Big news! Personal Democracy Forum Europe, our first conference overseas, is happening November 20-21 in Barcelona, at the Torre Agbar (pictured below). To get on the mailing list for more details, go to www.personaldemocracy.eu and sign up!

In case you haven't noticed, a few days ago we launched a new "vertical" here at Personal Democracy Forum: PdF Europe. The idea is to gather a community of voices reporting, analyzing and participating in the ways the internet is changing politics in across the Continent, and to build a gathering place online for all the people who are interested in this November's first-ever PdF Europe conference (Barcelona, Nov. 20-21). You can find posts by using the url www.personaldemocracy.eu or simply coming here.

Like techPresident and PersonalDemocracy.com, PdF Europe will be a group blog overseen by Micah Sifry (editor), Nancy Scola (associate editor) and Andrew Rasiej (publisher). Our primary partners in this endeavor, and the leaders of the PdF Europe conference project are Marc López and Javier Majan of NuestraCausa, a network and a platform of projects about collaboration between governments and citizens that they co-founded. With their leadership, we are recruiting contributing bloggers for PdF Europe and also hard at work organizing the Barcelona conference.

If you’re reading this blog post, you just might be the person we’re looking for.

Personal Democracy Forum is expanding!

We are looking to hire two new colleagues. We are seeking people who are creative, self-starting, hardworking, politically aware and web-savvy. One position will focus on business development and marketing our conference and our new PdF Network. The second position will involve writing and producing editorial content. Titles and salary are negotiable, dependent on experience. More details after the jump...

Here's a cautionary tale in how not to manage your message in a networked media age, or rather, further evidence of John Gilmore's brilliant maxim, "The internet interprets censorship has damage and routes around it." Late Monday night in England, the Guardian posted a strange article reporting that it was being prevented from reporting on a question pending in Parliament. The only thing the Guardian could say was that the case involved Carter-Ruck, a prominent PR firm that specializes in working with global corporations. But that didn't stop the blogosphere, which immediately took affront at the assault on free speech. Within 24 hours the whole story was out in the open, to the chagrin of Carter-Ruck and the oil commodities firm Trafigura, which was trying to hush up an embarrassing report on toxic dumping in the port of Aibidjan by one of its ships in 2006.

Founded in Sweden on 1st January 2006, the Pirate Party (Piratpartiet) now boasts more than 45,000 members, making it the third largest Swedish political force in number of affiliates. This rapid growth is due in part to the role the group played in the protests against the Swedish police’s shut-down of the Pirate Bay P2P exchange server and because the party represents a challenge to the establishment and formal politics. In other words, they defend very specific interests and, at the same time challenge with their critical vote the entirety of the political and electoral system.

We've just posted the hour-by-hour program schedule for Personal Democracy Forum Europe's inaugural conference in Barcelona, which is happening this November 20-21 at the beautiful Torre Agbar building. Just go to these pages: Day One, Day Two.

A few new speakers who we're excited to announce will be joining us:
-Richard Allan, Director of Policy, Facebook EU (UK)
-Julian Assange, the co-founder of Wikileaks.org (Australia)

Add it to the list of what separates you and me from a major world leader like Nicolas Sarkozy: his casual social media musings get fact checked by all the world. The French president's official Facebook page has turned into a lively playground of doubt after Sarkozy (or someone with the authority to post to his Facebook account on his behalf) posted his fond memories of a spontaneous trip to Berlin on November 9, 1989. The post included a photo of the then 34 year-old Sarkozy chipping away at the wall then bisecting the city of Berlin. "Arrivés à Berlin ouest, nous filons vers la porte de Brandebourg," posted Sarkozy, "où une foule enthousiaste s’est déjà amassée à l’annonce de l’ouverture probable du mur."

Hang on un minute, said a number of Sarkozy's Facebook followers. The accuracy of his recollection of that trip raised questions because (a) the actual fall of the Berlin Wall was pretty unexpected, often traced to an East Berlin spokesperson who got up on a stage and started freelancing about a new policy travel between east and west, and (b) there were public records kept on the travels of Sarkozy, who was already a well-known politician at the time. Sarkozy was at the wall, no doubt, and helped in some small way to bring in down. But was he there on November 9th? Some aren't so sure. And the French president doesn't have the luxury the rest of us perhaps do to fudge a bit online. The Guardian has the story.

Sarkozy's Berlin post has attracted some 1,300 comments, some of them convinced that the extremely self-aware French president is misremembering in a way designed to set himself in the center of history. That said, perhaps Sarkozy can take small comfort in the fact that "3,661 like this" post.

Our friends at SeeClickFix have some cool news to share today: The do-it-yourself civic platform is going multilingual. Citizens will soon be able to report non-emergency issues in their community to those accountable for the public space in 83 languages anywhere in the world using SeeClickFix on their PC or mobile phone. (And just in time for PdF Europe!)

Blogging will be light (if not nonexistent) today as much of the PdF crew is on its way to Barcelona for the first ever Personal Democracy Forum Europe conference, to be held in Torre Agbar -- a.k.a. the rounded tower rising above the city on the right side of the photo above. (We'll also be taking a break from the Daily Digest through the Thanksgiving holiday, so check the blog for new content.) We'll have updates and coverage here as the conference progresses, and please do follow along with all the action through the Twitter hashtag #pdfeu. Hasta más tarde! (Photo credit: Gerard Girbes)

Where a plug and a solid wifi connection never seem exist in the same space. Nonetheless, the PdF Europe Conference has been a vibrant carnival of discussion, quickly moving to its wrap-up in about an hour in the ground floor theater of the Torre Agbar. From the panels I've attended and the hallways discussions I've engaged in, two particular ideas have really caught my attention and provoked me to question my assumptions. The first is whether the Obama model, should it exist, is replicable in other countries and other lands, or whether its utility stops at the border of serving as an inspiration. In other words, is the recent American experience so unique to be an exception? The other is whether 'European conversation' exists that technology might amplify, and if not, whether digital communications spur useful cross-country engagement in Europe. And if it can, how widespread is the interest in having that conversation?

But that's just one woman's perspective on a multi-layered conference. Luckily for you, we've hooked up with a tremendous partner who is providing an eye and ear on the conference that is almost as good as being here, minus the tiny ham sandwiches they served for breakfast this morning. Civico is capturing and compiling what's going down at PdF Europe in a medium sure to suit just about everyone. There's slide presentations, there's audio, there's tweet analysis, and more. Check it out. (Photo by Jon Worth)