Archive:Things said to reporters

e-mail to NYTimes reporter
Well, there really isn't a lot to say about the organization at this point, considering that it doesn't fully exist yet :-)

We hope to serve as a flag for all of the scattered student supporters of free culture to rally around. It's really criminal that bills like the DMCA were able to pass unchallenged simply because a movement didn't exist to oppose them. Like a person without an immune system, governments around the world have contracted opportunistic diseases, in the form of bad laws that are passed in practical secrecy, below the radar of the public eye. There are a lot of Linux users, people worried about media consolidation, hip-hop fans, collage artists... hundreds and thousands of students around the world who would love to join a movement to protect their civil liberties. Until now, there was not a movement for them to join. We intend to change that.

It is already accurate to say that our organization is an international student movement. Our web developer is based in New Zealand, our web designer is at Stanford, we're on the East Coast, and we have supporters in our chat room from Norway and Portugal. But this is only a hint of a beginning. We'll need a lot more people participating to have a successful movement, and I think that we're going to see that develop over the next several months.

For a vague idea of what the site will be about (take into account that the material is not quite ready for the public yet), check out our future front page: http://www.freeculture.org/index.php

Incidentally, I'm in the process of finishing off Lessig's book, and it is indeed good stuff!

If you can't come yourself, if you could send another reporter or a photographer we would love you forever :-)