Jim Gilliam is a geeky activist building internet tools to shake up a broken political system.
- Act.ly is petitions designed to take full advantage of Twitter.
- GovLuv connects government leaders with citizens via Twitter.
- Tweet Progress is a directory of progressives on Twitter.
- WhiteHouse2.org imagines how the White House could work if it was run democratically on the internet.
- NationBuilder is the open source platform behind White House 2 being used by Australia 2, Parliament 2 in Canada, and Hugmyndaráðuneytið in Iceland.
In 2003, Gilliam hooked up with award-winning filmmaker Robert Greenwald to research Uncovered: The War on Iraq, and tell the stories of dozens of government insiders, from CIA officers to weapons inspectors, all desperate to tell the world that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction. Released in just four short months, the film reached millions of people worldwide without any corporate distribution, based entirely on activists holding thousands of free screenings in their homes, churches, and small businesses. The grassroots political documentary was born, and Jim later evangelized the model at numerous film festivals and created a free web service, Brave New Theaters, enabling any filmmaker to use the same techniques to tell stories the traditional media is too afraid to touch.
Following up on the success of Uncovered, Gilliam innovated with Robert Greenwald’s next three films, Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch’s War on Journalism, Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price, and Iraq for Sale: The War Profiteers. Outfoxed forever branded FOX News as Republican propaganda, severely damaging its ability to control the news cycle and public opinion. In the two years after Wal-Mart was released, the company completely changed its brand, logo, tagline, and ditched its smiley mascot, a brand Gilliam turned against them with “Evil Smiley.” Iraq for Sale led to Senate hearings on war profiteering and increased oversight of military contractors. It was also the first film to ever raise a substantial portion of its funds from small donations online — $260,000 from over 3,000 donors.
But 6 months to make a film was still too long, so in 2006, Brave New Films, a non-profit Gilliam co-founded with Robert Greenwald and Rick Jacobs, began making short YouTube videos on a wide range of political issues, from corporate greed to health care. The Real McCain video series dominated YouTube, and was the only negative link about McCain on the first page of Google’s search results. The McCain Mansions video started a devastating political meme when McCain couldn’t remember how many houses he owned. By the 2008 election, these videos had been seen 40 million times, and Brave New Films was 1 million members strong.
Prior to his activism and filmmaking career, Gilliam worked at Lycos in the late 90’s, one of the first internet search engines. In 2000, he launched Business.com as its Chief Technology Officer with Jake Winebaum from Disney and funding from Primedia, Reed-Elsevier, Mort Zuckerman, and the Financial Times. The company was sold in 2007 for $400 million to R. H. Donnelly.
Gilliam was honored in 2008 with Take Back America’s second annual Maria Leavey Tribute Award for his behind-the-scenes work building the progressive movement at Brave New Films. His work has been featured in publications like the New York Times, Forbes, Wired, and the Washington Post. He has fought cancer twice, and is the enormously grateful recipient of a bone marrow transplant and a double lung transplant. His blog, “Make the Future,” is available at jimgilliam.com.
Selected press
Who’s Winning the Twitter Wars?
Newsweek, 9.8.2009
But according to new-media specialists, most of the liberal action on Twitter isn’t coming from the Democratic Party. Instead, it’s coming from grassroots organizers who are building a base of like-minded activists. Jim Gilliam, a Los Angeles-based Web developer, says that unlike conservatives, progressives see Twitter “more as a way to connect people with each other.” He helped found TweetProgress.us, a directory of progressive Twitter users, and is currently working on GovLuv.org, a nonpartisan governmental directory scheduled to debut in September. He and his progressive colleagues use Twitter to collate support from the bottom up, rather than send messages from the top down.
His Fans Greenlight the Project
Washington Post, 8.20.2006
Jim Gilliam is only 28 years old. In a previous incarnation, he was a venture capitalist and a chief technology officer. Now his voice is a old man’s rasp and he does not have the strength to cook his own food. He is waiting for a double lung transplant. But sick in his bedroom, Gilliam had a revolutionary idea: Why not get the audience to pay for a movie before it gets made? He calls it “People Powered Film.” It could be the start of something.
Brave New Filmmaker
Matt Coker, OC Weekly, 6.8.2006
Jim Gilliam sits with his back board-stiff against the headrest of his bed, his legs dangling off the end. That’s life when you’re 6-foot-9. He has no hair, and he’s about as white as they make white guys. He’s not making a fashion statement, not trying to replace the lead singer of Midnight Oil. The breathing tube under his nose might have been your first clue.
Creative Commons is Rewriting Rules of Copyright
Washington Post, 3.15.2005
Hollywood producers Robert Greenwald and Jim Gilliam are among those challenging such assumptions. [...] Just weeks after [Outfoxed] was released in theaters, the producers posted 48 minutes of original interviews from the work online. Gilliam credits the Internet with boosting interest in the movie because it reached a wider audience than it could in theaters alone. “This isn’t necessarily just some altruistic thing,” Gilliam said. “You can make money off of this, too.”
Can O’Reilly Rebound?
Access Hollywood, 10.19.2004
“When the sexual harassment allegations came out I was like, ‘People have to see this.’ This fits into the pattern that he has been showing if you just watch his show,” explained Gilliam. In watching hours of O’Reilly’s show, Gilliam said a disturbing pattern emerges. In taking numerous clips of his shows that deal with sexual topics, he said that O’Reilly’s choice of subject matter is not always topical.
“It’s not like all of a sudden in the news everyone’s talking about the wet T-shirt contest in Florida. It’s not interesting to a lot of people but yet he deliberately seeks them out,” Gilliam told Access.
Much at stake in O’Reilly empire — Los Angeles Times, 10.18.2004
The [O'Reilly sex] scandal “really destroys his credibility of what he claims to be,” said Jim Gilliam [...] “He certainly can’t be giving advice to kids.” On Friday, Gilliam’s website posted a five-minute video, “The O’Sexxxy Factor,” that edited together excerpts of O’Reilly segments on collegiate wet T-shirt contests and other salacious material, which the filmmaker said showed the host’s “obsession” with sex.
Movement Seeks Copyright Alternatives
Associated Press, 10.10.2004
“Uncovered” associate producer Jim Gilliam said he wants to help future filmmakers avoid having to navigate the legal terrain. [...] Gilliam welcomes any reuse – even for moneymaking projects that don’t pay him a dime. “Every time someone takes a clip from `Outfoxed,’ they have to attribute it,” he said. “That serves as a marketing vehicle.”
How to Make a Guerilla Documentary
Robert S. Boynton, New York Times Magazine, 7.11.2004
Jim Gilliam, a 26-year-old former dot-com executive and a producer of “Outfoxed,” is enthusiastic about the way Greenwald’s projects meld grass-roots politics with the culture of the Internet. He predicts a future — augured by events like MoveOn’s competition for the best 30-second anti-Bush advertisement — in which young political filmmakers will be as likely to wield a camera phone as a digital camera. “It won’t be long before people will be shooting and editing short documentaries that they’ll stream from their blogs,” he says.
The Eparty’s Over
Forbes, 12.11.2000
“Business.com had trouble even before its launch in June, beginning with the search engine at the heart of the site. The job was entrusted to US Interactive, the teetering Internet consulting outfit. But US Interactive botched the job, and a desperate Winebaum turned at the last minute to 23-year-old James Gilliam, a techie who joined Ecompanies from Lycos. Gilliam put in several round-the-clock days to patch together the search engine.”
Master Builder
Red Herring, 12.4.2000
“If Business.com becomes the Yahoo of the business world, much of the credit will go to Mr. Gilliam. Before joining eCompanies, the Internet incubator behind Business.com, he designed information accessing systems now used in two dozen Lycos properties.”
