Government 2.0

How do you think government (either in the United States or elsewhere) can best utilize technology to engage the public and make government more transparent and accessible?

Former Senator and President Elect Barack Obama will record his weekly presidential campaign address and post in on his presidential transition site change.gov. His youth and experience with technology beg the question. Should Government should utilize the technology that’s in front of them, to connect with the average citizen? This is the way of the future in which the government can keep in touch with the growing population that is getting the majority of news and information online.

So far, Barack Obama is the symbol for change and hope and if this is one of the changes that would help get the people to keep a check on government, and hold them accountable for any wrongdoing, then I am all for it. The advent of the internet and various political blogs and message boards that have sprouted up, more so during the eight years of the Bush Administration have helped the people, more specifically young people engage in the political process again. Out of this, will come the new generation of political activists who are not afraid to speak out against government when it does something wrong. By the way, it is the patriotic thing to do!

The internet has helped propel the Barack Obama campaign by raising millions of dollars from small donors, helping to bring him to the national spotlight as a serious Presidential contender with a strong backing.

The idea of posting a YouTube video of Barack Obama’s weekly presidential address, is a wonderful idea. It will allow You Tube posters to post comments regarding certain policies that Obama will propose. Maybe it will have an impact on the way that new legislation is passed, because if the Obama Administration proposes something that is unpopular, then his approval ratings will go down and if he proposes something that the majority of Americans agree with, then his ratings will improve. So our comments may be able to sway his position on certain policies.

Overall, I think this could be beneficial to the American people. It will help keep those technologically savvy informed and that will result in keeping a close eye on our government when they screw things up. I look forward to this new Administration to see what’s in store.

http://ask.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/11/16/1526229

The Issue of Net Neutrality

There is a lot of debate with the big internet and telephone corporations over the issue of network neutrality. The big companies want to be able to regulate the internet through fees. Also to determine what internet content you want to see gets to you fastest than others.

The principle of net neutrality is that all information on the internet is treated equally. AT & T , Comcast, Time Warner and Verizon all argue that they should be able to charge internet sites a premium for delivering faster content on better known sites like Google or Youtube than on lesser known sites. Does an internet company have the right to limit the content that you wish to view?

Many of the internet companies feel that the due to the increasing use of games playing and video content being used, that it is taking up much of the bandwidth. As a result of this they propose a plan to charge heavy internet users fees to used websites with data rich, heavy content within them.

The argument against this is that this is practice threatens internet freedoms that we have always enjoyed. Opponents also fear of internet discrimination. The internet is the extension of free speech written in the first amendment of the Constitution. Also the fact that the lack of so called regulation of the internet has led to the technological revolution. MySpace, Facebook and Youtube exist with net neutrality and without it, online entrepreneurs are at risk of being at the mercy of the internet providers to be able to share their content.

Another issue to deal with is the issue of government being involved in such regulation. Should government be involved with such regulation or should the free market work itself out? Usually when government tries to regulate business, they do so with good intentions. But those good intentions often lead to unintended consequences. New regulations could help to stifle new competition from entering the arena. They would have to go to the government to seek approval wasting time in the process.

I support net neutrality because I want all of the content online to be equally distributed to everyone and not have certain sites available for users for a fee. As a supporter of the first amendment, I feel that the internet especially during this decade, has been a bastion of freedom of information and innovation, the likes of which no one has seen. In this case I don’t support government legislation for net neutrality and as a result , the market just needs to work itself out.