A new political party, designed by software devs and engineers, is joining the race in California. If elected, PlaceAVote‘s Congressional candidates vow to decide on every bill based on the majority vote of their constituents—as measured via online polling. Could that sort of direct, digital democracy improve how Congress works? Would it make government more dysfunctional? (Is the latter even possible?)
If you are a politician, it isn’t easy to get votes these days. Everyone knows politicians are crooks. And if you aren’t, no one trusts you because of the other bad apples. I suppose you need to do whatever you can to get attention, like this guy who dresses up as Spider-Man.
That’s what 32-year old Gaurav Sharma did while running for Parliament in India. The former martial artist once worked for the Mumbai police and now he’s in politics. He hopes that climbing buildings dressed as Spidey get him some votes and win the election.
This is the right idea. I say make them work for those votes. Dressing up as superheroes and actually patrolling the streets wouldn’t hurt either. It might be nice to see a politician willing to risk his own neck for his people.
[via Kotaku via Fashionably Geek]
It seemed like only a matter of time. When you donate money to an anti-gay marriage proposition in California, your employees are almost certainly going to have something to say … Continue reading
Here’s the question: in a world where the design of a 3D printed gun is freely available on the internet, can we—or should we–regulate open source design? Or are limits impossible in a world of anonymous file sharing? Does any attempt at control go against the whole spirit of open source, decentralized innovation?
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Turkey’s Internet watchdog has blocked Twitter, following threats by its Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan fuelled by the network’s ability to carry rumors about government corruption.
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One of the most popular forms of online protest against authoritative action is to bring down the official website and make life chaotic, and NATO is the latest to fall … Continue reading
Reporters Without Borders (RSF) released its annual "Enemies of the Internet" index this week—a ranking first launched in 2006 intended to track countries that repress online speech, intimidate and arrest bloggers, and conduct surveillance of their citizens.Some countries have been mainstays on the annual index, while others have been able to work their way off the list.Two countries particularly deserving of praise in this area are Tunisia and Myanmar (Burma), both of which have stopped censoring the Internet in recent years and are headed in the right direction toward Internet freedom.
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Microsoft is using its users’ data to target political ads to its roster of gamers, the Washington Post has reported. The company wants targeted ads on multiple of its services, … Continue reading
North and South Korea hasn’t had the best of relationships with one another for many, many years. In fact if you read stories and reports about North Korea, it seems that the government practices very heavy propaganda in which they constantly remind its citizens about the perils beyond the borders of its country.
However one man by the name of Park Sang Hak has spent years trying to fight the propaganda by sending in balloons over the border, and within each balloon contains materials like USB sticks that have been loaded with Wikipedia entries, DVDs of popular TV shows, anti-government leaflets, and sometimes even American dollar bills which can be used to buy food on the black market. (more…)
Balloons Filled With USB Sticks And DVDs Are Being Floated To North Korea original content from Ubergizmo. 
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Zello is a walkie-talkie app made by a small company based in Austin, Texas—but if you’ve heard of it, it’s probably because you’ve been following the news in Venezuela or Ukraine. Some of its biggest users are protesters taking to the streets. The app’s creators hadn’t planned on getting involved in political revolutions, so you could say this is one hell of a pivot.
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