Yes - I am all for it. The only concern is: if there is to strong a connection / correlation between the Dean campaign and this non profit service then the campaign is liable. I fully expect and would encourage something like this to happen - all the code is going to be open source - have at it, node host to your hearts content. These tools are going to be extremely useful on many different levels and many different applications. Splinter, rewrite, release - great.
-Zack On Tue, 22 Jul 2003, Britt Blaser wrote: > Why not welcome all campaigns to use the tools: Presidential, > congressional, state, etc.? Then we can gold plate the damn thing and > still be legal. Here's how I see it (from http://www.blaserco.com/blogs > ): > > A4D is being built by volunteers using an open source language (PHP) to > assemble software components (like Drupal, MySQL, RSS, etc.) to build > the toolkit. And their work is open source, so it's freely available > for others to re-use and improve by returning their improvements to the > code base. Sure, the code will be papered with advisories that it was > developed for the Dean campaign beta users�notices that must be left in > the code�but all candidates of all stripes are welcome to benefit from > this extraordinary body of work. > > If we offer it publicly and sincerely, it's just another open source > tool, which is required of us by the GPL anyway. Why be afraid of an > overwhelming grassroots movement of fundamentalist Internet mavens (is > there such a thing?). We should embrace all grassroots organizing that > raises the collective dialogue, since that exposes our most candid > thinking. > > Again, the GPL or any license requires us to re-publish the code, and > we assume some republicans/Kerryites will get the code by becoming > nodes. We're sharing it anyway, so if we say we're sharing it, the FEC > issues disappear, IMHO. > __________________________________________ > > > On Tuesday, July 22, 2003, at 11:02 AM, CMR wrote: > > >> Yeah, it is a soft money issue. Well you've got a good idea that I > >> will > > go check on (if one contributer payed for hosting out of pocket as a > > campaign contribution). But i think if this thing works hosting will > > cost > > a bit more than $2K a month and things will get messy. $2000 is not > > enough > >> to pay for this thing I think.... > >> > > > > Got it; and that's all fine by me (although, if it's just linux > > hosting, > > it's amazing what $2000, even $200, will buy...). > > > > But at least part of my idea on this was, what if (god forbid) Dean > > flails? > > As I've said a couple times before, this project is potentially much > > bigger > > than one cause because it's really all about the future of online > > networking/organizing. I'd hate to see things disintergrate if Dean > > "goes > > south", say, when the primaries go south. So having the hosting space > > might > > have given us an tangible "turf" where the organization's code and such > > could be sustained and a central "site" could operate if need be. > > > > But, even in this scenario, some hosting space could be always > > obtained at > > that junture and we all could (and will I imagine) talk about what, if > > anything, is next. So it's all good. (Besides, DEAN'S GONNA KICK > > BOODIE!!!) > > > > > > Cheers > > CMR > > > > <--enter gratuitous quotation that implies my profundity here--> > > > > > >
