Enthused Donors and Volunteers Crash Obama’s Servers
February 7, 2008
Barack Obama’s servers have experienced a meltdown thanks to the massive wave of post-Super Tuesday support coming in his direction. I tried to log onto his website to give him another contribution this morning and this was what I saw:
Obviously, this is a good sign that the momentum is in his favor, but he needs to spend some of that $7 million he’s raised in the last day and a half to scale his server base very quickly.
Thankfully, Obama is an effective manager. I don’t know how much of a tech-head he is, but if he’s he’s savvy enough to want a White House CTO, then he’s probably got a crackerjack team working on this problem already.
Dang. I was on last night and was going to make a contribution, but I decided to wait until I get my tax return (funds are a little tight).
Incidentally, it’s scheduled to be deposited on the 12th - the same day as my primary.
That’s pretty crazy though!
By the way I just read that article on Obama’s desire to appoint a White House CTO - wow. He knows his stuff. I mean, it takes a certain level of knowledge to even know what areas need addressing by a CTO - and that he cares enough about those issues to want to put someone in place to manage them I think is very wise.
It also inspires me to think that maybe, just maybe, we’ll have a president who actually knows something about science and technology for once. The generally scientifically uneducated politician is becoming a serious liability for this country as we become more and more technologically and scientifically oriented.
For instance, I think anyone with even basic knowledge about the internet, how it works, and its effect on the population would support network neutrality. And yet, the fact that it’s even an ISSUE demonstrates how deeply out of the technology loop so many of our legislators really are. Seriously, “a series of tubes”? Only someone who has NO IDEA how the internet works would describe it that way. That’s certainly not someone you want legislating internet regulation.
Anyhow, I ramble. Suffice it to say, Obama’s seeming knowledge on these issues is comforting.
Patrick, while I completely agree with your point re: having someone in office who knows at least a little science and/or tech (and that Obama would be such a person) the questionable support of Net Neutrality has less to do with understanding it than it does protecting the money interest behind those who oppose it.
Jake:
I know that opposition to Net Neutrality is more about money than about technology; I suppose what I mean is, I’m glad he understand the technology well enough to not be swayed by the money interest. We’re talking about a medium that has become one of the most powerful means of free expression in the world, and no amount of money can equal that value.