The tech community is abandoning ALEC

High-profile tech companies are abandoning the American Legislative Exchange Council, the 40-year old group known for quietly advancing business-centric, often conservative, bills through state legislatures.

One twist in the exodus? Companies like Google created the conditions that are making it difficult, if not impossible, for them to stay in ALEC. How's that? ALEC pitches itself as a place for business and government to work together to advance legislation, and for a time, the tech community saw it as that, too -- particularly during the last decade, when West Coast Internet-based companies were just starting to engage in politics and still finding their footing. But in the last few years, those same tech companies have found their political strength and savvy (not to mention giant bank accounts). Instead of partnering with groups that represent broad interests, such as, say, the defense industry, in recent years they've been retreating to organizations such as the Internet Association that focus on what matters to them most.

There's also something else behind the retreat. ALEC's main skill set is working in a distributed fashion, advancing legislation state by state -- including bans on municipal broadband like the one just rejected by voters in seven Colorado communities. By the time an issue emerged on the national stage, ALEC's take on it had the air of accepted fact. For decades, ALEC's involvement has happened below the radar. But in recent years a site called ALEC Exposed has trawled the Internet looking for signs of ALEC's influence on bills and its supporting memoranda, pulling the evidence into an online wiki that has served as fodder for countless blog posts, articles and radio news segments. That site has made it difficult to ignore ALEC's clout.