GeekPAC

SgtXaos writes "The newly created American Open Technology Consortium has posted a draft of their position statement online. They propose to change that by forming a real lobbying force to educate and influence congress about issues near and dear to all of us geeks. Here's a chance to put money where our uh, er, typing is." Newsforge (also part of OSDN) has a story and interview with the founders.

Comments

proposal of a draft of a framework?

[ghostlibrary]

So there's a proposal of a draft to consider a position statement about creating a framework for moving towards forming a possible entity. Wow! They have the political process down pat! Lots of action words and nothing real yet!

Seriously, it is a good thing, I just love these early, tentative stages. I'll likely pledge. I do think taking 'geekpac' as a contact name will be negative PR, even though "reclaiming geekhood" is trendy now.

Not bad.

[llamalicious]

Gotta applaud this for spirit though, we have to have someone on our side that can build up some clout.
But it's still one more four-letter acronym, and another pile of legislative paper to file. May the gods have mercy on their souls.

My favorite statement:

Once access is solidified into the hands of a very few companies, the "bottom up" content flow model of the Internet will be put in lethal jeopardy. This small group of companies that will control the access, will also be able to control the flow of content TYPE. The Internet as we know it will cease to exist. The absurd notion that the 4 major phone companies need protection FROM the ISP business community is laughable. Near 10,000 businesses may be legislated out of existence in favor of FOUR companies. This bill is so fundamentally anti-business, anti-entrepreneur and anti-American; it is SHOCKING that it was passed by Republicans, a traditionally Pro-business party.

Shocking? Methinks not. The Republican party may be "traditionally" pro-business. But each individual representative is simply pro-money-in-my-pocket.

fracturing effort?

[rknop]

I'm sure there is a good reason-- but I don't see it at the moment, so I'm hoping somebody will enlighten me. Why is trying to get people to put money and energy behind this a better idea than helping to promote the existing organizations working towards similar goas, such as the EFF? My fear is that this effort will dilute some of the broadbased support for the EFF, and instead of one organization which we can hope will become marginally strong enough to perhaps do something, we're going to have two organizations that look really good but aren't nearly beefy enough to compete with the current special interests purchasing legislators.

-Rob

"freedom to innovate"

[kryzx]

I don't know what is scarier, the fact that they used the phrase "freedom to innovate", or the fact that a certain corporation has so corrupted that phrase that it makes me cringe and sets off warning alarms.

This sounds like a good idea. We must play the game the way it's laid out, and that means forming PACs, funding them, and educating/greasing the right politicos to get what we want. I hope they succeed.

Re:Too bad...

[Golias]

Fortunately, down here in the US, the very first amendment to our constitution addresses this sort of thing, so most people who have been following this believe that the Supreme Court will strike down most of the current reforms as unconstitutional.

Congress actually had the balls to pass a law which says you can not buy a newspaper ad or tv spot to criticize a sitting congressman during the two months before an election, without it counting as part of the limited campaign budget of his opponent. If your representative or senator voted for this, remember that in the next election.

One work-around that occurred to me is to choose a third-party or no-party candidate who is nowhere near winning and nowhere near the spending cap, and then claim to be supporting them. That way, you could run a half-hour infomercial slamming Paul Welstone, end the commercial with "paid for by friends of Joe Blow, an independant candidate for Minnesota Senator," and none of it would count against his leading opponent's campaign, even that's who would benifit most. Hmmm....