Eli Pariser
PopTech 2010
Eli Pariser is a pioneer in online politics. Shortly after 9/11, Pariser created a website calling for a multilateral approach to fighting terrorism. In the following weeks, over half a million people from 192 countries signed on, and Pariser rather unexpectedly became an online organizer. His website soon merged with MoveOn.org and Pariser, then just 20 years old, joined the group to direct its foreign policy campaigns.
Under his leadership, MoveOn.org Political Action has grown to 5 million members and raised over $120 million from millions of small donors to support advocacy campaigns and political candidates. Pariser focused on online-to-offline organizing, developing phone-banking tools and precinct programs in 2004 and 2006 that laid the groundwork for Barack Obama’s remarkable campaign. He’s appeared as a commentator on Good Morning America, World News Tonight, The Colbert Report, and all of the major cable news channels except Fox News.
Pariser grew up in Lincolnville, Maine, and graduated summa cum laude in 2000 with a bachelor’s in law, politics, and society from Simon’s Rock College. In 2005, he received an honorary high school diploma—one of very few given to non-high-school graduates—from Camden-Rockport High School. He lives in Brooklyn, where he’s working on a forthcoming book titled The Filter Bubble: What the Internet is Hiding from You.