By Chris Taylor, Business 2.0 Magazine senior editor
November 13 2006: 10:20 AM EST
(Business 2.0 Magazine) -- Amid all the post-election noise, Democrats
haven't been subtle about their top priorities once they take control
of Congress: boost minimum wage, reform Medicare, rescind the 2001 tax
cuts, and clean up "the swamp" of Washington lobbying.
With such a teeming legislative plate, the tech industry might be
feeling like table scraps right about now. It shouldn't. The 110th
Congress could be the most technology-friendly in history.
Here's why: Yes, Nancy Pelosi, the presumptive new Speaker of the
House, hails from one of the most liberal parts of the country, San
Francisco. But she also represents a city that's near the heart of
America's tech sector.
A year ago this month, after extensive meetings with VCs and
entrepreneurs, Pelosi unveiled an "innovation agenda" that called,
among other things, for broadband access for all Americans, whether it
comes via Wi-Fi, Wi-Max or a fixed line by 2010.
Pelosi's pledge surprised no one inside the Beltway or Silicon Valley.
Lobbyists say Pelosi is close to Silicon Valley Democrats Anna Eshoo
and Zoe Lofgren. Eshoo's constituents include Steve Jobs, David Filo
and most of Hewlett-Packard (Charts). Lofgren, meanwhile, represents
the high tech hub of San Jose.
"We are optimistic when it comes to Democrats and high tech," Bill
Archey, President of the American Electronics Association, the largest
technology lobbying group in the US., told the San Francisco Chronicle
this week. "To use a Silicon Valley term, they tend to get it."
Hungry for H-1Bs
One issue that's near and dear to Silicon Valley's heart: H-1B visas.
These permits allow foreign engineers, programmers and other highly-
skilled professionals work in the United States for three to six
years. The base number of visas issued each year for skilled workers
is capped at 65,000, which is a huge concern for tech giants, like
Intel and Hewlett-Packard, which have an insatiable appetite for
engineers and programmers from India and China.
The H1-B ceiling once approached 200,000 before Congress started
curtailing visa applications in recent years. Legislative efforts to
raise the ceiling have failed, including two attempts in the current
Congress that were defeated amid the broader debate over immigration.
Republican leaders didn't want to appear soft on the issue.
Now that Rep. George Miller (D-California) is likely to chair the
Education and Workforce committee, tech companies are optimistic the
H-1B cap will now be increased.
Another hot-button tech issue likely to get resolved: net neutrality.
This is a complicated battle with telecoms and the cable industry
allied in one corner, and consumer advocates in the other. The
telecoms want to charge premium rates to allow customers to navigate
the Internet at top speeds. Opponents like Intel (Charts), Microsoft,
eBay (Charts) and Google (Charts) contend that high-speed lanes would
create a digital divide between the rich and poor - and, ultimately,
stifle innovation.
A proposal outlawing high-speed toll booths failed in the House
earlier this year, and met with a heartbreaking 11-11 tie in the
Senate's telecom committee. But now that both House and Senate are in
Democratic hands, it's far less likely telecoms and cable companies
will succeed.
Nancy Pelosi is a staunch supporter of net neutrality, as is Michigan
Democrat John Dingell, who called the telecom's plan "private taxation
of the Internet." Dingell will chair the telecom committee in the
house, and told reporters on Wednesday that "we're going to have to
address the question of network neutrality."
The privacy party
Of course, the Democrats aren't always pro-technology. How can they
be, when most Hollywood campaign contributions wind up in Democratic
coffers?
The major studios and Silicon Valley have long been at loggerheads
over legislation like the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). The
1998 law imposed a vice-like protective grip on Hollywood's
intellectual property by making certain software illegal if used -
even in theory - to circumvent copyright protection.
The DMCA was a bipartisan piece of legislation. And now some Democrats
want to go further to help the entertainment industry.
Rep. Howard Berman, a Hollywood Democrat who may end up as chair of
the subcommittee on intellectual property, once sponsored legislation
that would have let the studios and record labels legally hack into
peer-to-peer networks like LimeWire and disrupt them. The proposal,
which failed, gave computer security experts nightmares.
Here's where this debate gets interesting: Berman isn't the only
contender for that subcommittee post. Rick Boucher, a pro-Silicon
Valley Democrat, may get the appointment. In contrast to Berman,
Boucher has indicated he'll try to soften the DMCA. Boucher believes
privacy trumps copyright.
Indeed, Democrats are fast becoming the party of privacy.
Fourteen bills related to technological privacy - including one that
would have imposed tougher sentences for spyware makers and another
that would have required companies to disclose when consumer data was
stolen or misused - failed in the last two years.
Now pro-privacy stalwarts like Democratic Senators Dianne Feinstein
(California) and Patrick Leahy (Vermont), and Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.)
are likely to push their cause with a vengeance.
The takeaway this week for top-tier tech companies, online privacy
advocates, and believers in equal Internet access for all? The future
looks very bright.
At least until 2008.
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