World e-Democracy Forum

America's 2020 Broadband vision

In a few weeks, the American Federal Communications Commission (FCC) will unveil its "National Broadband Plan", as it was asked by Barack Obama at the beginning of its mandate. In a post published on "Broadband.Gov" and posted on the White House Blog, the Chairman of the FCC, Julius Genachowski unveils "America's 2020 Broadband vision", qualifying it as "vitally important to America's future" because "leading the world in broadband is leading the world".

In USA, the net-campaigning is changing

In USA, the election of the Republican Scott Brown to the Senate is a small political bombshell. He has been elected on the seat of Ted Kennedy, an emblematic personnality of the American liberals and he has demonstrated that Republicans know now how to use Internet effectively.

If Micah Sifry, founder of TechPresident, wrote that "the Internet has suggested again and again that it loves an insurgent candidate (Howard Dean, Ron Paul, Barack Obama...)",  he seems to regret that "the Internet's ability to alter the dynamics of US politics--given the existing hard-wiring of the rest of the political process--seems to be far better tuned for "stop this" than "do this."

Ross Douthat, in the New York Times, is thinking that the campaigning online is changing.  "The Internet was for the young, the hip, the multicultural, the liberal. Let the G.O.P. be the party of Fox News. The Democrats would be the party of Google, YouTube and Facebook. But it’s been crumbling ever since Obama took office. Republican politicians have taken over Twitter. Sarah Palin has 1.2 million followers on Facebook. And in liberal Massachusetts, Scott Brown, the Republican Senate candidate, has used Internet fund-raising to put the fear of God into the Bay State’s establishment." He also thinks that "the attempts to turn the campaign’s online community, weakly re-dubbed Organizing for America, into a permanent political force have flopped".

Google has enhanced the level of political transparency in U.S., according PoliticsOnline

Caitlin Morrissey, PoliticsOnline.com editor, explains in this video how the web's oldest political Internet company selects during the last ten years the "10 Who Are Changing the World of Internet and Politics". This year, the International e-Democracy Award was given by Phil Noble, founder of PoliticsOnline, to Peter Greenberger, head of the Google division in charge of political advertising. The online tools that Google offers (YouTube, Google Maps, Google Docs, Google Ads) were heavily used over the course of the recent American presidential campaign. Democratic candidate Barack Obama spent 7.5 million dollars integrating these tools into his campaign strategy. Peter Greenberger informs and educates policy makers and administration officials regarding the use of these tools in order to make the political process more accessible to ordinary citizens.

According PoliticsOnline, Peter Greenberger and his team have played a key role in enhancing transparency and democracy in the United States, which significantly change the worldview of politics among citizens.

100 days of a Tech Presidency

TechPresident.com publish its own version of the Obama's "100 Days" in terms of IT. 100 days marked by a strong political will to promote a transparent, open and participatory Government and to launch two major projects in favor of broadband Internet and e-Health record.

A 2.0 presidency?

After his victory, Barack Obama promised an "open government" and use "technological tools that can promote citizen participation in decision-making." Two recent initiatives (a chat from the White House and a grassroots campaign to support his budget proposal) illustrate this new way of governing in the digital society era.

In USA, Republicans want to catch up on the web

Republicans already are gearing up to regain lost ground from the 2008 elections, with a plan to level the digital playing field and fight the Democrats byte by byte. Last February, the new chairman of the Republican National Committee, Michael Steele, organized a "Tech Summit" which brought party activists and strategists together to present ideas on how the RNC can better use available technologies to engage voters. The challenge is big. "When I first suggested launching a blog chronicling my experience on my father's campaign for president, I was met with confusion and resistance. I got the sense that people on the campaign thought I was wasting my time" explained Meghan McCain, daughther of the republican candidate on her blog.

Debate around the American broadband Internet service

In his $900 billion stimulus program, the Obama administration plans to spend nine billion dollars to expand broadband Internet service to rural and underserved areas. A promise of President Obama who compared his project to the development of motorway during the Eisenhower period. But some experts, according to the New York Times, bring into question the relevance of this public investment, which could be "the worst kind of mistakes that lawmakers could make." Read the article in the New York Times.

Change.gov - Citizen engagement during Barack Obama's transition

Barack Obama’s Transition Team promised to build the most open and tansparent transition of all times. How did they carry on Obama’s sucessful online election campaign and how did they involve citizens online? Zebralog had a close look at the engagement tools used on change.gov - the Citizen’s Briefing Book, the discussion forum “Join the Discussion” and a tool called “Open for Questions”. Furthermore they give some predictions of the next steps of Obama’s Administration Online-Team. Read this interesting note published on PEP-Net.eu

USA : Newt's Pro-Drilling Petition Fuels Online Flurry on the Right

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich's American Solutions Group has created a viral online petition surrounding its pro-drilling campaign that has attracted 1.1 million supporters in only 30 days. According to PoliticsOnline, the right-roots are all abuzz about Newt's success, since it's the first good news as the right has taken a pounding online from Obama and the left.

Obama fights web smears

The Barack Obama web strategy is "a very high priority for this campaign from Day One... He's understood from the very beginning that the Internet makes it easier for everyday people to find ways to support the campaign, to get involved" said Chris Hughes, Obama's tech-savvy Facebook entrepreneur. Because of Internet, Obama won the democratic nomination. But now, he must take care about viral rumors which circulate from e-mails to e-mails. A new specific website was launched and Obama campaign is looking for a network security expert. A first time for an electoral campaign.