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Lessig's Challenge: Are You Up To It?
Eloquence writes "At the 2002 Open Source Conference, law professor and cyberactivist Larry Lessig, last prominently featured here because of the Eldred case, asked some poignant questions: 'How many people have given to [the] EFF more money than they have given to their local telecom to give them shitty DSL service? How many people have given more money to [the] EFF than they give each year to support the monopoly--to support the other side?' Luke Francl has interpreted these questions as a challenge, and decided to chronicle both his donations to good causes and his less voluntary payments to 'the media oligarchy' on this page: Lessig's Challenge. This is a good idea if others imitate it: If these pages become interlinked with each other, not only can they motivate us and let us track our progress, they may also help us to keep each other up to date about 'good causes' -- there's more than the EFF, after all. With Harry Potter in theatres and Lord of the Rings before us, should 'nerds' also be thinking about supporting those who fight for our rights to, say, play DVDs on an open-source OS?"
OSS will lose its appeal the the mass if they end up having to pay for opensource software as well
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|\A|ALYS|
The problem here is how to bring that message to folks. An uncontrolled medium such as the Internet is very easy to at least publish and, to a lesser extent, promote. The sad part is the very media that would reach the masses are controlled by the other side - namely, television and radio. It's the lowest common denominator, yet how do you penetrate it when it is on the opposite side of the fence?
This needs to start with us, every day. With our secretaries, our neighbors, our grandmothers, everyone in every way. Word of mouth is powerful. But it can't just stop there, and I fear that it won't be enough in the end. With digital tv and DVD Audio just around the corner, and more severe copyright controls, you can bet that this problem will be even worse, and this message will sadly be further quelled. Nevertheless, it all starts with us...
If you *really* believe that these companies are doing wrong you shouldn't be spending your money on them in the first place. Believe it or not, you'll be able to live without seeing hobbits on the big screen or having 1.5Mbps into your bedroom. Giving money to the opposition after the fact may make you feel better, but doesn't change the fact that you've already compromised your morals!
What's better--working for an hour to remove works from the tyranny of copyright, or working in a "regular job" for an hour and donating the proceeds to EFF?
ScienceSeeker.org
I'm not sure if I can totally approve of this type of activism, because it mirrors exactly what is wrong with the USA today. It shouldn't be just about "how much money". If you really care about something, get off your butt and do something about it. Get vocal - organise grassroots movements, write letters, explain the problems you see to your friends, family and community. But don't just expect to buy influence with money - that's what is currently ruining the democratic fabric of the USA.
I'd happily make donations to the EFF if I knew that they'd act for issues I'm faced with too (I live in England).
The last time I checked, I couldn't find any information about whether they would do this (please correct me if I'm wrong).
Of course, the rest of the world (Europe especially) do seem intent on matching American laws, so making American law sane would indirectly affect me, but that seems a very roundabout way to make my money effective.
As soon as the EFF has the monopoly on freedom, they can send me a bill in the same amount as my cable bill (with modem). Until then, it's small donations. Sorry guys, but I'm just not going to send a "Microsoft Tax" to someone else who is trying to guilt me into it.
Sure, it's a problem, but let's get a sense of priority going here, folks:
While waiting for your cracked copy of Eminem to finish burning, how many of you have done anything to alert your representatives about the madness of a unilateral attack by the US on Iraq?
'How many people have given to [the] EFF more money than they have given to their local telecom to give them shitty DSL service?'
We shouldn't have to pay as much for a just legal environment as we pay for goods and services. If the current legal environment is pay-to-play instead of a representative democracy (I believe it is), then shouldn't your lobbying contributions be going towards campaign finance reform?
The proposal that we must give as much to the EFF as we pay for goods and services seems like suggesting that it would be good financial policy to max out your credit cards and then put all of your disposable income into savings bonds instead of paying down the debt.
If the only course of action is to continue to play the game of having to buy laws; if fixing the process that makes the laws is not feasible, then it seems to me that it's already too late. It's time to forget reform and switch to either revolution or abandonment.
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
Does illegally downloading RIAA and MPAA proteced mp3's and divx movies count? According to the RIAA and MPAA that is equivalent to stealing from them. So instead of funding the opposition, might I attack the media conglomerates by depriving them of their income? I sure think it would be easier to motivate people to contribute this way.
they failed to stop the DMCA
Maybe its because they didnt have enough lobbying cash? You cant expect them to work miracles whilst being underfunded.
it was RedHat's lobbying that reduced the effect of UCITA
RedHat has money to do this good work. Perhaps people should buy a 7.3 box to say "thanks".
Either way, its a fascinating idea; match dollar for dollar the money you spen on the monopoly, on people trying to protect us from it.
An example of great thinking...
ATH0 Bitcoin: 1DnwFLXczVZV8kLJbMYoheUrpqHesjxrSi
+4 Interesting?
What on earth is interesting about, "my cable internet service is good and my Windows and Office are warez"?
I think you're caught up in the chicken and egg syndrome, if the EFF had more support and more people faxing, writing and emailing their congressperson/senator, they might have won. Money is a powerful foe, so it's never going to be a foregone conclusion, even if you are on the moral high ground.
Just last week, a Slashdot poll showed that approximately 70-75% of you who responded took no action to fax or email Congress about issues like this.
Since you haven't spent any money with the EFF, I would say you *are* currently getting your money's worth.
Also, assuming you spend a fixed amount of money per month on entertainment, each dollar given to independent sources of entertainment is a dollar not given to the media conglomerates.
In this way we work to take down the media cartel and put up a friendlier system in its place.
Karma: Bored. (Thinking about resurrecting the "Anyone else is an imposter" joke.)
As long as EFF is supporting the rights of spammers, I will not be making donations of any amount to EFF.
Examples of this include John Gilmore's infamous toad.com mail server, Brad Templeton's boneheaded statements about spam as free speech and EFF's objections to anti-spam filtering.
It is time EFF to stop the support of this cancer of the net.
Proletariat of the world, unite to kill spammers
In Soviet Russia, I ruled you
So yes, exploding dog does count.
My Slashdot account is old enough to drink...
You have some sensible ideas about how to make the EFF a better organization. Have you considered donating some of your time to help them utilize the Internet more effectively?
the moment their spending rises significantly over their governmental salary, launch a small investigation and find where the money came from. if it came from any lobby, throw that person in jail and backfill his government seat.
:-(
Unfortunately, first it would be necessary to delegalize form of bribery called "lobbying". Fat chance that those who get money this way would pass any law thay would stop it
The only way appears to be "raise more money and buy them back".
The moon is not fully subjugated. I demand a second assault wave preceded by a massive nuclear bombardment.
I strongly believe that the battles that are coming will require that FSF (where I work) and EFF both be as strong as possible. I pay $107.40 annually for my home Internet service (a cheap 56K dialup). I am today renewing my annual donation to EFF, increasing my usual amount from $65 to $107.40. I just yesterday pledged $120 to FSF for 2003. (Eben Moglen, BTW, recently gave substantially more than that). I hope that you will choose to support both organizations at the same level as your ISP charges (or split the amount of your annual ISP charges equally between FSF and EFF).
Sincerely,
Bradley M. Kuhn, Executive Director, Free Software Foundation
Joining an organization like the EFF is great--really. I'm a member, and you should be too. But if you really want to be effective in changing the policies that effect you, there are cheaper and better things you can do. The refrain here on /. is that Big Evil Corporations do whatever they want. As a political scientists, I can tell you that's only half true. In general, big corporations and special interests only win on issues that are out of the public eye. In other words, issues members of congress don't get bothered about.
Forget all this stuff about emailing your representative--most (though not all!) members of congress ignore email, because they get so much of it. Snail mail is the traditional way to go here. However, academic studies have shown that faxes and phone calls to congressional members' Washington office are the most effective in influencing policy. A few short phone calls are a lot cheaper than a membership in the EFF. And what sort of a geek are you if you can't get your computer to send a fax?
So what the fuck are you waiting for? Find out who your Senators and Rep is, and pick up the phone.
Say, "My name is Joe Hacker, a I'm a constituent and regular Slashdot reader. I use the Linux operating system on my computer and I'm a member of the open source software community. I'm deeply concerned about digital rights issues. I want to know where Senator X / Rep. Y stands on these issues."
Force them to articulate an opinion, and ask them to send you a packet outlining the member's positions on digital rights issues, the Microsoft Anti-Trust action, online privacy, the DMCA, etc. I guarantee you that if only 10% of Slashdot readers had called up their elected representatives, 80% of the crappy legislation we have to deal with wouldn't have been passed in the first place.
I used to give the EFF money, and now I don't, for precisely the reason you cite -- I disagree with them whole-heartedly on a couple issues they're totally, utterly wrong about (particularly, their constant, wrong-headed attacks on spam-lists as being anti-free-speech, as if my decision to use the SBL somehow gags an activist, or is not a personal decision like chosing which newspaper to buy).
I won't give money to support an organization that makes such awful decisions and is unwilling to listen to reasonable arguments.
If you're like me, pick your fights more specifically -- donate to individual legal funds, find smaller, more issue-oriented causes.
-- q
To play DVDs on Linux, you need to break the law, in America and soon elsewhere as well.
That's not true. To play DVDs on Linux FOR FREE, you need to break the law. There'd be nothing illegal against someone creating a closed-source DVD player that actually went through the trouble of licensing the DVD decoder, like every other software entity has to do.
If it was important enough to enough people who would drop $20 on it, you'd see a commercial Linux DVD player overnight.
I totally understand your point; it's just that you're saying two different things.
To say that it's illegal to play DVDs on Linux is untrue -- you just have to go through the same process every other company does and pay the DVD decoder license.
To your second point, yes, the product couldn't be freely distributed, but that a different issue! If it's important to you, why wouldn't you pay a company a couple bucks to develop it (and the DVD decoder license)? I don't see how it's that different from any of the good closed-source Linux packages that people see fit to pay for (admittedly there are few, but if this is something you really want, why not just pay for it?).
This is not a case of Linux being picked on; it's a case of Linux having to play by the rules of the rest of the world. If Linux users were willing to pay for it, they'd get it.