Claire McCaskill Hires Blue State Digital's Alex Kellner As Digital Director
BY Sarah Lai Stirland | Monday, February 6 2012
Missouri's senior Democratic Senator Claire McCaskill has hired Blue State Digital's Alex Kellner as its digital director. Read More
Hoeksterical or Hokey? Michigan Senate Candidate Pete Hoekstra's New Web Site Strikes A Nerve
Controversial Hoekstra Microsite Targeting Debbie Stabenow Created By The Prosper Group
BY Sarah Lai Stirland | Monday, February 6 2012
Michigan Senate candidate Pete Hoekstra has caused a firestorm in the past 24 hours with a new campaign ad that depicts China as a young woman riding a bike in a rural area speaking in broken English. The thirty second ... Read More
This 1812 cartoon from the Boston Gazette is widely credited as the origin of the term "Gerrymander." Source: Wikimedia Commons
In Pursuit of a Tech Answer to Gerrymandering, Good-Government Groups Must Wait Another Ten Years
BY Nick Judd | Monday, February 6 2012
This year, advocates for more public inclusion in the redistricting process put an idea to the test: That open-source software and voter outreach efforts could make people more aware and more involved. The idea here was that new tools would make maps easier to draw and even easier to understand, creating, at worst, evidence that lawmakers involved in redistricting were not drawing the right maps, and, at best, alternatives. Read More
Photo by Joshua Sherman, PdF 2011
Commentary: Is the Open Web Doomed? Open Your Eyes and Relax
BY Esther Dyson | Monday, February 6 2012
In a guest commentary by Esther Dyson, the longtime friend of Personal Democracy, technology writer and investor writes: "With Facebook going public and Google threatened by apps and closed services such as FB, is the open web doomed? You might think so after reading the dueling blog posts of John Battelle, Robert Scoble and Dave Winer in the past few days. But things are a bit more complicated." Read More
White House CTO Aneesh Chopra's Exit Interview
BY Nick Judd | Monday, February 6 2012
On his way out of the White House and back to Virginia, where he is expected to run for public office — but will neither confirm or deny that's the plan — Aneesh Chopra describes the shape of the post he pioneered as the country's first-ever chief technology officer.
As a result of Chopra's interview with The Atlantic's tech/politics correspondent, Nancy Scola, there's now a public record of what this first-ever CTO thinks the CTO's job actually is ("On any topic that is a priority for the president, my role is evaluate how technology, data, and innovation can advance, support, and improve upon those strategies," among other things) and how it might be improved.
Read MoreFirst POST: Counts
BY Miranda Neubauer | Monday, February 6 2012
In today's First POST:
- Members of the military may get security-hardened Android phones while President Barack Obama couldn't even get a real BlackBerry after taking office;
- Democrats mine the real-time social web for rapid-response opportunities;
- In an interview with David Carr, BuzzFeed's Jonah Peretti says the Facebook newsfeed has habituated people to seeing "a story about the Arab Spring" next to "a picture of your sister's new baby."
Slovenian ambassador apologizes for signing ACTA, Poland halts ratification
BY Antonella Napolitano | Friday, February 3 2012
Apparently, some EU countries are reconsidering their support to ACTA, only a week after signing the agreement.
Helena Drnovsek Zorko, Slovenia's ambassador to Japan, has in fact issued a public apology to her country for signing it.
Meanwhile, Poland Prime Minister Donald Tusk says he's halting the ratification process of the international treaty.
Last week people took the streets in Poland, and a protest is planned in Ljubljana tomorrow. Read More
Mitt Romney's campaign says President Obama is too focused on re-election. Picture: Courtesy Romney for President
Romney's and Obama's Teams Take It To The Tweets
BY Sarah Lai Stirland | Friday, February 3 2012
The business of political fund-raising has taken a new turn this campaign season, with the latest twist seeing Barack Obama's re-election effort and Mitt Romney's pursuit of the Republican nomination each piggyback their ... Read More
With Pinterest and Twitter, Activists are Out to Punish Komen
BY Nick Judd | Friday, February 3 2012
Susan G. Komen for the Cure's decision Friday to reverse a rules change that would have cut off further funding to Planned Parenthood may not be enough to stem the outpouring of anger against the breast cancer research charity. Komen's grantmaking rules no longer oblige it to issue no new grants to Planned Parenthood, but online activists are hoping to channel continued anger at what they say is the politicization of women's health issues into a sustained campaign. Read More
The UK government launched the beta version of GOV.UK
The Europe Roundup: Introducing GOV.UK
BY Antonella Napolitano | Friday, February 3 2012
The UK government has recently launched the beta version of GOV.UK as a "first step towards a single government website.", in Italy the Parliament has rejected a SOPA-alike bill, in Ukraine a charity develops an interactive map to fight AIDS. And if you're getting confused with ACTA, here's a list of the most useful resources. Read More