Thanks to Ilan, the founder of SCALE, I was notified of this list of 50 congresspeople who take money from the RIAA. Here’s the breakdown (from Consumerist.com):
| Congressperson Receiving Contributions From The RIAA |
Amount |
| Dist 19-FL |
WEXLER, ROBERT |
DEM |
|
$9,000 |
| Dist 21-TX |
SMITH, LAMAR |
REP |
|
$7,500 |
| Senate-UT |
HATCH, ORRIN G |
REP |
|
$6,000 |
| Senate-PA |
SPECTER, ARLEN |
REP |
|
$5,000 |
| Senate-AK |
STEVENS, THEODORE F |
REP |
|
$5,000 |
| Senate-NE |
NELSON, E BENJAMIN |
DEM |
|
$5,000 |
| Senate-CA |
FEINSTEIN, DIANNE |
DEM |
|
$4,000 |
| Dist 45-CA |
BONO, MARY |
REP |
|
$4,000 |
| Senate-FL |
NELSON, BILL |
DEM |
|
$4,500 |
| Dist 08-FL |
KELLER, RICHARD A |
REP |
|
$4,054 |
| Dist 07-NJ |
FERGUSON, MIKE |
REP |
|
$4,000 |
| Dist 28-CA |
BERMAN, HOWARD L |
DEM |
|
$3,500 |
| Dist 29-CA |
SCHIFF, ADAM |
DEM |
|
$3,000 |
| Dist 30-CA |
WAXMAN, HENRY A. |
DEM |
|
$3,000 |
| Dist 07-MO |
BLUNT, ROY |
REP |
|
$3,100 |
| Dist 06-TN |
GORDON, BARTON JENNINGS |
DEM |
|
$3,000 |
| Dist 06-VA |
GOODLATTE, ROBERT W. |
REP |
|
$3,500 |
| Senate-IL |
OBAMA, BARACK |
DEM |
|
$2,000 |
| Dist 14-IL |
HASTERT, DENNIS J. |
REP |
|
$2,000 |
| Dist 07-MA |
MARKEY, EDWARD J MR. |
DEM |
|
$2,000 |
| Dist 05-MD |
HOYER, STENY HAMILTON |
DEM |
|
$2,000 |
| Dist 14-MI |
CONYERS, JOHN JR. |
DEM |
|
$2,000 |
| Dist 03-MS |
PICKERING, CHARLES W |
REP |
|
$2,000 |
| Senate-NY |
CLINTON, HILLARY RODHAM |
DEM |
|
$2,000 |
| Senate-TN |
CORKER, ROBERT P JR |
REP |
|
$2,000 |
| Dist 07-TN |
BLACKBURN, MARSHA |
REP |
|
$2,000 |
| Dist 06-TX |
BARTON, JOE LINUS |
REP |
|
$2,000 |
| Senate-AL |
SHELBY, RICHARD C |
REP |
|
$1,000 |
| Senate- AR |
PRYOR, MARK LUNSFORD |
DEM |
|
$1,000 |
| Dist 10- CA |
TAUSCHER, ELLEN O |
DEM |
|
$1,000 |
| Dist 22- CA |
MCCARTHY, KEVIN |
REP |
|
$1,000 |
| Dist 49-CA |
ISSA, DARRELL EDWARD |
REP |
|
$1,000 |
| Dist 14-FL |
MACK, CONNIE |
REP |
|
$1,500 |
| Dist 05-IL |
EMANUEL, RAHM |
DEM |
|
$1,000 |
| Senate-LA |
VITTER, DAVID |
REP |
|
$1,000 |
| Dist 06-MI |
UPTON, FREDERICK STEPHEN |
REP |
|
$1,000 |
| Senate-MS |
LOTT, TRENT |
REP |
|
$1,000 |
| Dist 06-NC |
COBLE, JOHN HOWARD |
REP |
|
$1,000 |
| Dist 09-NC |
MYRICK, SUE |
REP |
|
$1,000 |
| Dist 02-NE |
TERRY, LEE |
REP |
|
$1,811 |
| Dist 07-NY |
CROWLEY, JOSEPH |
DEM |
|
$1,000 |
| Dist 10-NY |
TOWNS, EDOLPHUS |
DEM |
|
$1,500 |
| Dist 28-NY |
SLAUGHTER, LOUISE M |
DEM |
|
$1,000 |
| Dist 05-OH |
GILLMOR, PAUL E |
REP |
|
$1,000 |
| Dist 01-OK |
SULLIVAN, JOHN |
REP |
|
$1,000 |
| Dist 02-OR |
WALDEN, GREGORY PAUL |
REP |
|
$1,000 |
| Dist 01-WA |
INSLEE, JAY R |
DEM |
|
$1,000 |
| Senate-SD |
THUNE, JOHN |
REP |
|
$1,000 |
| Dist 05-TN |
COOPER, JAMES H. S. |
DEM |
|
$1,500 |
It’s important to note that the top Democratic presidential hopefuls, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, made the list, whereas Republican presidential hopefuls in Congress, such as John McCain, did not.
This gives me the opportunity to leak some info: you’re going to see a massive community-led project on this site in the near future on this very subject. Stay tuned!
Note that there is contact info for each individual named above in the linked article.
Tags: Action,
News,
lobbyists,
political campaigns,
politicians,
riaa
For those who think the open format legislation battle is all about one competitor vs. another, you’re wrong. This write-up on the recent KOffice ODF Sprint is a good example of what can happen with a truly open format: collaboration, spontaneous innovation, and multiple implementations of technology that benefit several vendors, not just one. The creativity on display in that report is a direct result of the freedom to implement and make use of an open format.
More info on the KOffice ODF Sprint.
Tags: News,
kde,
koffice,
odf,
open formats
I read the early transcript of Szulik’s keynote from day 1 of OSBC 2007. I was heartened to hear this bit on open formats in general:
Governments around the Globe are putting money into thinking about and implementing open standards, such as ODF.
It’s good to see companies like Red Hat wholly supporting open standards. Not only is it the right thing to do, but it also makes perfect business sense for a company like Red Hat. Perhaps Mr. Szulik would be so kind as to sign the BytesFree.org pledge and promise not to lock users into closed formats.
Edit: I just noticed this post at LinuxQuestions.org where Jeremy notes one other aspect of Szulik’s keynote: social responsibility:
In his [Szulik's] opinion he feels that Open Source also has a social responsibility component. He gives as an example a research institute that had to ditch a decade of breast cancer research due to data incompatibilities
More companies and CEO’s could learn from this example. Add that to the long list of examples for why we need open standards and legal protection of information access rights.
Tags: News,
matt szulik,
odf,
open source business conference,
osbc,
osbc2007,
red hat
For those of us who thought copyright law in the United States couldn’t possibly get any stronger, we were shocked and dismayed by the unveiling today of a new lobbyist group comprised of “backers of stronger copyright laws.” This group is led by the usual suspects: RIAA, MPAA, Microsoft, Viacom and Disney.
There was lots of talk about copyright owners who still want to get paid and promoting the vital role of copyright in the US economy. Nowhere to be found was any discussion about our right to access information and how current US copyright laws violate this basic human right.
2 good things came from the article. We now know which politicians in Washington to target:
The group’s formation drew applause from key politicians who preside over copyright law changes, including U.S. House of Representatives Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers (D-Mich.) and Rep. Howard Berman (D-Calif.), who heads a key House panel that influences copyright laws.
The other thing that I came across, and I must stupidly admit to being entirely unaware of this, was the Digital Freedom Campaign, which apparently launched in October. On that page, you’ll see a link to sign a petition for the “Digital Freedom Bill of Sights and Sounds.” While personally I’d like to see less reliance on the word “digital” and more references to “information” (since all information is going digital, anyway), this looks like an effort worthy of more support. Sign the petition today!
Tags: Action,
News,
copyright reform,
human rights,
mafiaa,
microsoft,
mpaa
In some of the video posted on this site from the April 17 JEDE committee hearing, one of the defenses Microsoft used to oppose AB 1668 is that everyone was already converging on standards so there was no need for legislation. I have always stated that if Microsoft’s OpenXML (or OOXML) passes all of the standards hurdles, then great, it can be accepted under the terms of the bill. I have the opposite view of Microsoft - if everyone is converging on standards, then let’s write it into law before the pendelum swings back the other way.
However, I just read a post on Bob Suter’s blog (Sutor works at IBM), and apparently OOXML won’t be so “open” after all. It would appear that some of the bits encoded into an OOXML doc require Microsoft Office to run. There are also ways to save binary files that only have relevance on a Windows platform. Luckily, AB 1668 would require multiple vendor implementations of any standard.
The reason it’s so difficult for Microsoft to tow the standards line is that their revenue depends on a continued Office monopoly, thus the reason they’re willing to spend significant resources fighting all of these open standards bills.
Tags: News,
ab 1668,
ibm,
microsoft,
odf,
ooxml
Microsoft has entered a new stage of aggression against open source technology and open formats. On this web site and many others, I have reported on the various shenanigans Microsoft has employed to stop current open formats legislation. And now Microsoft has taken to veiled threats against the free software community with possible patent litigation in the future, stating that various free software projects violate 235 Microsoft patents.
Microsoft has not explicitly threatened to sue anyone, and I kind of think they won’t. However, lost in the hubbub is the potential impact on the US economy should they make good on any veiled threats. It’s also important to note that, even if they don’t sue, their actions to spread misinformation will still have an economic impact. This impact will take the form of more companies with a “no open source policy” and more still that will remove open source software for fear of litigation.
If one takes the view of Linux as a $6 billion annual market and assumes that alternatives to Linux would cost at least double, this means that the global IT market would be on the hook for another $6 billion - which translates to $6 billion in opportunity cost. Of course, if the patents are valid, this is moot, but I suspect most of them are not. Microsoft hasn’t been too helpful in this regard by not releasing which actual patents are at issue.
Related to the open formats issue, another opportunity cost concerns the amount of money companies shovel into Microsoft’s coffers every year to purchase Microsoft Office. If not for this, I’m pretty sure companies could make use of this money on other things, including new business development and other money-generating activities. The market for office software is enormous, and so is the sunk opportunity cost.
As with the open formats issue, Microsoft could choose to be a team player and work with other companies on a patent solution. They have chosen not to. They could reveal which patents are violated now so that the affected companies could, if the patents violations are valid, remove the infringing code. It appears that Microsoft wants the threat of legal action so that they can cow the market. When Microsoft complains about their formats not being accepted in open formats legislation and about patent-infringing open source software, I hope plenty of people point out that the pain is of their own doing.
Tags: News,
microsoft,
patent reform,
shakedown
Do you create software? Do you know someone who does? Take the BytesFree.org pledge. Promise not to make software that violates our information access rights.
Tags: Action
Was happy to see Andy Updegrove’s Standards Blog with news that Norway is looking to adopt ODF and PDF as mandatory document formats. From his post:
Norway is the latest European country to move closer to mandatory government use of ODF (and PDF). According to a press release provided in translation to me by an authoritative source, Norway now joins Belgium, Finland, and France (among other nations) in moving towards a final decision to require such use.
See the full post here. Note that nothing is final yet, so there’s still time for shenanigans.
Tags: News
Here’s a paper I wrote to define what I feel should be the ultimate goal of digital rights: constitutional protection of our rights to information. I put it on the bytesfree.org wiki under a Creative Commons license so that others may edit it. The long and short of it is this: Access to information is a basic human right and should be explicitly defined as such. Exchanging information in a proprietary format; forcing me to use a specific tool to access content; denying me the ability to create my own tool to access content; or any other means of erecting artificial barriers to information is a violation of my rights. We must put these rights into law.
Tags: News
Jeff complains that Digg.com caved to pressure when it agreed to stop censoring posts about everyone’s favorite hexadecimal number.
Um yeah, Jeff. You see, there’s this history of people rebelling when laws become too oppressive and do not represent the wishes of the people. It’s called civil disobedience. Perhaps you should look it up. I guess all of those civil rights leaders should have just taken it on the chin during Jim Crow?
Tags: News
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