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Greenhouse
It sounds cynical, but if you want to understand why politicians make the decisions they make and vote the way they vote you just need to follow the money.
For every story there is a story behind that story.
Robert Anton Wilson often used a playful idea of seeing the "fnords", that is seeing the story behind the story.
In other words Greenhouse isn't doing anything thousands of other people couldn't have done. But they didn't. Nicholas Rubin did.
Rubin has received a lot of attention from the press in part because he's just 16 years old, but that catchy factoid sometimes hides just how fantastically useful Greenhouse is regardless of who built it and how old they might be. It's fantastically useful if you want to see the threads behind the news, to follow the money as it were.
1. how did you come up with the idea for Greenhouse?
Corporate personhood and
(if he talks about corporate personhood, mention that most people don't know that, can he expand a bit on that idea)
1a) ask about relationship to Lessig.
2. One of the things I found interesting about Greenhouse is that on one hand staring this data in face can make you cynical about politics, how did you feel about that? Has it been depressing to discover the sort of almost 1 to 1 equation that seems to exist between money and the way politicians vote on issues?
2a) at the top there you have a little ray of hope -- AKA, the contributions from ordinary people
like you and I. Was that there from the beginning? and do you see those numbers
as a kind of solution? (can follow up with Lessigs Grant and Franklin proposal
3. In reading some of the past coverage of greenhouse I noticed that you had a lot of people from all sides of the political spectrum -- pretty unusual to have Tea Party supports say nice things said about at the same time anti-Tea PArty supporters are saying the same thing. It's a bit like uncovering the money might unite some pretty dissparate ideologies around a common goal -- have you found that to be true,
that money is the common enemy of pretty much everyone seeking political reform?
3a) what's the most egregious example you know of -- who is the most paid for politician in america?
4. What are your goals for greenhouse?
5. i noticed that cory doctorow suggested a sort of reverse tool, where any time the name of a company or individual who makes massive donations comes up it shows the politicians who benefit from that money. Is there data out there for that sort of thing?
6. Can you share any plans for the future of greenhouse?
Lessig said recently on his blog that "
Opensecrets.org can tell you. Next time you read an article about how you local representatives voted, head over to opensecrets.org and check to see if the vote happens to -- coincidentally I'm sure -- to benefit the your representative's top donors in any way. Congrats, you've followed the money to the why behind the what.
In this case the "green" in Greenhouse refers to money, as in campaign contributions and how they influence the U.S. political system. The download page gives away the answer in its slogan -- "some are red, some are blue, all are green".
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