An enterprising group of techies who oppose the Stop Online Piracy Act is taking a page from corporate America with a fundraising campaign to hire its own lobbyist firm. With millions of dollars being thrown at members of Congress on behalf of corporations that want the power to shut down websites suspected of intellectual property infringement, an eight-person team calling itself "We The Lobby" is trying to give ordinary people a similar way of influencing votes in Congress.
Since getting the site online on Monday, the group has raised more than $1,300 toward its goal of $10,000, which will be used to lobby against both SOPA and PIPA (the Protect IP Act).
"There are so many times when it seems like 'call your Senator' or 'write your Senator' is the only cause of action for someone concerned with an issue," Web interaction designer and We The Lobby member Peter Knocke told Ars. When researching SOPA, Knocke and his fellow We The Lobby members concluded, to their dismay, that Congress members are largely uneducated about the Internet and that their primary sources of education are lobbyist firms.
"99% of the time this type of lobby representation is only available to corporate interests. It's never really available to the common person," said We The Lobby's legal advisor Adam Dunn, who has a law degree and said he used to work for a law and lobbying firm in Washington, DC. The rest of the New York City-based We The Lobby team is mostly made up of Web developers, designers, and software engineers.
For now, We The Lobby is just taking pledges. Credit cards won't be charged unless the goal of raising $10,000 is met by Feb. 16—although if the deadline comes and the goal is almost met, the team may extend that deadline.
Knocke noted that you can get lobbying services for as little as $1,000 on Lobbyit.com, but the team settled on $10,000 as a good starting point to have some real sway. They're already contacting lobby firms to find one suitable for the cause, and later on will ask pledgers to vote on the exact direction the cause should be taken. Dunn notes that lobby firms exist for all political persuasions, from liberal to conservative and in between, and are typically staffed with former Congressional staff members or lawyers who know how to get face time with elected leaders.
"The Internet is so good at pulling resources together, but we're not in Washington, and we're not the experts and professionals on how to make this actual change," Knocke said. "We want to be grounded in reality, in how the system actually works and what's the best way to get change through the system, which is partnering with these professional lobbying firms that do this day in and day out." Whichever lobbying firm the group chooses will have to sign an agreement guaranteeing transparency into the process, said Web developer and We The Lobby lead developer Sankho Mallik.
With Wednesday marking SOPA Resistance Day at Ars, we reported earlier on the various things you can do to protest, from calling Congress to blacking out your own websites to boycotting companies that support SOPA. We The Lobby was ahead of the curve—Mallik said he started considering the idea in December, taking his model in part from Kickstarter. "I got the idea: if corporations are paying law firms to work on their behalf, why can't we as a people do it?" Mallik said. "I went to Kickstarter, and they had an espresso machine project which was earning about $200,000, so I thought maybe people would want to put money toward things they are frustrated with in the political system."
We The Lobby isn't taking an official stance on OPEN, the Online Protection and Enforcement of Digital Trade Act, which has been put forward as a more reasonable alternative to SOPA. But Knocke said the group could end up opposing OPEN as well. "Currently, it is a little less threatening than SOPA/PIPA. So far we have not fully committed to attack it," he said. "As it gains more steam and attention we will look into fighting against it."
Although the group was started over concerns about SOPA and PIPA, We The Lobby is opening the door to raising money for other causes, as long as they are tied to specific pieces of legislation. Anyone interested can submit potential causes on the group's site. One other cause that's already listed is in support of a resolution proposing a Constitutional amendment excluding for-profit corporations from being counted as "people."
Listing image by Photo illustration by Aurich Lawson
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