<instructions>Your goal is to analyze the following comment and estimate how highly it will be upvoted by the Hacker News community.</instructions><comment><author>dankohn1</author><text>&amp;gt; Serious question: given that he didn&amp;#x27;t have a snowball&amp;#x27;s chance, why did you give him money, as opposed to giving money to some other change agent that does have a chance?&lt;p&gt;@tptacek, I thought of funding Lessig as what an angel investor would describe as exploring the problem space. That is, I believe he has correctly identified a huge problem, I knew he was a smart guy who would adapt to what he learned, and I was happy to support that exploration. I&amp;#x27;m also comfortable with him pulling the eject lever once he couldn&amp;#x27;t see a path to moving his goals forward.&lt;p&gt;I will admit to seeing a relative dearth of alternative change agents.</text><parent_chain><item><author>tptacek</author><text>Serious question: given that he didn&amp;#x27;t have a snowball&amp;#x27;s chance, why did you give him money, as opposed to giving money to some other change agent that &lt;i&gt;does&lt;/i&gt; have a chance?</text></item><item><author>dankohn1</author><text>I supported Lessig&amp;#x27;s presidential campaign monetarily, even though I never thought he had a snowball&amp;#x27;s chance and also didn&amp;#x27;t think that his model of affecting change was fully thought through. As entrepreneurs, I think many of us can sympathize with the idea of knowing that there is a huge, massive problem that needs to be fixed, without necessarily having the solution fully formed.&lt;p&gt;It would have been so easy for Lessig to coast on the reputation of his extraordinary work with Creative Commons [0] and his professorship at Harvard. Instead, he (IMHO correctly) identified one of the greatest challenges of our time, political corruption. His first proposed solution, the MAYDAY PACn [1] (A SuperPAC to end SuperPACs), was a brilliant idea and an abject failure. So was his second, which was this presidential campaign. It is incorrect to say that he never had a chance, since you can see how close he was in polling [2] to qualifying for the debate, and getting into the debate would have had a huge impact on awareness of his ideas and potential solutions.&lt;p&gt;I do complain that he had fallen for the Green Lantern Theory of the Presidency [3], instead of understanding the complexity required for real change. But, I give him huge props for trying both of these approaches, and I can&amp;#x27;t wait to see what his third attempt to take on political corruption will be.&lt;p&gt;[0] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Creative_Commons_license&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Creative_Commons_license&lt;/a&gt;
[1] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Mayday_PAC&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Mayday_PAC&lt;/a&gt;
[2] &lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;elections.huffingtonpost.com&amp;#x2F;pollster&amp;#x2F;2016-national-democratic-primary#!maxpct=60&amp;amp;mindate=2015-09-01&amp;amp;smoothing=less&amp;amp;showpoints=yes&amp;amp;estimate=custom&amp;amp;selected=Biden,Clinton,Lessig,Sanders&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;elections.huffingtonpost.com&amp;#x2F;pollster&amp;#x2F;2016-national-d...&lt;/a&gt;
[3] &lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.vox.com&amp;#x2F;2014&amp;#x2F;5&amp;#x2F;20&amp;#x2F;5732208&amp;#x2F;the-green-lantern-theory-of-the-presidency-explained&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.vox.com&amp;#x2F;2014&amp;#x2F;5&amp;#x2F;20&amp;#x2F;5732208&amp;#x2F;the-green-lantern-theor...&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain></comment><story><title>Lessig Ends Presidential Campaign</title><url>https://www.facebook.com/Lessig2016/videos/vb.832686670149581/909929802425267/?type=2&amp;theater</url></story>
<instructions>Your goal is to analyze the following comment and estimate how highly it will be upvoted by the Hacker News community.</instructions><comment><author>JoeAltmaier</author><text>Sometimes its about sending a message. After all, its not a horse race; you don&amp;#x27;t win any prize by backing the winner.</text><parent_chain><item><author>tptacek</author><text>Serious question: given that he didn&amp;#x27;t have a snowball&amp;#x27;s chance, why did you give him money, as opposed to giving money to some other change agent that &lt;i&gt;does&lt;/i&gt; have a chance?</text></item><item><author>dankohn1</author><text>I supported Lessig&amp;#x27;s presidential campaign monetarily, even though I never thought he had a snowball&amp;#x27;s chance and also didn&amp;#x27;t think that his model of affecting change was fully thought through. As entrepreneurs, I think many of us can sympathize with the idea of knowing that there is a huge, massive problem that needs to be fixed, without necessarily having the solution fully formed.&lt;p&gt;It would have been so easy for Lessig to coast on the reputation of his extraordinary work with Creative Commons [0] and his professorship at Harvard. Instead, he (IMHO correctly) identified one of the greatest challenges of our time, political corruption. His first proposed solution, the MAYDAY PACn [1] (A SuperPAC to end SuperPACs), was a brilliant idea and an abject failure. So was his second, which was this presidential campaign. It is incorrect to say that he never had a chance, since you can see how close he was in polling [2] to qualifying for the debate, and getting into the debate would have had a huge impact on awareness of his ideas and potential solutions.&lt;p&gt;I do complain that he had fallen for the Green Lantern Theory of the Presidency [3], instead of understanding the complexity required for real change. But, I give him huge props for trying both of these approaches, and I can&amp;#x27;t wait to see what his third attempt to take on political corruption will be.&lt;p&gt;[0] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Creative_Commons_license&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Creative_Commons_license&lt;/a&gt;
[1] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Mayday_PAC&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Mayday_PAC&lt;/a&gt;
[2] &lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;elections.huffingtonpost.com&amp;#x2F;pollster&amp;#x2F;2016-national-democratic-primary#!maxpct=60&amp;amp;mindate=2015-09-01&amp;amp;smoothing=less&amp;amp;showpoints=yes&amp;amp;estimate=custom&amp;amp;selected=Biden,Clinton,Lessig,Sanders&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;elections.huffingtonpost.com&amp;#x2F;pollster&amp;#x2F;2016-national-d...&lt;/a&gt;
[3] &lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.vox.com&amp;#x2F;2014&amp;#x2F;5&amp;#x2F;20&amp;#x2F;5732208&amp;#x2F;the-green-lantern-theory-of-the-presidency-explained&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.vox.com&amp;#x2F;2014&amp;#x2F;5&amp;#x2F;20&amp;#x2F;5732208&amp;#x2F;the-green-lantern-theor...&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain></comment><story><title>Lessig Ends Presidential Campaign</title><url>https://www.facebook.com/Lessig2016/videos/vb.832686670149581/909929802425267/?type=2&amp;theater</url></story>