Category: social computing
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Reflections: what I learned during my summer vacation
Apologies to my friends and relatives for being out of touch this summer…. Rather than going to the beach, I instead hung out in a variety of exotic online locales: my.barackobama.com, Wetpaint, Facebook, and the blogosphere (especially OpenLeft, Shakesville, Pam’s House Blend, and Jack and Jill Politics). It was kind of a working vacation, engaging…
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Poetry Friday: A web 2.0 poem
In addition to being a co-author on Tales from the Net, my brother Gregory K’s also a poet — best known for Fibs, fibonacci poetry, which wound up getting him a book deal after being featured on Slashdot. In his latest, for this week’s poetry Friday, worlds collide: I’M PRETTY WELL CONNECTED (a Web 2.0…
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A wiki, saving democracy?
But what about the votes that don’t count? What about the systematic attempts to erect barriers between voters and the ballot box? What about voter suppression? In order to educate, document and mobilize action, I’m excited to introduce the Voter Suppression Wiki. — Baratunde Thurston, Announcing The Launch Of The Voter Suppression Wiki – Learn,…
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Get FISA Right: on the air in St. Paul!
During the past 8 years, the Bush administration listened to Americans’ phone calls and read their emails without a warrant. If elected President, John McCain would do the same.* – Get FISA Right ad, scheduled to air on Fox News in St. Paul today Update: check out Nick Juliano’s Anti-FISA group targets GOP delegates in…
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Get FISA Right gets partisan!
The new ad stars the Constitution as the main player, with the visual featuring a pan over founding documents. One version of the ad takes aim at the Republican Senators, who voted unanimously to extend the powers of government to listen to Americans’ phone calls and read their emails without a warrant; another highlights John…
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One Million Strong: this week’s “other” convention
Even without corporate sponsorships or prime-time coverage, the One Million Strong for Barack Facebook group’s online convention this week is a fascinating complement to the Democratic National Convention (DNC) in Denver. Nobody’s quite sure how many of One Million Strong‘s 625,000 members are currently active, probably a few thousand. Unlike a lot of Facebook groups,…
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Evan Bayh: “Facebook me.” Progressives: “Sure!”
Written jointly with Ronit Aviva Dancis “Evan Bayh for Democratic VP Nominee” on Intrade Prediction Market The last time we heard from Senator Evan Bayh was early July when he voted with the Republicans against all three amendments to strip telecom immunity from the FISA legislation. A month later, here was Max Bernstein’s Can Progressives…
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Vegas, baby! Black Hat, glitter, and pwnies
The first of a two-part series on the Black Hat USA 2008 security conference. Vegas, baby! Continuing my tradition, I was in Las Vegas for Black Hat but didn’t attend the conference proper. My brother was able to come up from LA to meet me, so I decided to hang out with him instead —…
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Towards a rebirth of freedom: activism on social networks, part 1 (DRAFT)
DRAFT! Revised version posted at Pam’s House Blend and (under a different title, and minus the introduction ) Open Left.
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Get FISA Right: “Don’t let our Constitution die” (DRAFT)
DRAFT! Please see the revised version on OpenLeft. “We’ve got more than a million volunteers on my.barackobama.com. They’ve planned more than 70,000 offline events through the system, made millions of phone calls from home, and formed thousands of grassroots advocacy groups, including one you might have heard about recently.” — Barack Obama, Netroots Nation video…
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Mutual guest blogging: intermission and discussion
Second draft, posted on OpenLeft with a different poll. the version on OpenLeft continues to evolve please link and comment there rather than here. Originally posted July 17; revised July 18-19. We’re now at the midpoint of our first, more-leisurely-than-anticipated mutual guest blogging series. Thanks to Melissa, Sara, Pam, and rikyrah for their time, energy,…
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Get FISA Right: Paging Clay Shirky
Wow, what a weekend. Friday, the Get FISA Right campaign was on CNN a couple of times (including a brief clip by me on American Morning that also got picked up internationally and a great discussion of Obama & Get FISA Right Activism by Ari Melber on CNN headline news where he challenged the left/right…
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Get FISA Right: A night of Facebook action
It’s been a wild few days with the Get FISA Right activism campaign. Our bare-bones media room is the best place to get a quick summary of all the stuff going on; here are a few hightlights: over 22,000 members in the myBO group, and 1700+ on Facebook; we delivered our response and our asks…
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The first thing to do: set up a wiki
I remember hearing Zack Rosen of CivicSpace starting his talk about the team that put together the Katrina people finder by saying “one of the first things we did was set up a wiki” and it really struck a chord. As an effort like Senator Obama – Please, No Telecom Immunity and Get FISA Right…
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A proposal for OpenLeft: mutual guest-blogging
Update, June 14: posted on OpenLeft. Update, June 21: first round on track for week of June 30! Thanks to all for the feedback and review! We propose that OpenLeft feature 5-7 guest bloggers each week, prioritizing diverse voices and perspectives not usually heard on the front page. OpenLeft front page posters will reciprocate, by…
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CFP08 trip report (2): Dear Potus 08
Part 2 of a series; please see CFP08: trip report for part 1 If the Computers, Freedom, and Privacy community wrote a letter to the next President of the United States about our priorities for technology policy, what would we say — and how would we get him or her to read it? There’s only…
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CFP08: trip report
Part 1 of a series Computers, Freedom, and Privacy 2008 ended with me presenting Dear Potus 08 and circulating the letter to the presidential candidates for signatures, and then a closing plenary by Clay Shirky (notes below). It was exhiliarating as always, and I’m now simultaneously exhausting, revved up, and suffering from jet lag. So…
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Computers, Freedom, and Privacy 2008: showtime!
CFP2008 traditionally starts off with a day of tutorials. I was on a panel organized by Lillie Coney of EPIC on E-Deceptive Campaign Practices: “Elections 2.0″, which was extremely interesting; I discussed examples of, and responses to, e-deception based on my activism experiences this election season, much of which I’ve blogged about here already. Tova…
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E-Deceptive Campaign Practices: “Elections 2.0”
I’m at a tutorial on Tuesday discussing “elections 2.0” at the Computers, Freedom, and Privacy conference, and one of the things I want to cover is Web 2.0 technologies’ positive role in countering deceptive campaign practices. I’m planning on using some examples from the Obama activism work I’ve been doing on Facebook, as well as…
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“Where do you get your political news?”
when reading blogs, make a point to get a range of perspectives, starting with those that are shut out from the mainstream news. Reviewing an earlier draft of Allies in the blogosphere, one of my friends asked me for more details on this. Rather than bury it in an comment, I figured that it was…