UK | TechPresident

The Europe Roundup: Why are Political Blogs Dominated by Men?

BY Antonella Napolitano | Thursday, July 14 2011

UK | Why are political blogs dominated by men The Hansard Society has a new report out entitled "Gender And Digital Politics" in which the three authors examine the question: “Why are political blogs dominated by ... Read More

The Europe Roundup: Social Networks and Voting in Italy: is There New Evidence?

BY Antonella Napolitano | Friday, July 8 2011

Italy | Social Networks and Voting in Italy: is There New Evidence? In the past two months Italy has faced a round of elections – two administrative ballots and a referendum day – which have been unanimously ... Read More

The Europe roundup: Petition Your Council. Easily.

BY Antonella Napolitano | Wednesday, July 6 2011

UK | Petition Your Council. Easily. Yesterday mySociety.org launched a new project called PetitionYourCouncil.com: the website has been built to make it easy to petition your local council using their official online ... Read More

The Europe Roundup: The Danger of Transparency

BY Antonella Napolitano | Wednesday, June 29 2011

Slovakia | The danger of transparency A couple of weeks ago the winners of the Open Data Challenge were announced at the First Digital Agenda Assembly in Brussels. Best in the application category was ZNasichDani.sk ... Read More

UK Home Office Considers Mapping Faces of Criminals

BY Nick Judd | Monday, June 27 2011

The United Kingdom's Police.uk crime mapping website may be expanded to include photographs of offenders and more details about their offences, the BBC reported Sunday. The BBC gave a tip of the hat to the Sunday Times, ... Read More

The Europe roundup: Europe gets geeks - does it, really?

BY Antonella Napolitano | Tuesday, June 21 2011

EU | Europe gets geeks - does it, really? The Digital Agenda Assembly concluded its works last week gathering 1300 people from over Europe to discuss the key points of the Digital Agenda, the EU strategy for the digital ... Read More

The Europe Roundup: MySociety.org Evaluation Reports

BY Antonella Napolitano | Friday, June 17 2011

UK | mySociety.org evaluation reports After years of successful projects aimed at raising civic awareness, mySociety.org commissioned a detailed analysis of two of its most successful projects, TheyWorkForYou and ... Read More

Think Globally, Tweet Locally: British Town Council In Midst of 24 Hours of Tweets

BY Nick Judd | Thursday, March 3 2011

Boring but important: The Walsall Town Council took to Twitter March 24 to explain its value to citizens, 140 characters at a time. One of the weirdly great things about the rising significance of the Internet in daily ... Read More

British Austerity Battle Takes Up "Facts on Fees"

BY Nancy Scola | Friday, December 10 2010

Tories in the British government are rather chuffed with the response to their online campaign called "Fact on Fees," an attempt to push the conservative take on tuition increases for universities in the UK. Read More

We Have Joined Facebook

BY Nancy Scola | Monday, November 8 2010

News Briefs

RSS Feed tuesday >

For Crimea, Dangerous Memes (And The Listicles to Combat Them)

Could memes be making the situation in Crimea worse?

Anyone Anywhere (with Internet) Can Look for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370

This morning I helped look for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, and you can, too. (The website seems to be back on its feet after a crash following a surge of visitors.)

Public Good Software Lands Half A Million In Seed Funding to Bring Data-Driven Campaigning to NonProfits [UPDATED]

A group of former Obama techies want to port their campaign and entrepreneurial experiences to the world of non-profits, and help them to operate better. GO

monday >

More Fodder For Social Media Activism Pessimists

A recent study of the Save Darfur Facebook campaign found that the massive participation online gave the “illusion of activism rather than facilitating the real thing.” More evidence, if it was needed, that the “revolution will not be tweeted.”

friday >

For Millennials, Institutions Are Out, Selfies, Social Networks and Diversity Are In

A Pew survey released Friday highlights that young Americans are noticeably detached from traditional institutions such as political parties, organized religion and marriage even as they are increasingly connected with their peers through online social networks. GO

Snowden EU Testimony Renews Calls to Grant Asylum

On Monday, Edward Snowden will participate in his first live discussion before an audience as part of SXSW Interactive through a video conference with his legal advisor Ben Wizner, director of the ACLU's Speech, Privacy & Technology Project, as well as digital privacy expert Christopher Soghoian. (Republican Rep. Mike Pompeo from Kansas, also a member of the House Intelligence Committee, has asked SXSW to cancel the webcast, The Hill reported). Snowden's discussion will come amidst renewed calls in Europe to grant him asylum. GO

Minnesota Announces Civic Tech Legislation

Can civic innovation be managed statewide? A bill in Minnesota is betting yes. It is looking to grab some of the state's $1.2 billion surplus to fund open data, open government, and civic technology. Openminnesota.org, a site set up to promote and explain the bill, says the following: "Open Minnesota will build an engine for public open data use, civic technology creation engaging start-up companies and technology volunteers, and help hundreds more government units get cost-effectively connected to the best global open government lessons for local adaptation." GO

wednesday >

Now You Can See Who Really Pays NYC Property Taxes

Property tax revenue makes up around a quarter of New York City's budget, but until now broader information about it has not been easily accessible. Users could only look up individual properties by entering lot and block information into a basic online form on a city website, and would have had to cross-reference that information with a building's address and other sources, explained Chris Whong, co-organizer of New York City's Code for America brigade betaNYC. "This data is much more powerful in the aggregate," he said. That's why, as part of last week's Code Across NYC hackathon, he along with several collaborators worked to develop an online platform "born out of curiosity" that maps New York City property data. GO

Facebook's Got A Finger in India's Political Pie

Facebook is an increasingly active political force in India. The company launched their Indian election tracker Tuesday to coincide with the first Facebook Talks Live digital broadcast, “Town Hall” style conversations in which 2014 candidates field questions submitted by Facebook users. These projects build on the get-out-the-vote collaboration between the Times of India and Facebook, which was announced in September.

Civic Crowdfunding Looks to Bigger Projects with Phased Campaigns

Civic crowdfunding dreamed big but started small. The platform Neighbor.ly grabbed attention for a 2012 campaign to help fund a multi-million dollar rail car in Kansas City, but only raised $3,775 of its $10 million goal. The early campaigns of both Neighbor.ly and Citizinvestor that were actually successful reached for modest goals, usually less than $15,000. A look at the campaign pages of either platform today shows larger projects, in the tens or hundreds of thousands, creeping in as well. Civic crowdfunding is growing. To facilitate and attract more large projects Citizinvestor this week announced a plan to crowdfund projects in phases. GO

YanukovychLeaks.org Exposes a Corrupt and Violent Regime

Thousands of documents float and sink in a remote reservoir not far from a grand 345-acre estate contained within a sprawling wrought iron fence. As evocative as it may seem, this not the beginning of a spy thriller, but of Yanukovych Leaks, an online portal where the leaks have been uploaded by investigative journalists who say the extravagance detailed in those papers may prove ousted President Viktor Yanukovych's depth of corruption. GO

Civic Hacking

WeGov

Online Organizing

BackChannel