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Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales: MPAA chairman Christopher Dodd should be fired

167 points by ukdm 15y ago

wisty 15y ago
Not as crazy as it sounds - he's saying Dodd essentially told the members of Congress not to expect any more campaign funding from Hollywood if they didn't play ball. I'm pretty sure it's bad form for a former senator to tell members of congress to vote one way, or lose funding from his lobby group. Especially if he says it on the public record.
- khafra 15y ago
  The way I understand it, the Citizens United decision made that type of bribery completely legal.
  - burgerbrain 15y ago
    Bad form nevertheless. We should be outraged still.
  - pemulis 15y ago
    That's not what the Citizens United decision says at all. It allows Super PACs to collect unlimited donations to run campaign ads supporting or opposing specific candidates. That may open the door to corruption in a certain sense, but it doesn't allow quid pro quo on active legislation.
    - wl 15y ago
      That's not quite correct, actually. Citizens United overturned a part of a law that prohibited corporations and unions from spending their money on "electioneering communications" (generally defined as communications advocating for or against a specific candidate) within 30 days of a primary or 60 days of a general election. The decision is not about PACs or limitations on their ability to raise funds, though PACs certainly benefited from the ruling.
    - khafra 15y ago
      > It allows Super PACs to collect unlimited donations to run campaign ads supporting or opposing specific candidates. That may open the door to corruption in a certain sense, but it doesn't allow quid pro quo on active legislation. If the Citizens United decision did not allow Super PACs to talk about supporting or opposing candidates based on their actions with regard to particular legislation, then I was wrong. But that would mean Dodd committed a particularly egregious violation of the law in public. I don't think he would do that, and I think you were wrong to say I was wrong.
bproper 15y ago
Dodd's no longer a politician and lobbying isn't illegal. If the MPAA thinks Dodd isn't effective, maybe they should fire him. But they won't let him go because he put his foot in his mouth and highlighted how the political process usually works.
- officemonkey 15y ago
  They should fire Dodd because his lobbying wasn't effective. He threw money around and thought his old buddy-buddy tactics were going to be enough to beat the Internet Rage Machine. It's a sea-change, and Chris Dodd just got left behind in the 20th Century.
  - jm4 15y ago
    I'd be more than happy if they kept an ineffective lobbyist on the payroll. Why would we want them to fire a guy who's lousy and get someone better?
- roc 15y ago
  > "Dodd's no longer a politician and lobbying isn't illegal." But it is if Dodd does it. At least for another year. Though I concur that Dodd's not going anywhere. Worst case, they take him off the public stage and let him do his lobbying in private.
paul9290 15y ago
Check out this "We The People," petition. https://wwws.whitehouse.gov/petitions#!/petition/investigate-chris-dodd-and-mpaa-bribery-after-he-publicly-admited-bribing-politicans-pass/DffX0YQv https://wwws.whitehouse.gov/petitions#!/petition/investigate... The nation agrees with Wales!
- jedbrown 15y ago
  It's great that this petition reached threshold in two days, but it would have been nice if it had less than two spelling errors in the title.
dtf 15y ago
“I hope to see … a window of opportunity for Hollywood to come to the table and talk to Silicon Valley with a little more humility.” I couldn't help smile at this comment from Jimmy Wales - it really does show there's been a power shift. It's the kind of tone that will have some Hollywood stakeholders foaming at the mouth.
- mjwalshe 15y ago
  Humility not a exactly any wikipedians strong suit is it.
brown9-2 15y ago
I don't think the MPAA would fire Dodd for these comments that make them out to be a corrupt Congress-buying organization, because that is what the MPAA is, and it's how they want to be perceived.
kzrdude 15y ago
When MPAA bribes members of the congress, the foremost concern should be that congress is corrupt, not MPAA. It's a whole different level.
- TheCapn 15y ago
  Agreed. As an engineer when a vendor wants me to pick their product over another they try to "sweeten" the deal to make it seem like they're the right choice. It is my ethical duty to refuse the cherry on top and accept what's best for my employer at face value. Why can we not expect those working "for the public" cannot share such practices?
maeon3 15y ago
About 5 years ago I predicted that one day watching videos on the internet would become so difficult that youtube and other video hosting sites would be useless as a reliable storage medium. I bought a TB drive and kept all videos that have touched me over the last 5 years. Many of those videos are nowhere to be found anywhere with a simple Google query, no matter how much searching you do. In a sense, Hollywood has already won, the greatest tool on the planet has been greatly damaged, it is not reliable enough for me to use as a place to store things which I find very useful and want to keep for reference 5 and 10 years later. When I stop breathing one day, the vast wealth of knowledge I have accumulated with video evidence as backup will vanish into the night with me on my X TB drive. Because I won't be able to say: "Here, this video solves all of your problems, but it's been copyrighted, I'll stick it on a thumb drive for you." Internet video is becoming a treasure trove of information, and people want to take out all the good bits, put a giant wall around the good bits and charge cash money for it. Destroying the original intent of the internet. We need tools to bring back what the internet was... A symphony of thought, energy and freedom where you can post music, video, audio, lectures, comics, ANYTHING. Those days are gone. Now you will only be able to post these things if they are irrelevant and childish, filling the internet with banalities. Passing power right back to the content providers. The internet is under attack, and they have half won.
- vetler 15y ago
  Videos not available? Really? I stopped storing videos, because they are so readily available. What kind of videos are you storing?
  - mike-cardwell 15y ago
    Same here. I now delete videos after watching them because I know that if I want to watch them again in future they're just a quick download away.
  - DanBC 15y ago
    'Sex, Lies and Aliens' - a documentary. (http://www.drg.tv/ProgramDetails.aspx?ProgramDetail=10596 http://www.drg.tv/ProgramDetails.aspx?ProgramDetail=10596) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0265734/ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0265734/)
a_a_r_o_n 15y ago
Fire him? Heck no! He does the country a service by being open and up front about the legal bribery that runs Congress. I think more CEOs, lobbyists and other influencers should be this upfront, it would go a long way towards teaching Civics 102. Speak up!
jedbrown 15y ago
It could be wise to fire Dodd just to allow the MPAA to continue making contributions without risking interpretation as a quid pro quo. From the Hobbs Act: "It is important to note, however, that it is irrelevant whether the public official in fact intended to hold up his or her end of the bargain--it is enough that the official had knowledge of the payor's intent to buy official acts." Supreme Count statement in McCormick v United States (1991): "The receipt of such contributions is also vulnerable under the Act as having been taken under color of official right, but only if the payments are made in return for an explicit promise or undertaking by the official to perform or not to perform an official act." Related analysis: http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/whitecollarcrime_blog/2005/11/prosecuting_cam.html http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/whitecollarcrime_blog/2005/... See also Chapter 6 of http://books.google.com/books?id=gJY-i4QHHC8C&lpg=PR7&ots=E0G2ihyRu3&dq=Private%20and%20Public%20Corruption&lr&pg=PA127#v=onepage&q&f=false http://books.google.com/books?id=gJY-i4QHHC8C&lpg=PR7&#3... For example, consider Case 4 (http://books.google.com/books?id=gJY-i4QHHC8C&lpg=PR7&ots=E0G2ihyRu3&dq=Private%20and%20Public%20Corruption&lr&pg=PA137#v=onepage&q&f=false http://books.google.com/books?id=gJY-i4QHHC8C&lpg=PR7&#3...) which is very similar to Dodd's, and which Lowenstein argues might be considered bribery under the Hobbs Act, in light of McCormick v United States. An (opinionated) editorial on the topic: http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2006/0606.birnbaum.html http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2006/0606.birnbaum...
- nextparadigms 15y ago
  The White House petition to investigate him and MPAA for bribery has also been completed (25,000 signatures in 3 days), so at the very least maybe this will hasten his resignation: https://wwws.whitehouse.gov/petitions/!/petition/investigate-chris-dodd-and-mpaa-bribery-after-he-publicly-admited-bribing-politicans-pass/DffX0YQv https://wwws.whitehouse.gov/petitions/!/petition/investigate...
wmblaettler 15y ago
This quote from Christopher Dodd, heard on NPR the day after the blackout, really irked me: "It sort of reminds me of kids who can't get their way hold their breath and start screaming, instead of engaging with the debate and providing information, encouraging a discussion on how this can be improved. It just seems petulant to me." I wonder what he thinks of strikes, boycotts and public demonstrations, I guess they are all childish too.
- sp332 15y ago
  Actually a lot of people in the USA think strikes, boycotts and demonstrations are stupid. They look at the huge number of strikes in e.g. France and don't understand how the French get anything done. And then they whine that the government doesn't listen to them.
- lukeschlather 15y ago
  Don't mind him. When we initially tried to engage with the debate, his side figuratively stuck their fingers in their ears and said "na-na-na I can't hear you!" He's not interested in having a debate, he just wants to treat us like children (and have the government spy on our every move to make sure we're not doing anything the MPAA disapproves of.)
Vivtek 15y ago
I didn't like their mischaracterization of the issues: SOPA and PIPA, two almost-dead pieces of legislation that would give the U.S. government and copyright holders the authority to seek court orders against foreign websites associated with infringing intellectual property. It's not the court orders that were the issue here - it was the entirely extrajudicial ability to shut a site down merely on a copyright holder's say-so. And not just foreign sites!
vaksel 15y ago
fired? No, he is doing everything he's been hired to do. Getting him and MPAA prosecuted/fined by the DoJ for his remarks that amounted to admission of bribery? You betcha
raldi 15y ago
It would have been nice if the article had provided the actual quote where Wales said Dodd should be fired.
askmehow 15y ago
"10 million people contacted Congress, Wales said. “That’s not an abuse of power, that’s democracy,” he said. “[Dodd] had best get used to it.” Quoted for truth!
mrdingle 15y ago
Fired? Who really cares? But investigated for congressional bribery? Definitely.
zeruch 15y ago
I think we're still far, far from an endgame, and the MPAA and the like will be trying probably ever more under-the-table moves, as they are now quite aware of the number of eyes (and the capital behind some of those eyes) that are glaring at them. Frankly, firing Dodd would do nothing. Dismantling the MPAA, the RIAA, BREIN, et al would be a good first step. Next is helping along the "Megabox" idea to come to fruition (maybe Last.fm or some new player will take up that baton) and see if we can't just pummel the Big COntent dinosaurs into a gristled, historical footnote.

167 points by ukdm 15y ago

wisty 15y ago

Not as crazy as it sounds - he's saying Dodd essentially told the members of Congress not to expect any more campaign funding from Hollywood if they didn't play ball. I'm pretty sure it's bad form for a former senator to tell members of congress to vote one way, or lose funding from his lobby group. Especially if he says it on the public record.

khafra 15y ago
The way I understand it, the Citizens United decision made that type of bribery completely legal.
- burgerbrain 15y ago
  Bad form nevertheless. We should be outraged still.
- pemulis 15y ago
  That's not what the Citizens United decision says at all. It allows Super PACs to collect unlimited donations to run campaign ads supporting or opposing specific candidates. That may open the door to corruption in a certain sense, but it doesn't allow quid pro quo on active legislation.
  - wl 15y ago
    That's not quite correct, actually. Citizens United overturned a part of a law that prohibited corporations and unions from spending their money on "electioneering communications" (generally defined as communications advocating for or against a specific candidate) within 30 days of a primary or 60 days of a general election. The decision is not about PACs or limitations on their ability to raise funds, though PACs certainly benefited from the ruling.
  - khafra 15y ago
    > It allows Super PACs to collect unlimited donations to run campaign ads supporting or opposing specific candidates. That may open the door to corruption in a certain sense, but it doesn't allow quid pro quo on active legislation. If the Citizens United decision did not allow Super PACs to talk about supporting or opposing candidates based on their actions with regard to particular legislation, then I was wrong. But that would mean Dodd committed a particularly egregious violation of the law in public. I don't think he would do that, and I think you were wrong to say I was wrong.

bproper 15y ago

Dodd's no longer a politician and lobbying isn't illegal. If the MPAA thinks Dodd isn't effective, maybe they should fire him. But they won't let him go because he put his foot in his mouth and highlighted how the political process usually works.

officemonkey 15y ago
They should fire Dodd because his lobbying wasn't effective. He threw money around and thought his old buddy-buddy tactics were going to be enough to beat the Internet Rage Machine. It's a sea-change, and Chris Dodd just got left behind in the 20th Century.
- jm4 15y ago
  I'd be more than happy if they kept an ineffective lobbyist on the payroll. Why would we want them to fire a guy who's lousy and get someone better?
roc 15y ago
> "Dodd's no longer a politician and lobbying isn't illegal." But it is if Dodd does it. At least for another year. Though I concur that Dodd's not going anywhere. Worst case, they take him off the public stage and let him do his lobbying in private.

paul9290 15y ago

Check out this "We The People," petition. https://wwws.whitehouse.gov/petitions#!/petition/investigate-chris-dodd-and-mpaa-bribery-after-he-publicly-admited-bribing-politicans-pass/DffX0YQv https://wwws.whitehouse.gov/petitions#!/petition/investigate... The nation agrees with Wales!

jedbrown 15y ago
It's great that this petition reached threshold in two days, but it would have been nice if it had less than two spelling errors in the title.

dtf 15y ago

“I hope to see … a window of opportunity for Hollywood to come to the table and talk to Silicon Valley with a little more humility.” I couldn't help smile at this comment from Jimmy Wales - it really does show there's been a power shift. It's the kind of tone that will have some Hollywood stakeholders foaming at the mouth.

mjwalshe 15y ago
Humility not a exactly any wikipedians strong suit is it.

brown9-2 15y ago

I don't think the MPAA would fire Dodd for these comments that make them out to be a corrupt Congress-buying organization, because that is what the MPAA is, and it's how they want to be perceived.

kzrdude 15y ago

When MPAA bribes members of the congress, the foremost concern should be that congress is corrupt, not MPAA. It's a whole different level.

TheCapn 15y ago
Agreed. As an engineer when a vendor wants me to pick their product over another they try to "sweeten" the deal to make it seem like they're the right choice. It is my ethical duty to refuse the cherry on top and accept what's best for my employer at face value. Why can we not expect those working "for the public" cannot share such practices?

maeon3 15y ago

About 5 years ago I predicted that one day watching videos on the internet would become so difficult that youtube and other video hosting sites would be useless as a reliable storage medium. I bought a TB drive and kept all videos that have touched me over the last 5 years. Many of those videos are nowhere to be found anywhere with a simple Google query, no matter how much searching you do. In a sense, Hollywood has already won, the greatest tool on the planet has been greatly damaged, it is not reliable enough for me to use as a place to store things which I find very useful and want to keep for reference 5 and 10 years later. When I stop breathing one day, the vast wealth of knowledge I have accumulated with video evidence as backup will vanish into the night with me on my X TB drive. Because I won't be able to say: "Here, this video solves all of your problems, but it's been copyrighted, I'll stick it on a thumb drive for you." Internet video is becoming a treasure trove of information, and people want to take out all the good bits, put a giant wall around the good bits and charge cash money for it. Destroying the original intent of the internet. We need tools to bring back what the internet was... A symphony of thought, energy and freedom where you can post music, video, audio, lectures, comics, ANYTHING. Those days are gone. Now you will only be able to post these things if they are irrelevant and childish, filling the internet with banalities. Passing power right back to the content providers. The internet is under attack, and they have half won.

vetler 15y ago
Videos not available? Really? I stopped storing videos, because they are so readily available. What kind of videos are you storing?
- mike-cardwell 15y ago
  Same here. I now delete videos after watching them because I know that if I want to watch them again in future they're just a quick download away.
- DanBC 15y ago
  'Sex, Lies and Aliens' - a documentary. (http://www.drg.tv/ProgramDetails.aspx?ProgramDetail=10596 http://www.drg.tv/ProgramDetails.aspx?ProgramDetail=10596) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0265734/ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0265734/)

a_a_r_o_n 15y ago

Fire him? Heck no! He does the country a service by being open and up front about the legal bribery that runs Congress. I think more CEOs, lobbyists and other influencers should be this upfront, it would go a long way towards teaching Civics 102. Speak up!

jedbrown 15y ago

It could be wise to fire Dodd just to allow the MPAA to continue making contributions without risking interpretation as a quid pro quo. From the Hobbs Act: "It is important to note, however, that it is irrelevant whether the public official in fact intended to hold up his or her end of the bargain--it is enough that the official had knowledge of the payor's intent to buy official acts." Supreme Count statement in McCormick v United States (1991): "The receipt of such contributions is also vulnerable under the Act as having been taken under color of official right, but only if the payments are made in return for an explicit promise or undertaking by the official to perform or not to perform an official act." Related analysis: http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/whitecollarcrime_blog/2005/11/prosecuting_cam.html http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/whitecollarcrime_blog/2005/... See also Chapter 6 of http://books.google.com/books?id=gJY-i4QHHC8C&lpg=PR7&ots=E0G2ihyRu3&dq=Private%20and%20Public%20Corruption&lr&pg=PA127#v=onepage&q&f=false http://books.google.com/books?id=gJY-i4QHHC8C&lpg=PR7&#3... For example, consider Case 4 (http://books.google.com/books?id=gJY-i4QHHC8C&lpg=PR7&ots=E0G2ihyRu3&dq=Private%20and%20Public%20Corruption&lr&pg=PA137#v=onepage&q&f=false http://books.google.com/books?id=gJY-i4QHHC8C&lpg=PR7&#3...) which is very similar to Dodd's, and which Lowenstein argues might be considered bribery under the Hobbs Act, in light of McCormick v United States. An (opinionated) editorial on the topic: http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2006/0606.birnbaum.html http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2006/0606.birnbaum...

nextparadigms 15y ago
The White House petition to investigate him and MPAA for bribery has also been completed (25,000 signatures in 3 days), so at the very least maybe this will hasten his resignation: https://wwws.whitehouse.gov/petitions/!/petition/investigate-chris-dodd-and-mpaa-bribery-after-he-publicly-admited-bribing-politicans-pass/DffX0YQv https://wwws.whitehouse.gov/petitions/!/petition/investigate...

wmblaettler 15y ago

This quote from Christopher Dodd, heard on NPR the day after the blackout, really irked me: "It sort of reminds me of kids who can't get their way hold their breath and start screaming, instead of engaging with the debate and providing information, encouraging a discussion on how this can be improved. It just seems petulant to me." I wonder what he thinks of strikes, boycotts and public demonstrations, I guess they are all childish too.

sp332 15y ago
Actually a lot of people in the USA think strikes, boycotts and demonstrations are stupid. They look at the huge number of strikes in e.g. France and don't understand how the French get anything done. And then they whine that the government doesn't listen to them.
lukeschlather 15y ago
Don't mind him. When we initially tried to engage with the debate, his side figuratively stuck their fingers in their ears and said "na-na-na I can't hear you!" He's not interested in having a debate, he just wants to treat us like children (and have the government spy on our every move to make sure we're not doing anything the MPAA disapproves of.)

Vivtek 15y ago

I didn't like their mischaracterization of the issues: SOPA and PIPA, two almost-dead pieces of legislation that would give the U.S. government and copyright holders the authority to seek court orders against foreign websites associated with infringing intellectual property. It's not the court orders that were the issue here - it was the entirely extrajudicial ability to shut a site down merely on a copyright holder's say-so. And not just foreign sites!

vaksel 15y ago

fired? No, he is doing everything he's been hired to do. Getting him and MPAA prosecuted/fined by the DoJ for his remarks that amounted to admission of bribery? You betcha

raldi 15y ago

It would have been nice if the article had provided the actual quote where Wales said Dodd should be fired.

askmehow 15y ago

"10 million people contacted Congress, Wales said. “That’s not an abuse of power, that’s democracy,” he said. “[Dodd] had best get used to it.” Quoted for truth!

mrdingle 15y ago

Fired? Who really cares? But investigated for congressional bribery? Definitely.

zeruch 15y ago

I think we're still far, far from an endgame, and the MPAA and the like will be trying probably ever more under-the-table moves, as they are now quite aware of the number of eyes (and the capital behind some of those eyes) that are glaring at them. Frankly, firing Dodd would do nothing. Dismantling the MPAA, the RIAA, BREIN, et al would be a good first step. Next is helping along the "Megabox" idea to come to fruition (maybe Last.fm or some new player will take up that baton) and see if we can't just pummel the Big COntent dinosaurs into a gristled, historical footnote.