Candidacy of Oliver Lorenz as board member of FFII
Person: After studying law in Germany and France with an emphasis on copyright and competition, I have worked in the legal department of a software house in Berlin, Germany for five years. I currently prepare a doctoral thesis in the field of competition law in the IT sector, for and with the help of EMCITA, which I intend to shape into an instrument for competition competence in the future.
Objective and commitment: I see a great potential to make the FFII-program of ideas and principles more commonly understood and more widely supported. Many people - in addition to programmers and SMEs - would support our ideas on data literacy, access to knowledge and fair competition if they knew of them. The FFII program should therefore be presented increasingly in its societal context. I refer expressly to civil society, where with the help of politics and media, important potential endorsement can be gained. Popularizing the FFII-program by explaining the public interest of our work to people outside our community is fundamental to increasing our political influence. Accentuating failures and fallacies in the legal and economic framework through exact analysis and comprehensible communication will best familiarise people with the issues of civil rights in the information society and ultimately provide the support of our work for the important work ahead. I will emphasize rendering more visible the necessary link between our ideas and the public interest in improving the rules in our society through increased permanent press work, including the actual working with journalists, and all other form of communication to build a more and better understanding of our objectives at all levels of society. My work experience, including with corporate conceptions of benevolent work, should be helpful in extending the material base for the organisation' work. I recognise the need for a secure basis of funding in order to preserve our organisation's integrity and will therefore take responsibility to assure that FFII will not become dependent on any fundraising that could compromise its program.
Position in the current discussion on the FFIIs organisation: I look forward to working in a board headed by Hartmut in resolving any of the issues recently raised in the discussion about the presidency. Having cooperated with Hartmut in resolving the N***werk proceedings - which may have been insufficiently communicated to the board, and certainly were underestimated by some in their complexity - I must stress that his personal organisation and position-taking was exemplary in preserving FFII's interest. I am convinced at the same time that it requires a man of his capacities to keep FFII on the right way into the future. I also trust his presidency to further positive change to organisational shortcomings. Personally, I believe that a person shouldering some of the presidents office work and assuring more frequent reporting to the board would bring about the desired improvements. That some have apparently not considered this approach of problem-solving, however, demands to comment on dissenting motivations. I strongly advice against turning FFII into a typical Brussels lobby group. More than the ensuing conflicts of interest and potential loss of respectability, the organisation would loose its core appeal for the network of activists, supporters and donors (I cannot speak for the inner circle of the board) - the reputation on which the organisation has built its success. The academic acclaim of FFII analysis and our knowledge-based leadership, fundamental for our work and respectability, must be preserved if the FFII is. In this respect, I am unable to see how FFII could successfully pursue its path if Hartmut Pilch would not lead as president.
Heise quote with a campaign statement in favor of Hartmut as president
You can contact Oliver at oliver at ffii org or lorenz at emcita com.
