Business Competition this weekend - voter education and empowerment idea

[cbc58]

I am posting this here seeking input and feedback for an idea I have for voter education and empowerment system.

There is a "Startup Weekend" business competition in a few days, and if I can determine if this is a plausible concept I will pay to enter and try and get it started. I need to know if people would actually sign up to use it - along with any concerns they might have or suggestions for improvement. One thing I need to figure out is how to pay for it on an ongoing basis without charging users.

The idea is this: create a system that provides unbiased information to voters - on an ongoing basis - of proposed legislation, law changes and political/town issues that effect them at the local, regional and national level. The service would aggregate information and customize it based on user location. A user would then be able to voice their opinion in real time to a central website that records everyone's opinion. Sort of like opinion polling except it is totally transparent and available to everyone. I call this concept www.ballotstorm.com.

The impetus behind this is to make citizens more aware of the issues that effect them, and to develop a system of polling outside traditional manipulated media or political party. It would be totally non-partisan and 100% transparent so there can be a public record of voter opinion that can not be ignored by politicians.

Being here on the RP forums has taught me that alot of people want to change things but don't know how to go about it. We need to organize but how? How many people out there really understand or know how the general population thinks? Educating voters about what is really going on is the #1 way to effect real long-term change to this broken system.

To make this work, people here would have to sign up and provide some basic info on themselves so they can be verified as actual voters/citizens in a certain district. This info would be protected and would be presented as "de-identified" data so that certain user aspects could be presented such as age range, male or female, etc.

The term ballotstorm was envisioned by assuming voters could mobilize en-mass to voice their opinions about issues that effect them. Generally most people discuss problems and see many issues as so large that they have no way of doing anything about it.. but with ballotstorm there is a "strength in numbers" approach that could galvanize citizens to hold politicians accountable or make something happen. Locally it could become a pre-notification system for utility rate hikes, tax increases or public hearings.

Any feedback info appreciated. You will not hurt my feelings if you think this is a bad idea but I would at least like to know if it's worth a shot - and if you would use and support it.

Tks

[cbc58]

63 views and no replies so I'm guessing people don't think this idea is useful, or they are apathetic to something new because it seems to be an overwhelming chore to battle the status quo.

Absolutely understand that mentality - but would like to describe a scenario as it relates to Rand Paul's filibuster yesterday.

Had this concept been adopted and launched, there would be a system in place (outside of traditional media, special interest groups and political parties) that would allow people to voice their support (or non-support), record this information and present it in a totally transparent format. Sure there were people here voicing their support, as well as folks twittering about it and various news channels covering the event... but to my knowledge there is nothing that brought the support all together and presented it in a unbiased format.

Someone tried to get a petition together that the White House would have to address - but I think they received only 2,500 signatures. Had this been up and running and engaging voters across all spectrum's - it may have gotten 100k signatures in an hour or less. Strength in numbers and something that any politician couldn't ignore. And had this been a more mainstream issue requiring a congressional vote that more directly impacted citizens (such as raising taxes or reducing benefits) - people would come out of the woodwork and look for a way to make their voice heard. If anyone has ever tried to contact an elected official by phone or email you know that it generally goes into a black hole with no response back - at least that has been my experience. This way they have to acknowledge public opinion and can be held accountable by their electorate.

[cbc58]

I came across this site when researching the FL politician that wanted to require an anger management check to buy bullets.

Here is the site: http://www.lobbytools.com/

This just goes to show you how organized and well funded the establishment is - and this is just FL. You can not compete with stuff like this unless the common man/woman gets educated and vocal. They are too powerful and know how to work the system.

[helmuth_hubener]

So it would be like a libertarian version of the League of Women Voters?

And then the second part is like a transparent open-source polling project, competing with PPP, Gallup, etc. Right?

It seems like two totally different things. How were you planning on tying them together in a synergy?

Would the polling thing be doing phone calls to random people in a scientific statistical way, or just self-selected online polls?

[helmuth_hubener]

Bump. Have you secured the domain name?