Personal Democracy Plus Our premium content network. LEARN MORE You are not logged in. LOG IN NOW >

Obama for America's 50-State Strategy Shows Up Online

BY Nick Judd | Friday, October 28 2011

In 2008, Obama for America's 50-state strategy contributed to his election. Now it looks like his campaign isn't just adopting it again on the ground — his campaign is rounding up ground troops online as well. ... Read More

New Obama for America Page is a Jungle Gym for Donation Data

BY Nick Judd | Thursday, October 20 2011

Source: Barackobama.com Obama for America has released a website for users to explore data about the campaign's donor base, in order to celebrate, per the campaign, their one-millionth donor. The application allows users ... Read More

The Obama Campaign's Email Dinner Blitz For Your Campaign Dollar

BY Nick Judd | Friday, September 30 2011

President Barack Obama's re-election campaign is trying really, really hard to find Obama some dinner guests. White House photo by Pete Souza Over at Gawker, Jim Newell chronicles his personal experience facing the ... Read More

Obama Campaign Seeking Social Media Staffers

BY Nick Judd | Wednesday, August 24 2011

First data, now tweets: President Barack Obama's re-election campaign is seeking "social media copywriters." From an ad on the job board for the professional left, Jobs That Are Left, first spotted by New York politics ... Read More

If You're Measuring Buzz Online, Measure the Buzzworthy, Not the 'Top Tier'

BY Nick Judd | Friday, August 19 2011

The Washington Post has started tracking the online buzz generated by the presidential candidates on Twitter: Over the past four days, Perry has gone from a whopping 51,578 mentions on Twitter (these mentions could be ... Read More

Lawsuit Alleges Rick Santorum's Website Built With 'Counterfeit' Font

BY Nick Judd | Thursday, August 18 2011

A Dutch font foundry has sued the makers of Rick Santorum's website, alleging copyright infringement for the way the site uses used their font. Update: The lawsuit pertains to an earlier version of Santorum's website, ... Read More

The Slow End of a Campaign Online

BY Nick Judd | Wednesday, August 17 2011

Tim Pawlenty's online campaign is taking a long time to die. After placing third in the Ames Straw Poll last weekend, the former Minnesota governor released a new online ad and announced on Twitter that he was looking ... Read More

Here's the Dish On 'Tweeter'-Using Texan Rick Perry's Online Presidential Campaign

BY Nick Judd | Tuesday, August 16 2011

Rick Perry's online campaign will be THIS BIG. Photo of Perry at the 2011 Republican Leadership Conference: Gage Skidmore / Flickr Texas Gov. Rick Perry has come out shooting on the campaign trail, with headline-grabbing ... Read More

The White House Is On Foursquare, But Is There a 'Commander-in-Chief' Badge?

BY Nick Judd | Tuesday, August 16 2011

The White House has joined Foursquare, administration new media staffer Kori Schulman announced on the White House blog. You won't be seeing check-ins from President Barack Obama himself, but the White House plans to ... Read More

'Gaming' the Ames Straw Poll

BY Nick Judd | Friday, August 12 2011

ClickZ's Kate Kaye has a great look at how campaigns are going digital in their quest to win the Ames Straw Poll. Here's her describing how Republican political consulting firm Engage built a platform for former ... Read More

News Briefs

RSS Feed monday >

Czech Prime Minister Resigns Following Corruption and Surveillance Scandal

The prime minister of the Czech Republic resigned yesterday, irreparably damaged by a corruption scandal and the possibility of impropriety in his personal life. According to the Czech constitution, his entire government will also have to relinquish office.

GO

The Disappearance of Greece's Fourth Estate

On June 11 the Greek government abruptly announced the immediate closure of the country's state-owned public broadcasting company, ERT (Hellenic Radio and Television), in what they said was a cost-cutting measure. The move, which came with no prior discussion, puts 2,750 people out of work, in a country with an official unemployment rate that is nearly 27 percent. It also makes Greece the only European Union member state without a public broadcasting service. GO

friday >

Mayors of New York City and San Francisco Announce "Digital Cities" Summit

The Mayors of New York City and San Francisco announced Friday that they're co-hosting meetings in the Fall and early next year to examine the "best practices" that lead to tech-enabled economic growth. The meetings are follow-ups to the initial Bloomberg Technology Summit held last year in New York City. This year's summit in New York ... GO

New York State Joins GitHub to Get Feedback on Open Data Policy

New York is the first state to publish an initial draft of its open data guidelines on GitHub to seek feedback from the public, Governor Andrew Cuomo announced in a press release Thursday. GO

Brazilians Protest Forced Evictions on YouTube and in Mock World Cup

Tomorrow Brazilians who have been forced out of their housing in advance of the 2014 World Cup will stage their own “People's Cup” in Rio de Janeiro to draw awareness to forced evictions.

GO

A “Fix-Rate” for Corruption: Integrity Action Wins the Google Global Impact Award

“From wanachi (“citizen”) to up there,” Emmanuel Dzombo explains with an upward sweep of his hand, is how Integrity Action has begun to reverse the bureaucratic top-down approach that has often blocked development work in Kenya. Dzombo is a local leader in Chengoni, Kenya, a country that ranks towards the very bottom of Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index – at 139. The organization believes it could do more, and Google.org seems to agree. The Google Impact Challenge will provide the charity with £500,000 that will allow it to develop a mobile application for tracking and collecting data from citizens. GO

Crowdsourced "Danger Maps" Track Air, Soil and Water Pollution in China

Chinese citizens are exposing sources of pollution and other environmental problems by contributing to the partially crowdsourced website 'Danger Maps'. So far, the Chinese government is letting them get away with it.

GO

thursday >

U.S. Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board To Meet Next Wednesday

A long dormant independent agency that was at least nominally supposed to exercise a modicum of oversight over the booming intelligence-industrial complex is scrambling to meet up next Wednesday, but the public will still be none the wiser about what it plans to do, since it is a closed door meeting. The only indication that the toothless ... GO

Despite Software Problems, Civic Hackers are Pedaling Bike Share Data

Reporters are shoaling around the news that New York City's new bike sharing system, Citi Bike, is benighted with problems stemming from its high-tech software. But that's not putting the brakes on plans to explore what programmers might do with data generated by the system by hosting a Citi Bike Civic Hack Night later this month. GO

Grassroots Republicans Are Not Waiting for the RNC To Revamp Their Digital Strategy

Several members of the Republican Party rank and file aren't waiting around for the GOP to reinvent itself on the technological front. They're organizing events themselves to explore what a tech-enabled GOP might look like for the 2014 cycle. GO

wednesday >

New Russian Law Makes Publication of Information on Gay Rights Illegal

On June 11 the Russian parliament passed a bill against “homosexual propaganda” that effectively outlaws gay rights rallies and bans informational or pro-gay rights material from publication in the media or on the Internet. Violators of the law will risk heavy fines and censorship and, in the case of a media outlet, risk being shut down. It had near unanimous support, passing in a 436-to-0 vote, with only one abstention.

GO

Macedonia Draft Law to Regulate and Restrict the "Last Arena for Freedom of Speech"

The draft of a media regulation law in Macedonia has journalists and press freedom watchdogs up in arms. The proposed Law on Media and Audiovisual Media Services was written by the government behind closed doors and without input from the media or NGOs. It has been interpreted as a decisive move on the part of the government to limit speech online in a country where press freedoms are already limited. Until now, Internet-based news sites were not regulated like print media.

GO

Trying to Prosecute Online Piracy in Canada? Good Luck!

A private firm that is monitoring Canadians who download pirated content online has found itself at the center of a legal battle. GO

tuesday >

In Kenya, Apps Fizzle Out After Winning Competitions

This spring, Kenyan tech blogger Kennedy Kachwanya left the regional Microsoft Imagine Cup competition thoroughly underwhelmed by the quality of the apps presented. He then wrote an impassioned post (in his words, a rant) on his website Kachwanya.com about the decline of the Kenyan mobile app. He is also outraged because even winning apps seem to fall off the map – basically fail – after the competition is over and media coverage dies down.

GO

Companies and Internet Activists to Congress: Investigate Potential NSA Surveillance Overreach

Over 80 advocacy organizations and Internet companies including Free Press and Mozilla have launched what they are calling a global petition to Congress calling for an inquiry into the scope and scale of reported government surveillance and reforms to the Patriot Act, the FISA Amendment Act and the state secrets privilege. GO

Canada Has its Own Version of PRISM, Reveals Toronto Newspaper

While it may not have a Bond film-worthy name like PRISM, it turns out Canada has a surveillance program of its own. Canadian news outlet The Globe and Mail learned about the program through Access to Information requests filed with the government. They sifted through hundred of records, although extensive passages were redacted for reasons of national security so there are still lingering questions and concerns.

GO

More