering and voting e-elite should take some kind of interest in goverment.