Earlier this year, Lawrence Lessig the man who took on Microsoft in 1997, gave his final presentation on Free Culture, Copyright and the Future of Ideas. After a decade of spreading the word, Lessig is moving on from the copyright debate and taking aim at corruption in Washington. For a time, Lessig even considered running for Congress himself, but it appears those plans were tabled when an exploratory committee formed to evaluate that possibility, recommended otherwise.

Last month, Lessig joined forces with political consultant Joe Trippi to launch Change Congress, a national movement to end corruption in America's congress. Or, so they say on their website. It's hard to take that goal too seriously since Trippi is so mainstream he's worked on every "famous" Democratic campaign since the 70's. From Teddy Kennedy to Alan Gephardt and even Howard Dean, Trippi's been an inside the Beltway kind of guy for many years. His last political gig was the role of Senior Advisor to John Edwards.

In addition to his political career, Trippi has been a consultant to various Silicon Valley firms. Presumably, while dabbling in the private sector, he came across Lessig and their seemingly unlikely partnership was formed. I don't know if Trippi's a good guy or a bad guy but he's not exactly Josh on the West Wing. If you followed the show (I did until about 2 years after co-creator Adam Sorkin got busted at Burbank Airport for concealing crack and 'shrooms in his luggage) you know that the earnest Josh consistently took the high road, unlike most of the other politico's on the show. I think Trippi is just a hired gun and I don't care how many high-minded websites he launches, I'm fairly certain he does not truly believe in much of anything. He's roughly of my generation -a Baby Boomer-but he's more about capitalism and less about idealism.

Let me further confess that while I find Lessig a brilliant writer with a fascinating turn of mind, I don't think he's anybody's idea of a working class hero. Lessig takes issue with the way copywriting laws are implemented but he was never out there lobbying for FREE anything. He might be a big Obama supporter now, but in earlier years he was a Young Republican. He's sacrificed nothing for any cause and while he has his rabid supporters, I think he's all about making money. There's nothing essentially wrong with that…it's just not grounds for the sainthood that I think he might aspire to.

You'd never confuse him with Richard Stallman, for example. Stallman (better known as RMS to the faithful) is a proponent of free software, which is NOT the same as Open Source. I once worked for an association who hired Stallman as their keynote speaker at their annual conference and the poor child who was tasked with the responsibility of obtaining a copy of Stallman's speech in advance of his appearance innocently sent him an email asking for his "Power Point". RMS replied with a gentle discourse on the tyranny of Microsoft and while I did not join in the email debate that followed, I secretly "sided" with Stallman. Who decided that Power Point is synonymous with the word ‘presentation'? Where was I the day that vote was taken? Oh, right, I live in Florida so my vote never counts (note to the DNC: Come up with a realistic plan to count my vote or I'll savage you in every column from now until election day)

RMS is also political. He proudly supports Ralph Nader for President. I think we all know there's never going to be a President Nader. I admire that kind of conviction in someone. It was like the people that lopped off a few cents every time they paid their phone bill in the late 60's, early 70's. The philosophy behind it was that if you knocked off the equivalent of the Federal tax surcharge every month, you were – in effect - lodging an anti-war protest. The only problem was that the great lumbering bureaucracy that was Ma Bell, had no idea what you were doing and thought you were just another deadbeat. But I knew people that did it until their phone service was shut off. And let's not forget, that was way in advance of cell phones. You either obtained a phone through the phone company or you were stuck with 2 Dixie cups and a string. It was a brave, but futile act. Much like voting for Ralph Nader for President.

Nobody is even 100% sure of where Stallman resides. He lives in Massachusetts…but where? In his office? A basement at MIT? I don't think he's got a chick and if he did, she'd likely be an ex-Trekkie or something. He's got a tongue in cheek personal ad on his website, but if you are thinking of replying, be forewarned he's a little scary looking.

Both Lessig and Trippi are well-scrubbed with a certain preppy air about them. Whereas, RMS is a mess. Personal hygiene habits aside, therein lies the difference between the three men. Lessig and Trippi both have well-crafted images and slick websites with blogs and wiki's and probably standard fees for speaking engagements. Stallman has a basic website with some interesting and humorous links and I know from personal experience that he will speak anywhere that interests him for free, if you pay for his travel.

The biggest difference is passion. RMS is passionate about free software, the open source movement, preserving our environment and preventing censorship of the internet. Trippi and Lessig claim they are passionate about ending government corruption.

We'll see.

I want to believe them, I really do. So, I invite you to check out their websites, as well as the Change Congress site and you make the call. New American folk heroes or Madison Avenue-like hype?

For now, I'm sticking with Stallman and I'll leave it to the rest of you to decide if the Lessig/Trippi connection is for real.

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