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Life After Grokster Lobbying
by Randy Barrett
Former Grokster lobbyist Adam Eisgrau has started his own consultancy, Eisgrau Business Alliances. He was formerly the executive director of the lobbying group P2P United, which was part of Flanagan Consulting.
P2P United's members, including Grokster and Streamcast, had their internal workings cleaned by the Supreme Court in June, when the justices unanimously decreed that Grokster could be found liable for intellectual property theft because of its file-sharing service.
Eisgrau said his new gig "represented a good opportunity both personally and professionally. I wanted to indulge in some entrepreneurial instincts I've had for a long time." He will be flying solo. "Me myself and I are the three principals," Eisgrau said of the new firm.
He will bring one client, Visa, along with him into the land of the independently employed. He has represented the credit-card company for five years as one of his accounts at Flanagan.
Before joining Flanagan, Eisgrau worked for the Wexler Group and was a lobbyist for the American Library Association. He has extensive experience in intellectual property law and gun control. Eisgrau earned his law degree from Harvard University.
Meanwhile, Penrose (Parney) Albright has joined Civitas Group, a homeland security investment firm. Albright was assistant secretary for science and technology at the Homeland Security Department. Also joining Civitas is David Howe, most recently of the White House Homeland Security Council.
Surprise! Tech CEOs Change Their Handle
As foretold in this column, the Computer Systems Policy Project has changed its name. The new moniker is the Technology CEO Council.
It is a fine name, but the jury is out on whether the TCC will be any more memorable an abbreviation than CSSP. Anyway, the industry heavies that comprise the group, including Intel Chairman Craig Barrett, Hewlett-Packard CEO Mark Hurd, and Unisys CEO Joseph McGrath, must be pleased.
"As the high-tech leaders evolved their portfolios beyond computers to include services, software, semiconductors and storage, we needed a new name to reflect these changes," TCC Executive Director Bruce Mehlman said. "Our mission to provide thoughtful and actionable policy recommendations on matters of importance to the U.S. economy and our future competitiveness remains the same."
Toward A More Informed Health Community
At the first meeting of the American Health Information Community -- a federally chartered group to help the government get its health technology act together -- Intel's Barrett grabbed the group's attention with the following declaration: "Ultimately, I'd like every doctor I know to know as much about me as Amazon.com."
Other members of the group probably can help him with that. They include: Douglas Henley, executive vice president of American Academy of Family Physicians; Charles Kahn, president of the Federation of American Hospitals; and Scott Serota, CEO of the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association, among others.
The 17-member panel will spend two years advising the Health and Human Services Department about making health records digital, secure and able to be transferred among different systems.
New Director For Google
Shirley Tilghman has been elected to the board of the Google search-engine company. She is a professor of molecular biology at Princeton University.
Tilghman is best known for her work in cloning and mammalian genetics. She received her bachelor's degree in chemistry from Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, and a doctorate in biochemistry from Temple University in Philadelphia.
"It's an honor to welcome a woman of Dr. Tilghman's reputation to our board," Google CEO Eric Schmidt said in a statement.
Well Of All The Dirty Things To Say
Stop beating up on lobbyists. So said the, you guessed it, American League of Lobbyists. Those who curry government favor for corporate clients are tired of being the collective punching bag for the latest scandals in Washington.
"Recent news stories regarding alleged practices by Jack Abramoff and others have cast an unfair shadow on the entire lobbying profession," group President Paul Miller said in a statement. "The overwhelming majority of lobbyists exercise their First Amendment right to petition the government in a totally ethical manner and view adherence to current disclosure requirements as a critically important element of their responsibilities."
To help combat the bad rap on lobbyists, the association has adopted a code of ethics -- all in support of a federal lobbying disclosure law enacted in 1995. Congress passed the law to clean up an industry that many felt had become rife with favoritism and inside dealing by former government officials who left office to join the lobbying trade.
In other lobbying news, the New Democrat Network has moved to new digs downtown after nine years on Capitol Hill. "Our new home is perfectly suited to our dynamic plans for the months and years ahead," NDN chief Simon Rosenberg said in a statement.
PlayStation For Charity And George Lucas
The Entertainment Software Association will honor Star Wars creator George Lucas at a gala planned for Oct. 18 in San Francisco.
In conjunction with Nite to Unite for Kids, the group is running a charity auction on eBay, where videogames and memorabilia are being sold to benefit children's causes, including the Boys and Girls Clubs of America, Delinquency Prevention Initiative -- Year Three, the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, the Just Think Foundation and Web Wise Kids.
Up for auction is a PlayStation 2 signed by the cast of the television show Alias and a life-sized statue of Halo 2's main character, Master Chief. "We hope that the game community will join us once again this year to help kids by bidding early and often on the terrific exclusive items found on eBay from October 7 to October 14," association President Douglas Lowenstein said.
There are still some empty seats for those willing to pay $500 a plate. To date, the charity has raised nearly $7 million.
Quote Of The Week
"There has been an almost pathological resistance [at the FCC] to implement the [1996 Telecommunications Act] as written."
-- CompTel/ALTS CEO Earl Comstock at a press conference last week, lamenting what he feels is capitulation to regional Bell telecom and cable interests.
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