Getting Political...

DeVore · 02-09-2001 8:45pm #1

Maybe I shouldnt have been listening to Rage Against The Machine when thinking about this but I think we need to show a certain amount of strength.

Here's what I suggest:

When the colleges come back I think we should start to collect signatures (both online and offline). Now thats been done before and generally has little impact, but consider this:

Suppose the petition were worded:

"I consider Broadband to be critical to the development of the Irish Internet and our economy as a whole. If a general election is called without substantial movement on this issue I will vote against the current government."

I happen to know that there is a general election being called soon, and I think it might be time to start agitating towards that event... its our best chance to bring the gov into it...

I dont see any way that Eircom and Esat are going to solve it themselves and the ODTR are obviously impotent or incompetent, so that leaves the government...

I'd be interested in hearing the IOFFL ctte's opinion on this.

DeV.

LegacyUser · 02-09-2001 8:57pm

ye it's definitely the way to go,

Once IOFL can highlight the massive gap between ourselves and the rest of the world people are going to feel they've been bull****ted to for a long time with this Ireland/E Hub bollix - remember when Microsoft came out saying how much of a joke our telecom infrastructure was .... then suddenly the government splashed out big time on bringing bandwidth into the country... but the domestic/sme still got ignored, fkin 2bit job as usual, patchy SHYTE.

So, we need an election issue here... another berties bowl or something.... the country loves stuff like that.

Stuff like - for a 10MB connection in Sweeden it costs £300 a year, for a 10MB connection in ireland it costs £300,000 a year... stuff like that highlights the farce.

LegacyUser · 02-09-2001 9:44pm

DeV. I'm definitley looking into this.
I'm a member of Netsoc in UCD & perhaps they might be able to get some of this kind of thing movin.
My only problem is that there very into corporate sponsorship & accepting alot of stuff from the major tech co's. in the hope that they'll be "milk rounded" when they leave college

Of course here-to-fore IrelandOffline has rightl shunted such involvement.

UCD is great for getting any & everyone to get begind a campaign but.....
The problem is motivation & realising that the problem exists. Most ppl in UCD probably wont give a shit because we're all using the internet @ breakneck speeds through the network.
Also I'm loathed to say it but most students wont vote. I know for the Nice Treaty, most ppl who were not from Dublin couldn't have been bothered, so the proposition of attaching a political message w/ it may turn your avg. student off.

Having said that they are the negatives. There is alot of potential mileage in going down this route and thus it should be explored. I'll look into contacting some of the Netsoc guys as well

80p.
SAVE CHIP !!

LegacyUser · 02-09-2001 9:52pm

good idea Dev but as 80p mentioned getting students to vote is a totally different matter, altho i'd say we have somebody on this site from every walk of life which potentially means a hell of a lot of campaigners...the only problem is getting ppl of their fat ass's and doing something about this. But you start a petition on an email and send it to a college just watch the little ****er circulate!

Farls

LegacyUser · 02-09-2001 9:54pm

Been thinking about the political thing for a while now. I'd like to throw couple of ideas up for discussion

1) Lack of knowledge among politicians
Most of our politicians have very limited understanding of Internet - a lot of this is related to age, IMO.

They 'sort of' know what it is and that it's important but I suspect that very few of them have directly used it. Even in regard to email, this is usually handled by their secretaries.

About 4 weeks ago I spent an evening at the home of one of our members. He wishes to remain anonymous so I'll call him Nick. He knows Brendan Smith personally - Brendan is TD for Cavan - Monaghan and sits on several parliamentary committees as well as being a member of the British-Irish Interparliamentary Body. Nick wanted to get Brendan interested in the IOFFL campaign.

Brendan Smith admitted that he had very little knowledge of the internet. Nick then took him online and showed him our website. Brendan was particularly amazed at this forum and how we can debate the various issues withiout physically meeting. Nick also did some google searches and brought up various sites with stuff about Brendan Smith, including a site relating to some local community projects that Brendan had been involved with; also took him through some other interesting sites including usenet.

The net (pardon pun

) result of the evening was that Brendan Smith went away with a much better understanding of the internet and what it can be used for.

Now, I don't think that he got particularly enthused about getting behind our campaign but a) he's certainly aware of it and b) when new legislation comes up for debate in the Dail, he is likely to take a much more active interest in it.

I see a great need to do more of this sort of thing - it could also give us an opportunity to do something on a regional basis which everyone thought was good idea some weeks ago - like getting a number of TD's together in a region for an informal "here's the internet" session with our members.

I think TD's might respond to this - it's informal, it's local voters who are doing it and there is no 'hard sell' from IT companies involved.

2) Driving the figures home
In my seminar speech, I referred to Irish pride and our great successes in so many areas (and this was before the Holland match

) and made the point that we should be ashamed of our poor standing compared to other countries in the area of internet access.

Could we use this sort of approach to get public resentment going and embarrass our politicians into doing something?

We would have to find 'clever' ways to do this. Someone in another thread suggested newspaper ads but that would be prohibitively expensive and we would be straight up against the might of Eircom's very professional PR machine.

In regard to 'clever' ways, I would hold up our seminar as an example. The last thing in the world that Eircom would have wanted to do, IMHO, was to meet angry users in a public forum and try to defend their indefensible position; by getting Mary O'Rourke, Etain Doyle and Derek Kickham on board first, however, we 'wrong footed' them so that not appearing would be even worse PR than actually appearing

Any ideas out there about other clever ways we can use the profile and the contacts we have now developed. Mind you - it might be better to email these to me directly rather than expose them here and undermine them

3) Showing what our members can do
One of the things that has amazed me since I got involved with this campaign is the calibre of our members and their extremely high technical knowledge/skills.

I have visited a lot of members sites and some of them are really excellent.

Could we think of holding an exhibition of members' work to highlight the sort of activity that is going on out there by ordinary 'users' and small businesses?

This could tie in with the political thing above but it could also be a way of raising general public awareness of the potential of the internet - properly presented, I think that this could possibly be sold to TV as material for a feature.

Comments and other ideas are more than welcome.

Martin Harran

[This message has been edited by o_donnel_abu (edited 02-09-2001).]

LegacyUser · 02-09-2001 9:58pm

Good idea

url="http://www.ClanNESW.org"][i]NESW[/i][/urlEl_MUERkOurl="http://www.CoFR.net"][i]CoFR[/i][/url

Trespassers will be shot. Survivors will be shot again

LegacyUser · 02-09-2001 10:15pm

No you dont have to do that guys.
i found the solution.
i sent an email to Eircom and it goes like this...

"if i dont get broadband, i will shoot myself.you have until friday to satisfy my wishes."

Ashley Lyn

Ashley Lyn Cafagna

LegacyUser · 02-09-2001 10:18pm

Could we think of holding an exhibition of members' work to highlight the sort of activity that is going on out there by ordinary 'users' and small businesses?

hmm.. how about on the main site with just list off banners pointing to supporting sites. You can put http://www.qvolution.com in for a start.

Nothing like a big long list of small companies and sites

LegacyUser · 02-09-2001 10:50pm

The Portfolio aspect of it is a good idea.

It may also further serve to dispell the notion that €$at had @ the time of the original kick off...That the "2000" were a bunch of gamers & Napster heads, as oppossed to ppl who are using the internet for work, business, study & education & in a whole wide array of inneventive & creative ways.

It may also prove to €ircom that the Internet is more than their "Mouse" campaign makes it out to be...
"Learn how to check your e-mail"
or
"Check you bank balance online"
Yeh how about they check it after they get off the internet after dialing up w/ €ircomNet. It'll be considerably less let me assure you

Letting the telco's/politicians know who their customers/electorate are is a good idea!

80p.
SAVE CHIP !!

[This message has been edited by 80project.com (edited 02-09-2001).]

LegacyUser · 02-09-2001 10:56pm

Originally posted by Fergus:
hmm.. how about on the main site with just list off banners pointing to supporting sites. You can put http://www.qvolution.com in for a start.

Nothing like a big long list of small companies and sites

Sounds good to me but we would have to set some ground rules to avoid commercial exploitations.

Any comments Bard ?

Martin

dahamsta · 02-09-2001 11:07pm

I added a page to the WikiWikiWeb for business and organisations to register support for IrelandOffline publically. If you want to come up with guidelines Martin, you can pass them onto me (or of course edit it yourself, that's the beauty of WikiWikiWeb's). Bard could copy and paste it into the proper website (the WikiWikiWeb is only a "staging area"), or I could easily throw together a parser Niall could call programatically.

If I'm stepping overboard, please let me know.

adam

[This message has been edited by dahamsta (edited 03-09-2001).]

LegacyUser · 02-09-2001 11:15pm

Originally posted by dahamsta:
I added a page to the WikiWikiWeb for business and organisations to register support for IrelandOffline publically[/URL].

This is where we would need to be careful, I don't think we'd want to list larger companies, I was thinking more of individual users and companies with, say, up to 4 employees.

And no, you're certainly not stepping overboard

Martin

dahamsta · 02-09-2001 11:31pm

Well, that's why I think the WikiWikiWeb should be a "staging area", and not directly connected to the site (also why the design doesn't matter a damn

). I agree with a previous post made by DeVore though, in that the site needs to be expanded rapidly. Bard obviously doesn't have enough time - in fact no-one could - so using the WikiWikiWeb as a means of gathering submitted content would seem to be an ideal way to streamline the process.

I was going to suggest using a CMS (Content Management System) I'm developing, but I think it would be overkill, a bit of copying and pating never did anyone any harm.

adam

LegacyUser · 02-09-2001 11:56pm

Excellent ideas DeVore and Abu....

I think also think that highlighting how important

Home-grown SME's are to the future of the Irish economy and especially the IT sector... Multi-nationals come and go. SME's grow and expand but never leave...

As for Eircom, Esat and ODTR. Their arguments r based on economics. If it isn't economically fesable for them to release afordable Broadband(>€50) then the government should be prepared to invest in it for the country, it's citzens and SME's. Not just Multi-nationals who will be gone home with all our money. But the people who r ment to be able to have a voice by voting.

Demand-Supply isn't an excuse for the lack of affordable Broadband

"Information is Ammunition"
Choas Engine
Email: choas@netshop.ie
ICQ: 34896460

[This message has been edited by Chaos-Engine (edited 03-09-2001).]

yellum · 03-09-2001 12:31am

I might be able to get a TD interested in this. Maybe even a few more of his party. Will do my best.

Maybe this is a bad idea and I haven't a clue how shares in publically listed companies work but ever consider buying shares in Eircom ? One share entitles you to a vote, correct ?

The shares are cheap enough at the moment. If every member bought one share thats a large group of people threatening to be very voiciferous at the next AGM.

Has anyone been able to talk to Dunphy yet ? He'd be well up for a lively debate with Eircom.

dahamsta · 03-09-2001 9:31am

Maybe this is a bad idea and I haven't a clue how shares in publically listed companies work but ever consider buying shares in Eircom ? One share entitles you to a vote, correct ? The shares are cheap enough at the moment. If every member bought one share thats a large group of people threatening to be very voiciferous at the next AGM.[/b]

1 share = 1 vote, which won't do much for you. The problem here is that KPN and Telia own 35% of Eircom and the ESOT own another 15%, and they usually band together. An example is the last AGM where the Renumeration Committee put forward a proposal to hand out enormous bonuses to the directors - the audience went apeshot, because of course the directors have shown nothing but incompetence, but it still went through.

The only thing buying a share in Eircom will get you is a chance to air your views at the AGM. Which is as good a reason as any I guess.

adam

[This message has been edited by dahamsta (edited 03-09-2001).]

LegacyUser · 03-09-2001 9:46am

excellent idea, lets ALL do that

If a few hundred of us turned up at their next AGM we could be a considerable irritant

also how about some sort of protest outside with placards etc -just a suggestion

should target Eircom because one thing that was apparent from the last seminar was how much of an obstruction Eircom actually are to this campaign achieving its goals

Originally posted by yellum:
The shares are cheap enough at the moment. If every member bought one share thats a large group of people threatening to be very voiciferous at the next AGM.

LegacyUser · 03-09-2001 9:54am

Good idea. But will not Valentia be shortly buying all the shares anyway? Goodbye public ownership, goodbye public shareholding..

LegacyUser · 03-09-2001 11:26am

Originally posted by Fergus:
Good idea. But will not Valentia be shortly buying all the shares anyway? Goodbye public ownership, goodbye public shareholding..

Fergus I agree with you but while it might have been a good idea for a film script it would not practical in the real world.
Buying one share is not an option ... most brokers have a minimum charge for buying and selling (in Ireland it would cost you between £50 and £100 to buy one share( forgetting about the price of the share) and then there is stamp duty. The majority of brokers would tell you to get lost if you tried to purchase one share.

If you buy online from someone like E*TRADE the double transaction would cost about $25 (which is very good) but you would be required to open an account and fund it (the minimum being $1000)and the letter of credit would cost about £35 and my experience is than many online brokers will not accept orders for fewer than 100 shares. Even if we all bought one share the maximum percentage of the vote that we could control would be less than 20% and as Fergus said within a very short period of time Eircom will no longer be a public company so buying shares whuld do nothing other than cost us a lot of money.

Bard · 03-09-2001 12:02pm

Originally posted by o_donnel_abu:
Sounds good to me but we would have to set some ground rules to avoid commercial exploitations.

Any comments Bard ?

Martin

Sounds good to me.

BTW: I can implement WikiWikiWeb easily enough on the IrelandOffline site - I have all the necessary code already successfully running on a test site and powering an "in-production" feature of scaryeire.com. It will, of course, need some code put into it for parsing of "naughty" language (and possibly password protected access for certain features?) - any collaboration on doing this would be welcome.

Bard

'First motorbike in the bible ???? ---- a Triumph --- 'Yea verily Moses struck down the ammmanites and all the land heard the roar of his triumph !!!'

dahamsta · 03-09-2001 12:36pm

It will, of course, need some code put into it for parsing of "naughty" language (and possibly password protected access for certain features?) - any collaboration on doing this would be welcome.

This is why I would suggest either leaving it where it is or keeping it separate from the main Ireland Offline site. I would be disinclined to parse out naughty language or password protecting sections though. I think the Wiki should be open and accessible to all, because it is after all just for collaboration and staging. Content should be moved from the Wiki to the real site as soon as it's presentable.

adam

yellum · 03-09-2001 3:39pm

How about the group buying a large amount of votes as a group and then selling them back to the members for the same money. Would this cut down on costs ? Or would I be right in guessing changing ownership of shares costs money too.

Anyone know any helpful stockbrokers that would like to help the IrelandOffline cause ?

A very visible and vocal protest vote at an AGM might not change policy but it would generate negative pr for the company.

LegacyUser · 03-09-2001 4:28pm

Originally posted by yellum:
How about the group buying a large amount of votes as a group and then selling them back to the members for the same money. Would this cut down on costs ? Or would I be right in guessing changing ownership of shares costs money too.

Anyone know any helpful stockbrokers that would like to help the IrelandOffline cause ?

A very visible and vocal protest vote at an AGM might not change policy but it would generate negative pr for the company.

Changing ownership of shares costs.
As the company will no longer be public you will not have the opportunity to attend an AGM, you will be obliged to sell your shares and you will have no say whatsoever.

This is not a practical approach.