Lobbying For Linux

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Posted by timothy on Saturday September 20, 2003 @07:40AM from the man-on-the-ground dept.

Telex4 writes "Slashdot has heard a lot lately about why software patents are bad, and the passage of the legislation in the EU. But other than the online demo and a few pictures of the demonstration outside the European Parliament, Slashdotters hear little about the real behind-the-scenes lobbying. I've just put an article up on Newsforge describing and discussing my experiences lobbying inside the Parliament that might shed a little light on what we mortal geeks can do to save ourselves. There are some accompanying photos on my web site for those who like visual aids." (NewsForge and Slashdot are both part of OSDN.)

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hmm by Anonymous Coward · 2003-09-20 07:42 · Score: -1, Offtopic

interesting, indeed
imho by Anonymous Coward · 2003-09-20 08:02 · Score: -1, Offtopic

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Re:imho (Oops !) by Anonymous Coward · 2003-09-20 08:05 · Score: -1, Offtopic

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how can you have a legislative body that... by HBI · 2003-09-20 08:44 · Score: -1, Offtopic

has no commonality of experience?

I mean, at least in the US experience, civil war was precipitated by sectional division in the Congress, more than anything else. When one side got a majority through population growth, the other side pulled out of the government and there was a war.

My point is basically "What does a Greek or a Dane have in common with a Spaniard that would cause them to coexist in a government that votes against their interests in the majority of cases?" I mean, it's going to happen eventually that some nation will be pissed off at what the European Parliament does.

I look at how other multiethnic/racial nation-states have welded themselves together. The US, for all the immigration, has remained a primarily white European Protestant nation. The Russian Empire and the Soviets after them tended to send Great Russians to live in the republics, so as to solidify control by having a large minority of ethnic Russians in any particular Central Asian locale. The Chinese do about the same in their Central Asian lands, or they use troops. So how is the EU going to do it? Is it a loose confederation? Or will there be a war the day a country decides they'd rather go it alone? I've read a few books on the topic of the EU and they all talk about it like it's going to last forever.

--
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
1. Re:how can you have a legislative body that... by Anonymous Coward · 2003-09-20 09:15 · Score: -1, Offtopic
  
  You're questions would be better addressed by reading more books on the subject(s), but one example of "commonality of experience" can be found in international trade. The EU, as a single trading block, can wield considerably more power when negotiating with 1000 pound gorillas like the U.S. than can any individual country. The farmer in Parma objecting to the use of the term "Parmesan" by U.S. makers of fake-parmesan can join forces with the French winemakers trying ot protect the integrity of "Champagne" label; this was on the table in the recent WTO discussion. Then there's the on-going banana wars in which certain EU countries with existing ties to their ex-colonies would prefer to continue to do business with them rather than with the U.S. conglomerates irrespective of price. Add subsidies and bio-technology into the mix and it becomes explosive.
  
  More important but less tangible issues relate to the flow of capital and how the international markets work. The U.S. gets to finance multi-billion dollar programs like the Iraq escapade only because investors in other countries choose to buy U.S. dollars rather than euros.