

88% there: "Don't Mess With The Internet" billboard in Lamar Smith's district - kn0thing
https://www.crowdtilt.com/campaigns/dont-mess-with-the-internet-billboard-in-lamar-smiths-home-district#openinternet

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jasonkester
Strange that they'd put together a whole page about this without ever
mentioning who this person is or what he's doing that messes with the
internet.

There seems to be a tendency among people who are _really involved with
politics_ to assume that everybody else is also _really involved with
politics_ , and therefore don't need any explanation about why we should be so
angry about whatever it is we're supposed to be angry about.

But we're not. So if you want us to get behind your cause, you're going to
need to tell us what it is. Possibly on your giant billboard itself.

~~~
zinkem
Hopefully everyone in Lamar Smith's district knows who Lamar Smith is and what
he stands for. SOPA triggered a mainstream debate and you don't need to be
'really involved in politics' to know that.

This sentiment that people with political agendas need to inform their
potential constituents is what has created our current political problems in
America. When people don't pay attention, anyone who can attract eyeballs and
make a reasonable sounding argument gets to do as they please. If we were
paying attention, we wouldn't let these people wreak havoc in our society.

edit: What does it mean to live in a democracy where nobody knows whats going
on? I know we're all familiar with and jaded to the current state of affairs,
but I'm asking that we spend more time thinking about that state of affairs
and what we expect of ourselves and our politicians.

~~~
natrius
_"Hopefully everyone in Lamar Smith's district knows who Lamar Smith is and
what he stands for."_

That's some misplaced hope.

~~~
jamesbritt
_That's some misplaced hope._

Considering he was elected I kind of assume a lot people like what they think
he stands for.

~~~
natrius
Texas's 21st congressional district had 651,619 people in 2000. The district
contains parts of the Austin and San Antonio metro areas, which grew 37% and
25% respectively in the intervening decade. Let's use the lower value since
there are rural areas in there as well. That gives a 2010 estimate of 814,523
people. 27.3% of Texans were under 18 in 2010, which gives a voting age
population of 592,158.

In 2010, 236,284 people voted in the district, of which 162,763 voted for
Smith. Let's assume all voters know who he is and what he stands for, and that
everyone else probably doesn't. That gives us 40% of the district's population
that know what's going on. Fewer voted for him, and even fewer _like_ what he
stands for, since voting is usually a compromise.

This is an overestimate.

~~~
jamesbritt
Thanks very much for this.

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ComputerGuru
I know all about the Lamar Smith debacle, and even to me, this billboard would
be ridiculously vague.

This is more of a gloating-esque billboard, not an effective one. I completely
support the idea, but I think this as poor of "an implementation" as possible.

~~~
SoftwareMaven
I don't think the artwork shown is the actual billboard artwork. They said in
the post they want to make sure they have money before spending effort on real
art.

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jjb123
As one of the co-founders of crowdtilt, I figure we'd mention that this is our
fastest growing campaign to break $10k (2 days) to date. Not saying a _whole_
lot since it's only been about a month since launch, but still cool to see it
go from Alexis' idea of "let's toss it up and see what happens" to ~90% funded
in that time frame.

~~~
brandnewlow
If you can be "imgur for crowdfunding", i.e. the crowdfunding platform that
Redditors use, that's a pretty darn solid place to start from.

~~~
redthrowaway
Kickstarter's got a pretty solid grasp on the reddit crowd at the moment,
though.

~~~
jjb123
Yeah, we think the models that Kickstarter/Indiegogo have for projects and
pre-sale retail is pretty amazing and we actually see campaigns that go up on
our site that are more suited for a model like Kickstarter. With Crowdtilt,
we've essentially taken our favorite elements of crowdfunding models like
those and provided it for groups of friends/existing networks instead (so
think of it for funding a wedding gift between bridesmaids or renting out a
bar for sxsw, instead of a documentary or creative project).

~~~
redthrowaway
That's a pretty cool idea. I could see integrating it with facebook events and
invites being a logical next step.

~~~
jjb123
Thanks, and yes those are steps we're actually working on right now :)

Give the site a try sometime and let us know any feedback you have that could
improve the experience: team @ crowdtilt.com

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davemel37
I wonder if the Billboard Owners are large pro-SOPA media companies. IT would
suck if this money went right back into the Pro-SOPA lobby.

A better strategy might be hacking the billboard system by buying up remnant
space and cancelling after a month. Since it costs money to take down
Billboards, and remnant boards are remnant for a reason, they will probably
stay up for several months without paying for more than a month. (If they get
PSA pricing, it will be even cheaper.)

~~~
saryant
Aren't ClearChannel and Viacom the two big billboard companies? That's just
going by the logos I see at the bottom.

If so, you're right. This is money going right back into their pockets.

Though I know area around his San Antonio office might have some private
billboards set up by local landowners in the area. He's right off a major
highway. Maybe one of those is a possible choice?

~~~
davemel37
Also, CBS, Van Wagner and others... More importantly, the amount of red tape
you have to go through to get a billboard up is crazy, so I can't imagine
every billboard company isn't in bed with the politicians.

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uptown
Does anybody really think this is going to have an influence on Lamar Smith?
Maybe I'm just jaded, but I don't see this as changing anything aside from
giving money to a billboard company, and emptying the pockets of donors.

~~~
felipemnoa
What do you suggest could be done? Is not bad to attack an opponent from
different directions.

~~~
uptown
I'm not sure. I just don't think this is it.

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plasma
The billboard should probably be Facebook, Reddit, Twitter etc logos with
Lamar Smith holding a gun shooting them with "Stop Lamar Smith from destroying
the internet".

~~~
zachrose
The billboard should probably be a computer in cowboy hat.

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lowglow
Having been born in Texas, I fully support this design. :D

~~~
joshontheweb
Me too, go Texas! Although I'll never move back. Too hot!

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tocomment
It his the same thing as the super PAC that was started for this same purpose?
Or is this an unrelated group of people doing a second billboard?

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midas
I don't normally give to charity, but this is totally awesome.

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knighthacker
I love it :). It is fun watching this campaign move so fast.

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acav
Love it - seriously awesome way to use crowdtilt

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seddona
a very interesting direction for Crowdtilt. I'm interested to see how
democratised crowd funding for political intent plays out.

