The 463: Inside Tech Policy

Dog Bites Man: Eric Schmidt Endorses Obama

Usually, political endorsements that follow conventional wisdom get little attention ("Gee! The NRA endorsed a Republican?!" -- "A Democrat just got the nod from the AFL-CIO?! OMG!).

It's the (somewhat) surprise factor (not to mention gravitas) that made people sit-up and pay attention to yesterday's Colin Powell news.

So, today's WSJ story on Google CEO Eric Schmidt "endorsing" Obama managed to raise my jet-lagged eyebrows. As the story notes, Schmidt has been involved with the campaign as an advisor on Internet and clean tech policy for a good while. He also has participated in at least one advisory meeting with the candidate regarding the economy. And, it is a relatively well known fact that the several on the Google team played a key role in consultations that led to Obama's tech policy plan that was not so coincidentally announced at Google last November.

Is it possible to advise a campaign without endorsing it?

(BTW, I do get how this is really about packaging tech and business leader endorsements).

Oh, and since Google is a place that is so proud of doing things unconventionally, perhaps I also shouldn't be surprised by the following related tidbits that were found in a few minutes of searching:

--As the WSJ briefly notes, Schmidt hasn't given any money to Obama. This means that, according to the campaign, 3.1 million people have given more money to support Obama than the CEO of Google who will be traveling with said candidate. A 58-year-old massage therapist in Anchorage has given $2000 more than Eric Schmidt. This is made stranger by the fact that Schmidt is no political babe in the woods. He got politically active when at Novell and battling Microsoft. And, he has been involved in plenty of Valley/DC money activities in prior cycles. In 2004, he gave money to Kerry, Lieberman, Dean and Gephardt. Perhaps he didn't find it money well spent. This cycle he has maxed-out contributions to Google's PAC (for mostly Congressional candidates) and the DNC ($25,000).

--Despite recently getting quite smart and engaged on FCC issues, Larry Page hasn't given any money to a candidate this cycle (at least he hasn't made any contributions that qualify for FEC recording). He has made requisite $5,000 contribution to the Google PAC.

--And, likewise, Sergey Brin has only made the Google PAC give. This surprises me only because I was at an election party in 2004 with Brin and happened to be the only person there with a computer. Predictably, Brin and others gathered around the light of the laptop and were much more interested in tracking the moment by moment mathematical swings in key Ohio counties than wait for some suit with a TelePrompTer tell them that the election was over. And, when it was over, I got a sense of genuine wistfulness from Brin that he didn't get involved in one way, shape or form.

Obama & McCain Debate Tech Policy

Not shockingly, outside of knowing nods at the benefits clean technologies, there has been precious few tech policy moments during the debates or in the rest of this mavericky election. So, as a public service to our dear target audience, below is a replay of last year's Obama and McCain (separate) appearances at Google. If you play the videos at the same time, you can pretend they are debating, my friend.

Obama's visit was in November -- when most thought he might give Hilary Clinton a run, but wouldn't prove victorious. And, McCain's visit was last May -- when even members of his own campaign team didn't think he had much of a chance.

Obama is from Google and McCain is from AT&T

Or, at least, so says this somewhat oversimplified essay from the Washington Monthly.

Convention Wrap: Where Tech Meets the Pols (or not)

I have friends still drying up getting over the enthusiasm and energy from their time spent at the conventions the last couple weeks.

Thanks to the power of that neat technology called video, here's an easy way to do a recap without writing a lot of words.

First, here is CNET's high energy Charlie Cooper and the tranquilized Declan (The Iconoclast) McCullugh talking about the two presidential candidates and their respective tech policy positions...

Now, courtesy of Tech Daily's Andrew Noyes, here's Telecommunications Industry Association President Grant Seiffert talking geek meets politician stuff...

Speaking of Andrew, he covered the Republican RIAA party, and buried one of the great under-reported stories of the conventions. Headlining the RIAA Democratic convention party was Kanye West. The dude sitting on a stool and singing covers at the Republican party was American Idol finalist Chris Daughtry. It's pretty clear who the RIAA thinks is going to win.

Andrew also posted pretty pictures of the Republican Google party. Here's one...

Oh, and here's a found video on YouTube that gives you a walk around of the same Google party set in Denver. Feel free to name those tunes in the comments (did I hear Peaches?!). Great dancing. Woo.

I Hear Kayne West Was Great

[Editor's note: 463er Katie Hallen reports from Denver. Katie, if it was me in Denver and not (463 partner) Jim Hock, I would have done everything to hook you up with a convention floor pass and tickets to the RIAA/One Campaign party with Kayne. I'm sorry that Jim is so selfish....]

From the Google and Digg hosted blogger tent (above) to Barack Obama’s text messages and Twitter feeds, tech took center stage at this week’s Democratic National Convention in Denver. Tech events and parties were among the hottest tickets in town. A few highlights from the Mile-High City:

Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter hosted an all-star clean tech lunch at the governor’s mansion for members of TechNet, the bipartisan group of CEOs and senior execs focused on advancing the innovation economy. Kleiner Perkins’s John Gage, Facebook’s Chris Kelly, Google.org’s Dan Reicher, Project Better Place’s Michael Granoff, Tesla Motors’ Diarmuid O’Connell and other tech influencers gathered in one of only three governor’s mansions with rooftop solar panels. Forbes.com’s Brian Wingfield recaps the event.

The Consumer Electronics Association released a national poll that showed 62 percent of Democrats say they benefit from free trade. Later that day, CEA held a press conference outside its “America Wins with Trade” bus with Congressman Gregory Meeks (D-NY) (below) to call on Congress to pass stalled trade agreements and recognize trade’s positive force in creating jobs. BusinessWeek’s Catherine Holahan has the story here and here's her video report...

Untitled from catherine holahan on Vimeo.

While 463 partner Jim Hock scored floor credentials and headed to the Pepsi Center, I settled for stopovers at some of the numerous parties in the clubs, restaurants, museums and streets of downtown Denver. Joe Pantoliano (The Soprano’s Ralph Cifaretto) and billionaire Ted Turner turned out for the kick-off party at the Denver Art Museum. John Legend performed at the Democratic Leadership Council’s party at Beta Nightclub. The mayors of Denver and St. Paul were spotted walking together to the Best Buy party at Lucky Strike.

The Technology Reception at Rioja Restaurant, hosted by TechNet and co-sponsored by 463, drew a huge crowd of tech-policy followers with an unverified visit by filmmaker Laurie David.

CEA and TechNet are 463 clients.

What Google is Doing in Denver

From the National Journal via Tech Daily...

The company also has set up Google and YouTube booths within the Pepsi Center -- but its involvement doesn't stop there.

In tony LoDo, the Lower Downtown district of Denver stacked with upscale eateries, hotels and shops, Google is co-sponsoring the "Big Tent," a two-story structure that is a gathering place for bloggers and sessions on topics ranging from climate change to evangelical politics.

And the company leaves its calling card Thursday, when Google CEO Eric Schmidt speaks at the tent -- while throwing a shindig that evening with Vanity Fair at the Exdo Event Center near downtown, where invited guests can watch Obama's acceptance speech in style. The facility features what it calls a "New York loft style atmosphere."

Speaking of Tech Daily, the enterprising Andrew Noyes is taking it for the team and reporting on the tech policy happenings and gabfests FROM DC (contrary to prior reports and claimed sightings). David Hatch of NJ's Convention Daily is on the ground in Denver.

The Case for a National CTO

Mitch Kapor is a smart guy who gets both the business side of tech and the policy world. He founded Lotus way back in 1982 and cofounded EFF in 1990. More recently, he became one of Senator Obama's (several) tech advisors who helped the campaign devise its tech policy policy positions.

The current MIT Tech Review has an interview with Kapor where he expounds on his call for a National CTO...

TR: Why does the country need a CTO?
Kapor: The underlying premise is that tech is inextricably intertwined with virtually everything. You can't talk about homeland security or education or energy without it being in large part a conversation about technology. The president will be well served if policy making is done in a more technologically sophisticated way.... The advantage of a CTO is that there can be coördination. There's a ton of work that goes on within different agencies: there needs to be someone to identify the best ways of doing things and some common practices.

When the Obama tech policy plan was announced, I wrote:

A month or so ago the question of whether the next president should have a CTO came up in a work conversation among a diverse group of tech policy folks. We all agreed that the title is nice, but you would need to establish and delineate real power for it. Of course, the best way to do this would be to create a cabinet position for technology and innovation. People rolled their eyes at this until it was reminded to them that we do have a Secretary of Agriculture. What industry is more important to the next 100 years of the United States?

Of course, historically, the adding of a new cabinet position generally comes in a time of war or heightened crisis. Not during slow boiling worries over competitiveness.

So the most telling tech policy appointment by the next president will be Secretary of Commerce (yes, more so than FCC chair). The president will have a host of business leaders from multiple sectors to chose from. Will he pick one who eats, sleeps and breaths technology driven innovation? Or one more comfortable with the oil or food industries (for example)? This Secretary will have the authority to provide a true bully pulpit amidst an administration.

A national CTO would be a nice to have. A savvy Commerce Secretary is a need to have.

Update: Scoble has jumped into this convo with a discussion on who the CTO should be.

From Attack Dog to Music Blog

Former (current?) Hillary Clinton communications director Howard Wolfson has a new blog.

He is using it as an unabashed platform for promoting his music likes. (As opposed to the more abashed me).

BTW, Howard, if you like Grizzly Bear, check out this Girl Talk remix. And, you also have a kindred blogger spirit in the venture capitalist Fred Wilson.

Newt's Valley Guy

David Kralick works for Newt Gingrich in Silicon Valley and attracts strange artificial lighting wherever he goes. (photo by Chistina Koci Hernandez for The Washington Post)

The Post has a piece today about Newt Gingrich's emissary to Silicon Valley. It's written by a Bay Area native with an engaging, evocative style and doesn't spare many clichés about life and work between San Jose and South of Market. (Neither apparently does the Post's photo editors. See above).

The lede:

Here, he's from another planet. Here in Silicon Valley, David Kralik is, let's face it, some strange import. That's why he's attracting such buzz one recent afternoon inside Buck's, the legendary eatery, while lunching on a pulled-pork sandwich.

Jamis MacNiven, Buck's owner, plops himself down and blurts out: "So you're the guy that works for Newt the Snoot!"

Yep, that's Kralik. A lifelong Republican in the land of liberal Democrats. Who relocated from uptight, Brooks Brothers Washington. And works for Newt Gingrich.

Bucks really needs to be taken out of the Let's Go Silicon Valley Guide for Media. And, OMG a Republican in Silicon Valley! Get me my binoculars, ma!

But, there are good amounts of interesting anecdotes in the piece -- especially centered around how to apply tech to solve big government problems....

...Says Peter Leyden, the former editor of Wired magazine who heads the New Politics Institute, a think tank focusing on technology's impact on Washington: "There's an emerging sense that both worlds need each other. Think of it this way: The scale of the problems that the world faces -- globalization, global warming, global terrorism -- can't be solved without these two hubs cooperating with each other."
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Kralik knows all of this full well. On a recent six-hour flight from Washington to the Valley, he drafted a three-column chart. "The world that works." "The world that fails." "Making government from a world that fails to a world that works."

Kralik puts the U.S. Census Bureau in the world-that-fails column. After spending more than $150 million on handheld computers to count everyone in the country, the Census Bureau announced a few weeks ago that it will scrap that program and hire 600,000 temporary workers and go back to the same way that it's counted people since 1790: with paper and pen.

"You've got to be kidding me, right?" says an incredulous Kralik. "Why can't we get together the brightest minds at Google, at Apple, at whatever companies here in the Valley, and figure out a more high-tech way of counting our citizens?"

Let the Obama v. McCain in Silicon Valley Stories Begin...

v.

Amy Schatz of the WSJ is the first out of the gate with a Obama v. McCain-for-the-hearts-and-wallets-of-Silicon-Valley story. (Previous pieces hedged with other candidates).

Few presidential candidates have had as much experience dealing with technology and telecommunications issues as Sen. McCain, who for years chaired a Senate committee that deals with them. But he rarely brings tech issues up on the campaign trail and hasn't released many significant policy proposals about them yet.

By contrast, his likely rival, Sen. Obama of Illinois, presented a detailed technology agenda in November that addressed many of the industries' hot-button issues -- including support for building faster broadband networks and keeping Internet traffic unfettered. He has subsequently raised significantly more Silicon Valley cash than Sen. McCain.

A running total of campaign donations by Silicon Valley zip codes maintained by TechNet, an association made up of 150 high-tech chief executive officers, finds that by March 31, Sen. Obama had raised $5 million, compared with almost $800,000 for Mr. McCain.

The piece notes that the discrepancy in funding between the two candidates can be partially attributed to the fact that tech issues aside, there just happens to be a lot more people ideologically attuned to Obama in the Bay Area. Very true, but a well-done June Atlantic Monthly piece also shows how Obama quietly used the Valley as a fundraising launching pad for his campaign early in the process...

...But more than any policy, the idea of Obama and the world he speaks for seemed to excite something deep within the limbic system of the Valley brain that manifested itself through the early and continuing financial support that was crucial to launching Obama’s campaign. Getting behind Obama, especially for those who did so early, appealed to their self-image as discerning seers.

Discerning seering aside, the WSJ does pick up on one policy note that will likely be exploited by McCain with industry-types in the coming months (and with good reason): Free trade. As the primary election trudged on, Obama's pragmatist instincts were smothered by an apparent need to score populist political points on the issue. McCain has had no need for nuance on the need for free trade in a global economy.

BTW, this week marks the year anniversary of McCain's keynote interview at the All Things D conference (my picture below). I remember a general feeling among the many tech execs in the audience of "it's kind of embarrassing that this guy has zero chance to get the nomination and he's speaking here, but, hey, he's a war hero, a senator, and (John) Chambers supports him, so I guess I will listen."

Even more tellingly, was the post-speech handshake tour among the dining attendees. Cisco's Chambers diligently introduced the Senator to different tables of folks. It was all very polite and people were genuinely interested in meeting and talking to McCain, but there was no rush of people to do so. Folks stood back and if McCain made it to their table, than great, if not, than, hey, look over there... what is Chad Hurley wearing?

It would be different scene altogether if McCain was speaking this year (not to mention Obama). Just shows how vaunted visionaries can miss half of the future even when it has walked in the room and extended its hand.