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

Prices.

[saintlupus]

a chance to put money where our uh, er, typing is.

If only senators were "free-as-in-beer." Well, senators besides Teddy Kennedy...

--saint

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.

One possible strategy.

[Apreche]

America likes to believe it's #1 in everything. I think that if we showed the senators/representatives and the American people that we are behind everyone else in consumer technology (we ARE ahead in military technology), and that it is because of legislation like the DMCA, that we might start seeing some changes.

If you don't think we're behind you might want to look at some Japanese cell phones http://www.nokia.co.jp or some of those incredibly fuel efficient cars from Europe. I don't have a link for those, but just a normal Fiat is more fuel efficient than an SUV. Gas prices go down! Especially a good idea now with our middle east action.

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

Re:fracturing effort?

[Spoing]

You mean like this?

1. "Enough is enough is enough," he added. "It is time for people in the technology community to open up their wallets and donate money to the EFF and fund this political action committee ... We've got to do this or we're going to lose, folks, it's that simple."

The EFF had a Washington D.C. based branch, but backed out of it because they didn't like how they were pressured into endorsing really bad ideas inorder to gain clout on the issues they were primarily interested in.

Will Geek Pac work better? If they know going in that this is the way D.C. works, they might be able to deal with it.

Either way, it might be more effective to have two different organizations -- one 'Washington insider' and another clean of such dreck and nonsense.

Re:fracturing effort?

[Mr. Fred Smoothie]

I was under the impression tha the EFF was a 501(c)(3) (tax-exempt public charity). If so, they are prohibited from contributing to political campaigns or spending more than a certain amount lobbying to affect legislation.

There is a need for a non-tax-exempt PAC who can fill that role.

The big question in my mind is does this effort redundant given what digitalconsumer.org is doing? It's also unclear to me that the GeekPAC people understand the tax status of organizations whose primary purpose is to lobby to affect legislation or to contribute to political campaigns. I don't believe that such contributions are tax-deductible.

Leveling the playing field...

[Linuxthess]

Senator Slash Dot (R. -Cubicle) proposed the Consumers Don't Want Your Shitty Broadband Anyways Act (CDWYSBAA)yesterday in congress. The vote split along partisan lines as Sen. Mickey Mouse, Sen. Donald Duck and Sen. Bugs Bunny (D. -Disney, TW) launched a vehement attack against it, calling it "Unpatriotic" and "Communistic" and mostly unfair to the multi-trillion dollar media companies, which never had to empower the consumer, other than taking a "Tariff" from his paycheck.

Score 0: Bad '70s Reference

[realgone]

Corporate Membership: $500.00 minimum donation - Corporate members will receive a framed and signed certificate of membership, the monthly newsletter, and the right to name a member of our Advisory Board.

Okay. Here's $500. And your name is Flounder.