Very interesting article from TechCrunch on the wasted opportunity (my words) of technologists. Look at what we just saw is possible with SOPA / PIPA. We went from a backroom deal that they hoped would sneak through to public embarrassment and backpeddling that killed an otherwise sure thing. The reason why SOPA/PIPA were written has very little to do with pirating (not nothing, but very little). They were written to protect the privileged market position of entertainment arbiters in the face of innovation that makes them nearly irrelevant. (Same idea with Big Oil and alternative energy though not so stark in that we still really need oil.)
I find that technology, communications technology in particular, is littered with powerful examples of what if... What if Cable TV and Community Access wasn't crippled by funding and end-of-dial regulation? What if we wre allowed to leverage the foundational P2P architecture of the Internet to create connections between difference and "other" instead of like-interests?
We now know what is possible if the new-tech/communications/information industry comes together to apply pressure against regulation. What if they were to realize that Citizen's United is exactly the same threat as SOPA/PIPA? What if they were to realize that what is passing for political discourse is least-common-denominator and then decided to do something about it? What if the something they decided to do didn't provide a revenue boost to this FQ but provided a win for their customers, their communities, the commons. What-if...
http://techcrunch.com/2012/01/20/do-great-things/
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