 | |
| |
TechnologyDaily Mobile
Sharing His Mind With Mindshare
by Randy Barrett
Matt Gross, who created and operated the now-legendary Web log for Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean, has joined Mindshare Interactive Campaigns as a senior consultant. He will lead the company's Raleigh, N.C., office.
The blog generated $25 million in mostly small contributions for Dean's campaign. "One of the things we realized is there are people out there who want to take action, and the challenge is asking them and giving them something meaningful to do," Gross said.
But most important was simply listening to supporters on the blog. "The most critical thing we did well on the Dean campaign was to allow ideas to percolate up from the grassroots," he said.
Dean, now the chairman of the Democratic National Committee, read the blog religiously, and new ideas were immediately discussed and often executed, Gross said. "The lesson is, it isn't the technology that's important but the social network you build."
Gross said he took the job at Mindshare because "they're a great company -- very cutting-edge."
As for the more important matter of Gross' first automobile, often a key indicator of later career success: "It was a 1978 Pontiac Grand Lemans that drowned in a quarry. We fished it out and started it up and it spit out a few gallons of water and kept on going."
On Inter-Carrier Compensation ... And Rockets
The Independent Telephone and Telecommunications Alliance has hired Jay Driscoll as legislative director.
Driscoll, formerly a chief lobbyist for the Western Telephone Alliance, said the biggest issues facing rural telecom carriers include reform of the system that aims to guarantee communications services to all Americans and of the inter-carrier compensation that governs what telecom carriers pay each other for carrying calls on each other's networks.
Unlike most lobbyists who are lawyers, Driscoll is an economist. He came to Washington five years ago at the behest of Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., who wanted someone with local regulatory experience on his staff. Driscoll was formerly a telecom rate analyst for the Montana Public Service Commission.
But now to the burning question: What is Driscoll's favorite Smithsonian museum? "Air and space," he said. "They have cool stuff. I don't want to look at tribal headdresses. I want to look at rockets."
Farewell To The FCC
FCC Wireless Bureau Chief John Muleta has announced he will leave the agency at the end of March. Outgoing FCC Chairman Michael Powell praised Muleta for his "significant and lasting contributions ... as both a manager and as a lawyer."
Muleta has held the job since February 2003. Earlier in his career, the engineer, businessman and lawyer held high-level positions with now-defunct PSINet. There he was president of PSINet Ventures, president of the company's global facilities division, and president of the firm's Indian, Middle Eastern and African subsidiaries.
Hello, I'm Now Representing ...
On the lobbying front, the Smith-Free Group has registered to represent Sony BMG on copyright-protection issues. Leading the charge will be Sarah Dumont, James Free, Timothy Locke and Alicia Smith.
James Ferguson will lobby lawmakers for ArcSight on network-security contracting.
And Michael Taylor of Parker Poe Adams & Bernstein has completed the paperwork to represent Dell and help familiarize Congress with that company's new 527,000 square-foot manufacturing plant in North Carolina. The facility is scheduled to open in the fall and will employ 1,500 people, according to the company.
Last week's "People Column," meanwhile, failed to report that Alex Vogel is on the Yahoo team lobbying on e-commerce and privacy issues.
Presidential Bling for Tech Innovators
President Bush on Monday bestowed National Medals of Technology at the White House. Individual recipients were Jan Achenbach of Northwestern University; Watts Humphrey of Carnegie Mellon University and Robert Metcalfe of Polaris Venture Partners.
The team award went to Rodney Bagley, Irwin Lachman and Ronald Lewis, all former Corning employees, while the petroleum technology company UOP and the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation won the organization medals. Stanley Gembicki and Carl Gulbrandsen collected those medals.
"The laureates we honor today have made new and lasting contributions in fields from mathematics to behavioral science, to geology, to genetics," Bush said at the East Room confab. "You've discovered new clues about the behavior of viruses, the workings of the human mind and the shape of the universe."
Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez, presidential science adviser John Marburger, National Science Foundation Director Arden Bement and Phil Bond, the Commerce undersecretary for technology, attended the ceremony, and Sen. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., and Rep. Roscoe Bartlett, R-Md., were among the people in the crowd.
A Decade Of Democracy And Technology
A who's who of Washington-area technology glitterati attended the 10th anniversary bash of the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT) at the restrained but ever-tasteful Ritz Carlton Washington last Wednesday.
Plenty of recognizable faces were found in the cocktail swarm in the foyer: Federal Trade Commissioner Orson Swindle, chatting and enjoying the excellent passed crab cakes; a pin-striped and mellifluous Theodore Olson of the Gibson Dunn law firm (who offered a quick history of solicitor-general appearances before the Supreme Court while eying the crab cakes, which he finally got to taste); and Christine Varney, a former federal trade commissioner and now barrister with Hogan & Hartson.
Also in attendance were: Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-Va.; Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt.; FTC Chairwoman Deborah Majoras; John Podesta, president of the Center for American Progress; and eBay chief Meg Whitman. And former Michigan Gov. James Blanchard bestowed a fellowship in memory of privacy lawyer Ron Plesser from his law firm, DLA Piper, Rudnick, Gray and Cary.
All in all, more than 600 of CDT's closest friends gathered to gab, eat and party to mark the civil-liberties group's milestone. "We had a great turnout," CDT Associate Director Ari Schwartz said.
Quote Of The Week
"I wrote something that ended up with: 'May they burn in hell.' My staff told me: 'We may have to nuance that a bit.'"
-- Leahy, telling the crowd at CDT's party of his reaction after information breaches at the ChoicePoint and LexisNexis database firms.
NEW FEATURE
-Advertisement-
-Advertisement-
-Advertisement-
