[vox-outreach] Hi, I'm a new member

[Christian Einfeldt]

Hi, my name is Christian Einfeldt, and I'm a new member of this 
list!  I found the list through Paul Miller, whom I met on the 
OpenOffice.org marketing list.  

Bill Kendrick asked me to introduce myself, so here goes:  

I'm producing a film called the Digital Tipping Point, which is a 
documentary on the cultural implications of the global shift to 
open source software.  I believe that OSS is like the printing 
press being reinvented all over again.  Like the printing press, 
OSS and the Internet will result in diffusion of the tools of 
expression to groups which would otherwise be separated from those 
tools by the digital divide.  If you think that democracy is a good 
thing, then you gotta love OSS and the Internet.  

However, it is also true that there are a some people who oppose the 
highest and best use of OSS and the Internet, and these people have 
lots of money and power.  If OSS and the Internet are going to 
succeed, then those of who like OSS and the Internet are going to 
have to work hard to shepard it through a few minefields.  To do 
this, we will need more support, which is why I am doing my film, 
to let Joe Sixpack know that he has options and why he should care.  
Computers are not just geek toys; with the Internet, computers are 
TVs in reverse.  TVs just passively receive information; computers 
can make anyone a broadcaster. 

We have 90 hours of footage for our film, and have interviewed the 
following people: international pop music star Gilberto Gil, who is 
also now the Cultural Minister of Brazil; Christian Ude, Mayor of 
Munich; Miguel de Vasquez, the Minister of Education for the 
Spanish State of Extremadura; Brian Behlendorf of the Apache 
project; Ian Murdock, the founder of the Debian Project; Stanford 
Law Prof. Lawrence Lessig, the author of the book, "Future of 
Ideas"; Tim Witham, the director of the Open Source Development 
Lab, where Linus Torvalds is a Fellow; Chris Hofmann of the Mozilla 
project; Oregon State Representatives Phil Barnhart (D) and Jerry 
Krummel (R); and Scott Robinson, the Portland Schools administrator 
who refused to allow a Microsoft audit of the Portland Public 
School district.

So thanks for allowing me to participate in your list!

Christian Einfeldt
415-351-1300