The 463: Inside Tech Policy

Tech Policy Palooza

Lollapalooza is back this year with a three-day festival under the hot Chicago August sun.

The Computer Freedom & Privacy (CFP) conference is hitting DC next week with FOUR days of hot geek on geek debating action.

Lollapalooza will feature rock, hip-hop, alt-country, house, garage, electro, punk and dancehall.

CFP will throw down with all the most kickin' tech policy genres like Net Neutrality, privacy, digital content policy, Internet governance, and cyber security.

Sleater-Kinney, Built to Spill, Kayne West, The Flaming Lips, Gnarls Barkley, The Rapture and dozens of other artists will blast Chicago's Grant Park.

Senator Patrick Leahy, Congressman Joe Barton, Stewart Baker of DHS, PFF's Jim Delong, Google's Andrew McLaughlin, and Web 1.0-gone-2.0 guy Jonah Seiger will all be waving their arms in the air like they just don't care at the L'efant Plaza Hotel. 

[Oddly, former Tsunami and Grenadine lead singer, Jenny Toomey, will be on a CFP panel and not on the Chicago stage.  (She's actually the executive director of the Future of Music coalition)].

BTW, as I think about it, Lollapalooza organizer Perry Farrell would fit right in at a CFP event.  Maybe we can get him to spin at the 463 Happy Hour on Thursday night.

After the jump, our panel picks...   

Quaero: Qu’est que c’est?

The World is Flat.  India and China are advancing.  Iceland is kicking tail on broadband penetration.

World leaders are falling over themselves to preach innovation and competitiveness.

It's all a very serious global battle for who will prosper in the next economic era.  And, in tech policy world there's an endless cacophony of competitiveness doom and gloom.  Sometimes we just need bearable moments of lightness.

Thanks goodness then for the French.   As EE Times (and many others) reported this week:

President Jacques Chirac of France announced Tuesday (April 25) a 2 billion euro (about $2.5 billion) plan to back a series of projects including one on a Franco-German search engine intended to rival Google.

The search engine's name is to be Quaero said Chirac.  (It's Latin for "I search for.")

Yet, Chirac will likely be searching for a long time to find a French Google-killer.  Because it doesn't and won't exist.  As search-industry blogger John Battelle explains today: 

R v. D = A Sad Day for Tech Policy

One of the major hallmarks of the contemporary era of tech policy (1995-2006) is its bipartisanship.  Whether it's been stock option expensing, encryption exports, digital copyrights, R&D funding, securities litigation reform, immigration policy, etc..., the tech industry has had strong allies from both sides of the aisle (and, conversely, both Rs and Ds who opposed the industry, too).

You can question whether this truism is no longer thanks to the hot issue of the day -- Net Neutrality.  Consider the following vote breakdown from today's pro-Net Neutrality amendment offered by Ed Markey (D-Mass) in the House Energy & Commerce Committee.

Total vote:  23 yay - 34 nay

Dem vote:  22 - 5

Rep vote:  1- 29

Now, it doesn't matter if you love legislated Net Neutrality so much that you want to marry it or that you think it's a sure sign of the apocalypse. Or that, sure, Republicans are traditionally less apt to regulate and Democrats are more apt to take "pro-consumer" positions.  Throw both the gut feelings and the pragmatism out the window and recognize that partisanship in tech policy sadly means less examination of issues on their sometimes complicated merits and more policymaking that often first considers what's best for Democrats or Republicans.

Let's hope that Net Neutrality is an anomaly and not the beginning of a trend.

Deporting Innovation

What do the founders of Intel, Sun Microsystems and Google — Andy Grove, Andy Bechtolsheim, Vinod Khosla and Sergey Brin — have in common with Albert Einstein and Wernher von Braun? All are part of America's tradition of welcoming talented immigrants who have made significant contributions to our industry.

So starts an op-ed in USA Today penned by Sun Microsystems Chairman Scott McNealy and TechNet CEO Lezlee Westine.  Other exceprts...

Clean Tech Initiative Nearing Ballot

As Republicans and Democrats both take hits on oil companies making record profits in the shadow of upwardly spiraling gas prices, backers of the Clean Alternative Energy Act in California expect the turn in twice as many signatures needed to get their November initiative on the ballot.  From the LA Times:

...backers of (the) initiative contend that collecting as much as $380 million a year from an extraction tax on all oil pumped from California fields and offshore platforms would fund research needed to break what President Bush has described as the country's addiction to oil

The campaign is expected to submit petitions with 1.2 million signatures, about twice the number required by law, by the end of the month, said Julie Buckner, a spokeswoman for the campaign. It is being bankrolled by Hollywood movie producer Steve Bing and Silicon Valley venture capitalist Vinod Khosla.

High oil prices and profits, Buckner said, "are causing people to stop and think."

See more on the initiative and clean tech here.

Net Neutrality Goes Schoolhouse Rock

It's not "Conjunction Junction" and, to the consternation of many, it may not be "I'm Just a Bill."  Regardless, Net Neutrality is blowing up so large it's got it's own cartoon (okay, it's more like a well animated PowerPoint presentation).  Check it out after the jump below along with all sorts of Net Neutrality happenings...

Other Peoples' Patents

The Deal does a deep dive on the current issues surrounding the patent law reform fights and looks into the chances for legislative remedies this year.  Intro to the story after the jump...

This Week's DC Tech Policy Events

Notable events in DC this week (4/24-4/28) after the jump. The House and Senate are back in session and interoperability and competitiveness seem to be the topics of the week.

Beer, Oranges & Microsoft

Florida's State Senate District 14 includes Gainesville.  Let's look at who's giving money to the primary candidates for the seat...

Beer Distributors.  Check.

Citrus Packers.  Check.

Microsoft.  Huh?

In yet another example of how the times are changing in tech political giving, Microsoft has given to candidates on both sides of the primary and has already contributed nearly $10,000 to Florida legislative candidates.  Microsoft's federal PAC gave barely over $200,000 in 1998.

We're sure the hot race in Alachua County is topic du jour over lattes in Redmond these days.

But, seriously, we respect the right of Microsoft to get involved in the political process -- be it local or presidential politics.  It's a good thing that up-and-coming politicians learn about the value of technology and the policies that best tap its potential. We do wonder if the push to engage at the state level has anything to do with Microsoft's battles in Massachusetts over the state's decision to move from proprietary formats to ones supporting open standards.

Bush @Cisco

The downsides of the Iraqi war are aplenty.  But, one that doesn't get much mention by Bush critics is the fact that the War on Terrorism has taken W away from some of the elements of domestic policy that are in his comfort zone and benefit greatly from the President's attention.

Bush first gained the approval of the Republican tech crowd when he began his 2000 presidential campaign because he spoke from the heart about education reform and he spoke with experience as Governor of Texas.  Bush's interpersonal skills and ability to extemporaneously talk in-depth about education won over a group of tech executives who met with Bush at Cisco in 1999.  The execs weren't just supportive.  They were enthused and they were brought into the Bush fold for the long haul.

Obviously, today's forum at Cisco could be interpreted as partial payback for the support (here's the who and why behind the event).  But, more than anything, it was a welcome slice of what those tech execs hoped for when they got behind Bush.  The President spoke today with authority about education reform; public and private R&D funding; our innovation race with countries like China and India; and, and his administration's strategy for keeping America competitive.  No one begrudges the impact of 9/11, Afghanistan, Iraq and Katrina, but one can see how the President might have firmly cemented himself as the deserving Education President without those factors.  Don't just take our word for it, you can watch the entire Cisco event here.

After the jump are a few more 463 photos and the transcript of the event....