According to the NRA's 2010 form 990[1], total revenue in that year was $227 million. According to your link, only one corporate donor gave the NRA between $5 million and $10 million and four gave between $1 million and $4.9 million, etc.
$100 million alone was from membership fees, $11 million from royalties, $11 million from sales of goods, $20 million from advertising, etc.
Those who claim that the NRA is just an arm of the firearms industry don't understand the fervency of gun owners in the US.
EFF needs to be the NRA of privacy and electronic freedom and everyone needs to get as fervent about privacy as gun owners are about the 2nd amendment.
In related news the EFF should definitly clean up their merch offerings. Especially their fashion section looks like crap. I would definitely leave more money there for apparel that appeals beyond a DefCon crowd. With a single blog post "submit t-shirt designs" and a followup with a bit of voting would fix that problem. Or just having one getting design by somebody like Fairey.
Your post made me think that the EFF logo is pretty cool, and I would totally wear a T-shirt with that on it. I went to their merch page, and...they don't have one. The only shirt they have is the "Kingpin", with a metal-band-ified version of the handle of a hacker I've never heard of. What?
I never claimed that the NRA is an arm of the firearms industry. Firearms are a viable enough commodity that they generate such revenues. Large corporate donations indicate the industry's health. Certainly it is because people like, and often need, their guns.
Bottom line, there's vastly more money going into fighting against privacy than for it.
There is also vastly more money against the NRA than for it. With Bloomberg around, it's essentially infinite. You don't need money. You need people who care.
$100 million alone was from membership fees, $11 million from royalties, $11 million from sales of goods, $20 million from advertising, etc.
Those who claim that the NRA is just an arm of the firearms industry don't understand the fervency of gun owners in the US.
EFF needs to be the NRA of privacy and electronic freedom and everyone needs to get as fervent about privacy as gun owners are about the 2nd amendment.
1: http://ia601205.us.archive.org/32/items/NationalRifleAssocia...