Archive for the 'Politics' Category

Ideas About Ideas

Published by Jarred on December 20, 2009 in Advertising, Books, Business, Computing, Consumer Behavior, Copyright, Culture, Design, Environment, Google, Health, Legal Issues, Lifestyle, News, Politics, Privacy, Science, Social Networks, Space and Web 2.0. Comments

The New York Times recently issued the ninth edition of its annual Ideas feature for its magazine. I’ve read through most of the entries and found several really fascinating; others were also interesting but neglected to surface other important angles. I thought I’d use this space to highlight both, seeing as Tropophilia is all about ideas that may bring about change in our world.

The Advertisement That Watches You - I’ll leave the details of this particular implementation to the article, but the essence of the technology is a billboard with a built-in camera that, through facial recognition technology, can tell when anyone within a certain radius of the advertisement is looking at it. This one, interestingly, changes to its main message when people are not looking. You can imagine, however, how this technology might develop over time: electronic ads could be powered off until it new there were passersby actually looking at the space. Facial recognition could also be used to power an impressions-based ads payment system, much like exists on the web: advertisers would only have to pay per “view” or elapsed “eyeball time” on the ad. Of course, such commercial use of facial recognition technology also raises enormous privacy concerns (How long are camera images kept? Would the technology eventually be used to identify people and serve ads based on their personal interests, or even the clothes they were wearing or the book they are reading at that moment?). It will be interesting to see how this area grows, if at all.

Bicycle Highways - I thought this was a cool idea, but I’m not sure I see it gaining widespread adoption outside of cities that have significant numbers of bike commuters. What I think is really clever is the possibilities raised with GPS and RFID technology that would allow for bikers to create on-the-fly pelotons, which in turn would be able to gain privileges for traffic lights and such: a mix between EZPass and carpool lanes. Throw in a custom social network for the city so you could plan your departures in order to meet up with a regular riding group, and this could be really great for those cities with big biking cultures.

The Counterfeit Self - I think this research has implications for the Web. There has long been a debate about authentication online: when writing a blog, posting comments, or joining a social network, is it “better” for users to have the ability to remain anonymous or pseudonymous, or should they be encouraged or required to use their real identity (obfuscated to whatever degree they prefer). Many argue that encouraging or requiring authentication would, for example, solve the problem evidence by the (often hateful and troll-like) comments of any given YouTube video. Opponents summon the right to free dom of speech as a defense of anonymous use of the web. Some governments, like South Korea, actually require what is referred to as “real name verification” for websites in their jurisdiction that surpass a certain threshold of users; users are required to authenticate against a national registry before they can interact with the site. Considering the idea of how behavior is influenced by fake identity could offer a fresh perspective in this debate.

Good Enough is the New Great - One aspect that this idea doesn’t cover (and I can’t remember anymore if the Wired article does or not) is information. Just as consumers are turning to cheap cameras, low-fi music files, and YouTube videos, they are also turning to Twitter for their information fixes. Many argue that in moving from mainstream to social media as our main source of information, we make a similar sacrifice of quality for convenience. I think that may be true in the short-term, but I’m hopeful that just like companies are starting to fit better and better sensors into those tiny Flip cameras, so will Twitter eventually recapture some of the fidelity of the “news” that it carries.

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Debugging Earmarks

Published by Jarred on July 22, 2009 in Politics. Comments

earmarks

One of the big buzzwords around Washington and the rest of the country since November 4th, 2008 has been “transparency”. President Obama was widely prophesied as the harbinger of a political culture of openness and honesty. He has also been expected to be the first to leverage the Internet as a chief means of communication and collaboration with the American people.

So far the President and his administration have made promising steps on both fronts (see data.gov, for example). But what is important to remember about the web is that it’s designed to let the novice user contribute just as much as the elite power players.

WashingtonWatch.com, a website maintained in his spare time by Jim Harper of the Cato Institute, has started an initiative to let the average Joe and Jane identify pork spending buried within federal legislation. Wired.com’s Epicenter blog notes that the site, in partnership with the Sunlight Foundation, will be rewarding the top citizen watchdogs with Amazon Kindles, iPods, and other prizes.

This is a perfect example of what the New York Times recently referred to as “focused crowdsourcing.” If you want to put the mob to work, you need to do a few things. First, identify a market where there is a thirst for action. Then provide a specific and realistic objective, ideally one that is measurable and that can be registered in discrete steps (so as to lure both the curious and the committed). Offer users the tools and rules of the game, and provide worthy incentives. Next thing you know, you’re harnessing the wisdom and effort of the crowds to (hopefully) do some good in the world.

Harper has followed this model to perfection. The contest ends either when all earmarks have been entered, or when the fiscal year ends in October. Here’s hoping for robust participation from a digital citizenry hungry to see and make some change.

The Science of Political Science

Published by Jarred on April 19, 2009 in Education, Politics and Science. Comments

Back in January, I got into a debate with some work colleagues over the status of political science as a “true” scientific discipline. Though I think one or two were playing devil’s advocate, the consensus seemed to be that political science was not worthy of the second half of its name. I argued (and do believe), however, that it is indeed a valid science.

To be honest, I can’t remember my friends’ specific arguments (we may or may not have been sitting in a hot tub in the mountains and a few drinks in — thus making the debate fairly comical to begin with). I’ll be sure to let them know I’ve blogged about it so they can correct, clarify, or elaborate on their arguments in the comments. As I remember it, though, their main contention was that because political science is the study of human behavior, and because observations of human behavior cannot reliably be generalized and retested to form a consistent theory or law, the study of politics cannot be classified as a science in the same vein as physics, chemistry, or the other “natural” sciences. It’s simply too flaky.

At Davidson (where Taylor and I went for undergrad and both majored in political science), there is a huge division among the department faculty on this point. Currently, every political science major is required to take “Methods and Statistics in Political Science,” a course that is almost uniformly dreaded. “I’m majoring in a social science precisely because I suck at math”, they complain. “When will I ever use this again?” The science and math wannabes that we are, Taylor and I loved it, and ended up working with our professor one summer on a quantitative study of how congressmen shape their political messaging.

The fear of the course stems mostly from a failure by the faculty to execute any kind of positive PR, because really, it’s not that bad and not that hard. Anyone who is smart enough to get into Davidson can handle it. The first half of the course doesn’t deal with a single number, formula, or regression model, but rather shows how to take a question of politics and attack it using the scientific method. Delineate the specific question, form a hypothesis, decide what the variables are, and propose a way to run an experiment. Not hard, right? The second half is certainly more difficult because it delves into the quantitative realm using computer-aided regressions; but really, it’s nothing impossible and the professors are not only ready, but eager to help them understand and succeed.

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Changing Congress

Published by Jarred on March 4, 2009 in Politics. Comments

Two weeks ago, I was lucky enough to watch Lawrence Lessig give a presentation to Googlers about his new Change Congress movement. Lessig is renowned for his unique presentation style (he probably uses every Keynote transition and effect there is), and it was indeed a very engaging experience. I’m embedding the recording of that presentation at the end of this post — you should definitely check it out.

The Change Congress website describes the movement’s purpose thusly:

Right now, special interests have more influence over our political system than regular folks because of our broken campaign finance laws. These special interests pump millions of dollars into congressional campaigns each cycle, and as a result, they block real change on issue after issue.

Here at Change Congress, we believe that politicians should work for the people, not special interests. But it’s not enough to push politicians to stay out of the system of corruption—we have to reform the system itself. That’s why we support a hybrid of small-dollar donations and public financing, to keep big money out of politics.

Change Congress is supporting new legislation that will be introduced in the next few weeks to reform campaign finance laws:

Under this legislation, congressional candidates who raise a threshold number of small-dollar donations would qualify for a chunk of funding—several hundred thousand dollars. If they accept this funding, they can’t raise big-dollar donations. But they can raise contributions up to a certain amount (such as $100 or $250), which would be matched several times over by a central fund. This would create an incentive for politicians to opt into this system and run people-powered campaigns.

But while this bill shows more promise than ever of passing (President Obama is reportedly going to advocate for it), Lessig’s new organization is not just pushing legislation; it’s also trying to get people involved. To kick off its campaign, Change Congress is organizing what it is calling a “donor strike”. Essentially, it is asking supporters — that is, ordinary Joes and Sallys like you and me — to withhold contributions to politicians who do not explicitly support the hybrid model of campaign financing that Change Congress champions.

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It’s The Technology, Stupid!

Published by Jarred on January 27, 2009 in Politics, Social Networks and Web 2.0. Comments

Wordle of President Obama's Inaugural Address

There was a lot of press last week about the horrid conditions in which the new administration found the White House. Of course, all the floors were mopped and clean, the windows sparkling, the gardens perfectly maintained, the Oval Office tidy and ready for its new occupant. There is one part of the White House, however, that was left in utter disarray. To the naked eye it is invisible and mostly buried under the floors, hidden inside the walls, or tucked away in closets. Yet it is decrepit, neglected to the point of near disfunction. I’m talking about (surprise!) the technology.

Now don’t get me wrong — I didn’t expect very much. A Washington Post article describes the surprise of incoming White House staffers who seem to have been expecting to show up with their MacBook Air laptops, hop on a wireless network, and update their Facebook status to “OMFG I’m at my desk in the West Wing, feeling like such a n00b, LOL! Top secret clearance, FTW!” That would just be silly.

Yet while I had low expectations, the conditions still managed to shock me. New members of the administration showed up to find no computers at all. No loaner laptops. On the few computers that were there and worked, the e-mail system was broken to the point of forcing staffers to route messages through their personal Gmail accounts. Maybe it was because they were using Windows 2000. Even some of the phone lines were down. I mean, really? I wouldn’t have expected this in 2001, let alone in 2009.

But as I mentioned, there’s been a lot of press and blogging done about this already. What I want to talk about is how this situation is symptomatic of a much larger problem — and, as with any large problem, a very large opportunity as well.

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