Advice or Ostriches?

The lawyers at WilmerHale are undoubtedly excellent. But this "advice" is hardly new or newsworthy. Washington Lawyers' Advice to Silicon Valley: Don't Sit on Sideline [SiliconValley.com]. 

I've been representing high-tech companies, start-ups and VCs on technology policy issues for more than 15 years, including many many heavyweights — starting with Netscape at the dawn of the commercial Internet in 1995. To do a good job on tech issues, one must not only understand the technology itself, but how to relate to the values of Silicon Valley. So the question in my view is not whether the Valley will sit on the sidelines — Eric Schmidt's high-level economic advisory role with Obama shows clearly it does not — but rather how, when and on what issue(s) it will engage Washington. The days of the "ostrich syndrome," like Bill Gates in the early 1990s, ignoring D.C. in the hopes it would just go away, are passe — LONG long gone.