cnewmark

PublicMarkup.org: a new government transparency tool from Sunlight

Sunlight Foundation launches a new project today - PublicMarkup.org. They've developed a model bill for government transparency online so you can weigh in before the bill is even introduced into Congress. This is a pretty unique opportunity to tell them - and your elected reps -- what you think transparent government should look like. It's open for public comment today.

The bill incorporates some pending pieces of legislation with some Sunlight drafted creative new requirements for Congressional transparency. Sunlight needs your help, so visit the site and tell them what you think of what they've done. You can comment on the entire bill or on specific sections.

Eloquence from the White House

(From Time magazine "Perspectives")

"So?"

From Dick Cheney, when told that most Americans don't believe the Iraq War was worth it

"the American people have input every four years, and that's the way our system is set up."

From Dana Perino, when asked if the Bush White House cares about input from Americans

craigslist hiring programmers

Hey, we're hiring open source programmers, with Linux, Perl, MySQL and related experience.

The detail is here on our site.

My favorite line: chance to build X, as in "craigslist should have had X years ago!"

Multiple language support on craigslist

We tend to do stuff without much announcement, but I figured you might want to know that we implemented multiple language support for craigslist in November. Just Spanish then, but last week we added more languages. Check for yourself:

• http://quebec.fr.craigslist.ca/
• http://venice.it.craigslist.it/
  
• http://rio.pt.craigslist.org/
  
• http://paris.fr.craigslist.org/
  
• http://zurich.de.craigslist.ch/

The programmers inform me that maybe Basque, maybe Klingon, are next.

Election shocker: people view long Obama speeches online

Well, looking at the numbers, people are turning to substantive speech in long form online.

Jon Stewart captured the gist; people are shocked that Obama's treating us like adults.

Micah Sifry and Andrew Rasiej capture the issues in an article in Politico:

So far, Obama's videos have been viewed more than 33 million times on YouTube--and that's not counting partial views, since YouTube only reports a full viewing as a "view." His campaign has uploaded more than 800 video clips, and adds several more a day.

If you just look at his ten most viewed videos, here are some astonishing facts:

• The average number of views for these top ten is currently more than 1.1 million (nearly double the average from a month ago!)
  
• The average length of these ten videos is 13.3 minutes.
  
• There have been nearly 3.9 million views of the longest of Obama's most popular videos, his "A More Perfect Union" speech on race in America.

In an age of sound bites, that's pretty impressive; in particular, his speech on race is maybe genuinely historic.

The Times is talking about the youth aspect in this regards.

Big things, they're happening.

"Celebrate The Democralypse!"

Hey, this is the The Stephen Colbert Pennsylvania Straw Poll That Makes A Difference.

Barack's got 1149 voters, helping out 12393 students.

On his TV show "The Colbert Report," host Stephen Colbert dubbed the rivalry between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton "Democralypse Now." As an alternative, Stephen challenged his viewers to participate in a "straw poll that makes a difference" by giving to projects in public school classrooms in Pennsylvania, the state of the next democratic primary. Donors can choose to fund a classroom project "in honor of Hillary Clinton" or "in honor or Barack Obama."

Jackie Speier, next Congressman for my district

Neighborhood talk; just got behind the new GI bill.

Colbert: vote in Pennsylvania via DonorsChoose.org

Hey, last October on the Colbert show I voted for his presidential run via DonorsChoose.org, which allows you to send money right to teachers and classrooms who need it.

Stephen just challenged us all to vote for our candidate of choice by contributing more, check out what I just did via the Colbert contribution link for Obama...

... and please help out by voting in this manner, I'd really appreciate it!

The "Change Congress Project" with Larry Lessig, Sunlight Foundation, and Omidyar Network

... or, as Sunlight Foundation puts it: Mr. Lessig Comes to Washington

Hey, with this election year, and tools for Congressional accountability and transparency coming online, we got something big coming up. I really feel this is big history in the making.

Lawrence Lessig, Stanford University law professor and world-renowned expert in intellectual property, is announcing that he's going to invest a significant amount of his time and energy confronting the pervasive and corruptive influence of money in our democracy. You may have heard of the recent Draft Lessig movement that almost convinced him to run for Congress. He ultimately decided not to make the run, but he's not retreating from the fight.

Today, at a lecture here in Washington, sponsored by Sunlight and Omidyar Network, he's launching the ChangeCongress project where he'll focus his academic interests on the issue of the systemic corruption of American democracy. Lessig will outline his hopes for ChangeCongress and how it will help citizens reclaim their democracy from the culture of corruption.

Lessig will give his lecture at 1:30 p.m. (Eastern Time) today at the National Press Club. We are very proud that Lessig recently joined Sunlight's advisory board, where he's helping us stay on the vanguard of using technology to promote a transparent and open government.

These guys are the real deal, I'm just a pretty face.

Check that link for the webcast and more.

"Detectives seek UFO answers"

Check it out:

Private investigators are searching for the origins of a photograph that allegedly depicts a UFO flying over a Capitola, Calif., utility pole.

...

The pictures, which were posted by someone using the name Raji on Craigslist, depict an object that appears to be too small to be manned flying above a utility pole. Raji told the Open Minds Forum in an e-mail that the pictures were taken Capitola near the home of his fiancee's parents, but his e-mail account disappeared and the forum was unable to get contact them.