The problem with nerd politics (The Guardian)

Posted May 18, 2012 16:20 UTC (Fri) by pboddie (subscriber, #50784) [Link]

Assuming we accept that, what prevents geeks from organizing politically? Is it the stereotype of introversion? Or is it a lack of consensus politically among geeks in other arenas of life? i.e. conservative geeks, liberal geeks, anarchist geeks etc...

Because the technical solution can be put in place today, without asking anyone's permission, or going through the courts, or spending money, or lobbying politicians, or gathering votes in the hope that (someday) that law might change.

It's a lot less work for technically capable people to just deal with a problem in a technical way. Another example is dealing with persistent spammers: the purely technical solution is just to use various tools to make sure you never see their spam again; the political solution is to spend time on making sure that various private and public organisations are aware of the activities of the spammers so that the remote possibility that they are reprimanded and that the spam will be stopped permanently at the source may be achieved.

The political solution is thus a distraction from more interesting and rewarding work, so frequently people just hope that others will get involved in that thankless task.