Grassroots Fundraising Hits $4 Million

Mary — Thu, 08 Nov 2007 16:44:21 -0300

Now we know why Ron Paul is smiling.

UPDATE: See the YouTube video below

Trevor Lyman, a supporter of libertarian presidential candidate Ron Paul, decided to help his preferred candidate raise money. He bought the domain ThisNovember5th.com, the purpose of which was to encourage people to make a small donation on that day. The campaign was ridiculously successful. This past Monday, the site raised $4 million for Ron Paul's presidential campaign.

Interestingly enough, the site itself did not even collect the donations, but rather sent site visitors on the the official campaign site, RonPaul2008.com, to make their donation.

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Creating a Petition Culture in Chile

Mary — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 14:32:00 -0400

image from Chile Primero website explaining what a petition is: "What are Petitions? Let's Learn a New Political Practice"

Petitions are one of the most popular forms of digital activism nowadays. MoveOn does it. Avaaz does it. Even the Free Paris Hilton campaign does it. You've probably signed an online petition yourself for one cause or another. The problem is, petitions don't translate into all cultures.

As I've mentioned before, I am working with Chile Primero, a new Chilean political movement (which would like to grow into a party) which is very interested in using technology in spreading its

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Fighting Web Ads , Freeing Culture

Mary — Tue, 08 May 2007 19:32:00 -0400

Blogger Ethan Zuckerman says that we should not pay too much attention to innovations just because they are shiny (ie, because of the "oh neat!" factor), but rather because they are "crunchy," that is, because they have lasting and widespread value.

I'm not sure if the innovation I'm about to write about is shiny or crunchy, but I know that I like it. It's called AddArt and, according to the blog Smart Mobs, it's a plug-in for the Mozilla browser that replaces ads in websites with art. It's not ready for download yet, but hopefully it will be soon.

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the People's K Street

Mary — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 11:16:00 -0400

Special interests are the American boogeyman. They are used as political ammunition by both the right and left and everyone agrees that they are a danger to our democracy because the priorities of these "special interests", rather than the public well-being, set the political agenda in Washington.

However, special interests are not the problem. Every citizen has their own special interests. (Mine, for example, include opposition of the Iraq war, support of green energy alternatives, an irrational revulsion towards plastic packaging, and celebrity gossip blogs). No, the problem is not that special interests exist. The problem is that some special

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Why Tech is Changing Politics - wiki project

Mary — Wed, 18 Apr 2007 12:30:54 -0400

We all know that technologies like the internet, cell phones, text messaging, and social networking are changing politics. We hear HOW these changes are occurring every day with a new case study or anecdote (now politicians announce their candidacies via YouTube and try to create online social networks around their campaigns, MoveOn raises millions from ordinary people rather than big donors).

However, I don't think that it's clear WHY technology is changing politics. What about e-mail or digital video or mass access to cell phones is politically revolutionary? In an effort to answer this why questions I have started a

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