Slashdot Mirror
The Worst Coders In Washington
spooky writes "The American Open Technology Consortium, 'a nonprofit organization of technologists who have joined together to educate lawmakers and regulators about technology -- especially in regards to The Internet' has compiled a list of the lawmakers responsible for eight bad internet laws. They say, 'These bad coders and their backers have done more damage to computing, the Internet and freedom than all the virus authors, spammers and crackers combined', Do you agree? Did they miss anyone?"
Unfortunately, it seems that most lawmakers know exactly what they are and have been doing, and that's why they've been so devastatingly effective. Keep in mind, they're policymakers and politicians, and campaign donations are alway welcomed.
Fnord.
It still strikes me as odd that politicians can create laws that govern so much of what goes on through the internet, when they have no knowledge of it themselves. I feel like they are trying to regulate it in a similar way as television. However, the internet isn't just in the United States. It's also throughout the whole world. How can we decree what other countries must follow? This is a conondrum that needs to be addressed in it's own arena, separate from the real world, because it is not the real world. If politicians are able to expand their powers through limiting action on the internet, then what's to stop them from gradually throwing out the constitution altogether?
Besides that, I feel that there is too much trust when it comes to the internet. I don't trust media companies, why should they have the right to hack into anyone's computer? I really hope that people are able to keep ridiculus laws from being enacted that are only made by the politicians as ways of gathering support (and money) when they are so far reaching (As the article says). Well. I guess I agree with them.
Regardless of this being flamebait, he's right, at least if this site is to be believed: only 18 of the 93 people on the list (assuming I counted right; in any case it's a very small portion) are democrats. Furthermore, only two of the 25 worst offenders are democrats. The rest are republicans.
That doesn't make the legislators any more right than the abusers. We can have a direct effect on the legislators while it is much harder to have a direct effect on the abusers you list. Beside, if you compare many of these representatives voting records with other bills you will find that they don't just push bad tech laws, many of them push bad laws in general.
And don't try telling me that other countries try to control it too - for two reasons:
We, on the other hand, want to control what everyone else in the world does with the Internet. We wait for them to come to our shores for some conference and arrest them. And all this, after feeding illegal porn into those other countries.
Our politicians must realize that the Internet is what it is today only because it is globally accessible. Attempting to regulate it on our own is in very bad faith!
All your favorite sites in one place!
Very true, but I never said Democrats aren't evil. I'm just pointing out who's more evil.
:-)
However, telling a democrat lawmaker that a law is anti-consumer garners much more of a concerned response than telling a republican lawmaker the same thing.
But, in the end, it's all about the money. Which is why I'm planning to move to another country...
+1 Insightful, -1 Troll. What can I say, I'm an Insightful Troll.
knowing who to support is more effective than knowing who to trash
.. On a US TV station, I recently saw a debate between two politicians, and one of the questions posed was "why aren't you smearing your opponent" - the moderator repeatedly pushed this, and seemed not to be able to understand the answers the candidates gave (which boiled down to "I want to win - mud throwing detracts from the issues at hand.)
This is a very salient point, that (happily) some people in power are beginning to understand, but people in the media appear to have a hard time grasping
That being said, can anyone come up with a list of "good guys", besides Rick Boucher and Zoe Lofgren?
0-Libertarian.
Consider yourself informed.
<soapbox>
A Libertarian would never pass any law to stifle the Internet, and would never let the government pass protectionist laws for corporate lobbies.
</soapbox>
Just a note, John Warner is facing Libertarian Jacob Hornberger in Virginia in tomorrow's elections. John Warner is going to win, no Democrat is running.
This is a good chance to show your support for Libertarians if you are a Democrat, or a Republican, but you agree with what the Libertarians are saying about a lot of things. Your vote will almost definitely not change the outcome of the election, but rather than not voting in the race, why not send the politicians a message that they need to wake up and start listening to the people, or they risk losing to Libertarians.
A 10% Libertarian vote in this election will do just that. So hey, nothing to lose, just do it!
I've had enough abrasive sigs. Kittens are cute and fuzzy.
I hate stupidity.
Whenever someone just selectively grab bills and laws then THEN tries to apply correlations to party, you're going to get a skewed outcome. (It's selective by the shear nature they they picked the "worse" bills, which is still subjective.) And then someone, like you or the parent poster, will come along and, without a thought, say "See!" Look, if they had added prominant copyright bills, the democrat margin would be higher than the current 20% margin. And if Clinton hadn't signed the DCMA or Sonny Bono Copyright Extension Act, this would be a voided question.
And you don't even pretend to take into consideration that the overall current representation count is Republican, due to the dominance in the house, which OF COURSE is going to more Republicans being mentioned.
And OF COURSE if campaign donations from special interests continue to be legal, the media companies are going to shower those representatives in a position of getting bills passed, which in the Senate are Democrats, and in the House are Republicans, which is going to FURTHER push it to the Republicans (as they controlled the Senate until the flip of the one rep, control the House, and are in control at the last lawmaking step, the Presidency). Rest assured, if Dems were in power in the House, the special interests would be showering them with money, and more so if Gore had won.
These bad laws have NO POLITICAL ALIGNMENT because neither party has a strict or well-founded policy or issue guidance on them.
The reality is, the parent post is flamebait because voting should not be strict party lines, not even based on money the person receives, but on the issues and past voting record of the House or Senate rep that you have in front of you. And don't even pretend a web page analysis is going to be really all-encompassing or relevant to what occurs in your local races. Hell, this is just the federal level (we've already seen state laws creating an effect).
Finally, the fact is, both parties screw you. You have to look at WHO in the party does what. If you vote on party lines, all you do is push party alignment on the issue. I don't want another NRA/Republican alignment. If "techies" (what the fuq is a techie really, and when did they all suddenly vote liberal?) were one and did all vote liberal, all the special interests will simply fund Republicans, and vice versa. Don't help them align. Vote on the issues and the voting record, and look at campaign donations to then add relevance to your decision.