AKVM

Hi Lessig - will you join Bernie Sanders in pledging not to run if you lose the Democratic nomination, and if not, why?

Yeah. See these CGP Grey videos: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL7679C7ACE93A5638

Essentially, our inane voting system makes third party candidacies vulnerable to the "spoiler effect". If Lessig runs as an independent, most of his votes will come from people who would otherwise have voted for Hillary. If he gets enough votes, he could draw enough votes from Hillary to abet a Republican victory.

This is essentially what Ralph Nader did to Al Gore in 2000.

Wonderful! You should publicize this more - I've heard lots of people worry about this.

Not sure if this is allowed, but I'd like to offer my take on this - Lessig's usual answer has been to note that while Sanders shares his concern about citizens' equality, he's not willing to make it a priority, and if elected he won't be able to do any of the things he wants to. But being perfectly honest, it's unlikely that either Sanders or Lessig will be the nominee. Rather, the (extremely important) purpose of their campaigns is to attract media and popular attention, and thus shift popular attention and the attention of the Democratic establishment to their stances on these issues. Thus, their efforts complement each other, not detract from each other. Read my full explanation of this here: https://www.reddit.com/r/Lessig2016/comments/3ice9g/why_this_isnt_about_lessig_v_bernie/

Lessig could run as an Independent in the general election. (Which could possibly take votes away from Hillary, and lead to a Republican victory. See this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ralph_Nader_presidential_campaign,_2000