COMMENTARY

Peter Burgess

John Maloney, the President of Tumblr Kickstarter David Karp, founder of Reddit Fight for the Future Brad Burnham, a partner at Union Square Ventures David Segal, executive director for Demand Progress, a non-profit group. Nate Westheimer, executive director of the New York Tech Meetup Clay Shirky, a scholar of Internet culture who teaches at New York University’s Interactive Telecommunications Program, Claire Cain Miller contributed reporting for the NYT Ron Conway, a Silicon Valley patriarch who runs SV Angel, an investment fund. Fred Wilson, venture capitalist Paul Graham, venture capitalist

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The following is from a New York Times article about the fight for Internet freedom. This is about a meeting in November 2011

The idea for the feature came out of a three-hour meeting the weekend before, organized by people who opposed the legislation, including members of Fight for the Future; Brad Burnham, a partner at Union Square Ventures; and David Segal, executive director for Demand Progress, a non-profit group.

John Maloney, the president of Tumblr, said the company volunteered its offices in Manhattan for the meeting, which included roughly 40 people in the room and another 40 or so on speakerphone. Employees of well-known sites like Kickstarter and Reddit were there.

“They told us why it was flawed and asked us to think about it as an industry and a group,” said Mr. Maloney, who added that David Karp, Tumblr’s founder, “was very quick to raise his hand and say ‘We’re in.’ ”

“I looked at David and he had a spark in his eye,” Mr. Maloney said.

Mr. Maloney said a team of people at Tumblr worked late into that evening and returned early on Sunday. That Wednesday morning they posted their work, sat back and watched it come to life and spread around the Web.