Comments on: Lawrence Lessig Needs Your Help Awakening a Sleeping Giant

By: ethanz

ethanz — Sun, 26 Feb 2012 21:52:00 +0000

Matt, you’re getting very, very strong at turning liveblogging into a compelling read. In this case, your subheads are a really important piece of this – they signpost the piece in a very helpful way. I also thought the introduction was compellingly put together and framed. In a non-four hour context, would have loved a closing stretch reacting to Lessig’s talk and offering your thoughts on where he’s on strong and on shakier ground. But perhaps that’s a later companion piece?

(And, of course, I feel awkward putting professorial comments on a piece that’s obviously getting a wider audience than this class, but hey, that’s the joy of writing in public.)

By: Seth Finkelstein

Seth Finkelstein — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 10:56:12 +0000

Regarding “… has terminal brain cancer. Would you do nothing?” – ironically, for people with an _incurable_ disease, there’s an argument that “do nothing” is exactly the right answer. That is, aggressive attempts at treating the disease only reduce the quality of life for the sufferer through the pain and misery of the side-effects, and might even end up reducing whatever time they have left via further stressing an already ill body. It’s terrible to say, but sometimes the best option for such a tragedy seems to be simple palliative management, and just enjoy whatever life remains.

Hence, sacrificing oneself for a futile cause is not necessarily advisable.

Was anything deeper said about solving the collective-action problem? (it’s sort of true by definition that if only a few participate, everyone loses).

By: Jim Gibson

Jim Gibson — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 14:41:07 +0000

Most people realize that THE MONEY is THE PROBLEM … but, there are very few solutions that will really work because you are asking the very people who have control over the process to vote AGAINST their own interest.
THIS is a REAL solution http://youtu.be/I9ApEG2NhMs
It’s a 3 minute video that explain a plan that can work.