DEAR AUNT BETTY……

From Tamara:

You have always been there as a part of my “farm” memories – dressing chickens, preparing and canning veggies, melons, learning the right way to do laundry, get the silks out of corn, use the ironer, sprinkling clothes and ironing just to name a few. You taught us to calculate how much tip to leave waitresses. I trained my memory skills correcting papers on weekends for many years. I remember the road trip to Detroit with you, Carol and Terry. Shortly after we returned to the farm, there was the tornado and I remember you standing out in the yard taking pictures. I always enjoyed going to Sweet Adeline’s with you and particularly the After Glow parties – I felt special and grown up. When you came to visit when we lived in Grand Mound, there were always lots of bags of groceries that always contained treats. You were brave enough to let me learn to drive your car in the field at the farm and I still managed to run into a fence – I don’t remember that you seemed very upset. More recently, I always looked forward to your bean salad when I returned to Iowa the past many years – it was the best and a staple in my diet the past 2 years since I stopped eating meat. You have given so much to all of us. You will be in my memories always.

Love, Tam

James (Tamara’s son)

I have drawn so much strength from hearing you talk about your childhood growing up on the farm… Working as hard as you did for such little reward… I remember each and every story you’ve told me. And when we are in the middle of our hardest days… No sleep… No days off to rest in weeks… Shows in bad conditions and all that comes along with that… I am able to walk into everything with a smile on my face because I know what was given for me to be able to be sleep deprived, overworked, but doing what I’ve always dreamed of doing.

Tim:

I have been thinking about you a lot lately and I did not realize how many wonderful memories we have made over the last 50 years. Here are just a couple of my fondest:

• You gave me one of my the best Birthday presents in Heidi for my 8th or 9th.  I remember being at the farm when I found out I was going to get a dog and then going to pick out pick her out.  How exciting it was.  Heidi brought our family and me a lot of wonderful times and memories and I can’t imagine my childhood without her.
• Visiting you in Fort Madison was always a treat with the rodeo and parade being the biggest highlights.  I can still remember standing in line and getting an autographed picture from Festus.
• The best memories I have come down to that you were always there.  This may sound a little strange, but my heart and mind are full of memories of holidays, birthdays, baseball games, graduations and family events that would not have been the same without you.  You have not been a normal aunt, you have been a member of my immediate family and a big part of my life.  What a lucky guy I am.

I have also been thinking about Aunt Betty the person and the legacy you are leaving with me.  The top if the list for me will always be your generosity.  I can’t remember you ever going anywhere empty handed.  You always bought fund raiser items from me or my kids.  The amount of work you went through for many years to sell fruit for others is incredible.  The years you spent singing with Sweet Adeline’s and volunteering at Horse Shows and their organization are very, very admirable.  You did not have a family of your own, so you “adopted” others to give your time, energy and talents.

In closing I want you to know how fortunate I am to have you as a part of my life and family.  I am sorry it has taken me so long to tell you.

All my love always,

Tim

Deana (Tim’s wife):

When I think of being a part of this family, my mind immediately goes to all of the family gatherings that took place on the farm.  Tim & I would quite often drive down on Friday evening after work and, before long, Aunt Betty would be driving around back and coming in the back door with coolers and boxes and bags full of food.

After the car was unloaded, she and Leona would begin the ritual of slicing and dicing and chopping away in food preparation.  They would work in that kitchen for hours….sometimes chatting …sometimes in silence….but seemingly always in perfect synchronization.

I think this made an impression on me because in my family, aunts were guests and  treated as ‘company’.  Aunt Betty was never ‘company’….she was family and the group wasn’t complete until she got there.:)

Greg (Tim & Deana’s eldest son):

One of my favorite memories with Aunt Betty was going to the rodeo in Ft. Madison with her when I was really little.  It was my first rodeo and we went to her house first for lunch and then watched the parade before going to the rodeo.  I remember thinking  the animals were really cool. Brianne & I dressed up as a cowboy and cowgirl   That’s the only rodeo that I’ve ever been to and I’ll never forget it!’

Grant (Tim & Deana’s younger son):

I always looked forward to Aunt Betty’s Birthday Grocery Bags as I was growing up!  It was fun to make the list with Mom of what I wanted and then wait to see what Aunt Betty surprised me with.  It was awesome to have your very own pudding and pop and candy and gum!  My dad says she did that very same thing for him when he was a kid.  That’s a cool tradition!

Troyt

When I think of Aunt Betty, a lot of things come to mind.

• • Trips to Burlington to pick out shoes/boots. From Grandpa Bill for Christmas
  • Pacifying Traci and me on Christmas eves so we wouldn’t go downstairs.
  • Grocery bags of food for Birthdays back when they were paper. No inflation in that project huh!!!
  • 25c for a single, 50c for a double, 75c fora  triple , a dollar for a home run.
  • Grading 4th grade math papers before I was in 4th grade. AB’s own “TAG” program.
  • Cable TV and WGN before anyone else.
  • Rodeo parade in Gpa Bills pickup (and rain I believe)
  • Autographed photos of Festus!!!
  • Crash course in farm gardening when we moved.
  • Sweet Adeline shows. A definite source of my love for singing, a capella music and old music with 4 parts.
  • The Rathjes, Jeff and Mark, with us to rodeo.
  • Ohio trip to see Brodies…license plate bingo.
  • Summers at the farm.
  • Slicing cheese, picking nuts, cleaning up the kids plates.
  • The THRONE
  • Upstairs 1/2 apartment addresses
  • Stern voice and unconditional love.
  • Covering the home base with Gma when we needed a hand.
  • Slide shows at the farm
  • Taking lots of pics when we were younger.
  • Always there for friends and family when they needed a helping hand…to her own detriment at times.
  • One of the toughest, most determined, most stubborn and bravest patients I’ve known. I don’t know that I am a strong enough person to do what she’s done. I admire that so much.

Overall, a GREAT aunt who puts others before herself and asks little to nothing in return…other than a thank you and a hug!!!

Kelsey (Troyt’s daughter):

My first memories of you are when you would bring orange juice, Sterzing’s potato chips, and licorice to the farm.  You have supplied my family with caramel corn, cookies, cereal snack, melons, grapefruit, and oranges for as long as I can remember. For birthdays you would buy whatever groceries we wanted, you would always remember to get me pretzels and Twinkies, even when I forgot them on my list.

When I got older, you took me to Ft. Madison to see the river, that was the first time and last time I had seen your house.  We stopped by your house that afternoon, and I noticed an unopened Kleenex box, that you decided we didn’t need and I agreed.  Well, when we were leaving the river to go home, I got a nose bleed, and we had to go to your old house anyway to get the Kleenex box we left there.  A couple years later, you took me back to Ft. Madison to see a horse show, and we were both surprised that I enjoyed it.  I’ve loved going with you to the multiple horse shows we’ve gone to.

Whenever I would stay at your house, we watched a sporting event of some sort as I put together a puzzle.  You always made sure you had pancake mix for breakfast, tenderloins for lunch, supper, or both, pretzels, Tin Roof Sundae ice cream, and Ginger Ale, all of which are my favorites.  Summer with you has been one of my favorite parts of the year.  One year, you took me to the Dover Museum, and you were my tour guide.  Another year, we went to the county fair to watch the talent show.  We worked a couple trips to the Jet Stop into our day as well.  We would get Casey’s pizza one night and ice cream the next.

I’m greatful for everything you’ve done for me over the years.  I’ve enjoyed hearing stories you tell me about yourself when you were younger, and Grandpa Bill.  I’ve enjoyed every activity we’ve done together, and I love you very much.  Thanks for everything.

Love,

Kelsey

Traci

As I look back to my history with Aunt Betty, my mind is overloaded with times spent with her.  As a child I remember times going to the Rodeo and Rodeo parade.  Spending time on the farm with her and Grandpa Bill during the summers.  Her very patiently staying up with me on Christmas Eve, because I was so excited that I could not go to sleep waiting to see what Santa had brought me.  I remember her wrapping toilet paper around her head at night so that her hair wouldn’t get messed up in her sleep.

Staying with her in Ft. Madison and getting to watch cable tv and getting to stay up late and watching something besides ballgames. Birthday groceries were always a hit.  Cereal snack mix, carmel corn, pumpkin pie, relishes and Betty cutting the cheese so perfectly, are foods that will always remind me of her.  Going to Sweet Adeline practices and going out afterward and being out late. (a big deal to me at the time).  She fixed up a bedroom for me so that I could stay with her while I went to cosmetology school.  As an adult and having my girls, she was always there for me and my family.  If I needed someone to stay with the girls or just someone there to help supervise, I always knew that she was just a phone call away and more then willing to help.  I had many friends say, “wow, I wish I had an Aunt Betty!”  Coupons, need one, call Aunt Betty, I am sure she will have one for what you need.  I could go on and on, but most of all my greatest memory is just looking back and feeling the love and support that she gave me and always knowing and feeling that security from her and she never expected anything in return.

Brianne (Traci’s daughter):

Aunt Betty has always been a grandma to me. She has always been there for our family whether a good time or bad. I know that for me to pick a favorite memory with her would take longer then for me to name all of the great things she has taught me and let me experience with her. I remember Mom getting off the phone with her saying Aunt Betty is coming through town and wants to know if anyone wants to go to the patch. Making the drive to the melon patch, as we called it, to get watermelons and cantaloupe is always a good time. Aunt Betty makes sure that she gets everyones order and special requests before she goes so that she can make sure that everyone gets to enjoy the summery goodness.

Birthdays when I was younger were always great at the farm because not only did I get to open presents and see all of my family but I got a BIRTHDAY SACK from Aunt Betty! A while before our birthdays she requested a list of what our favorite foods and snacks (things mom wouldnt buy us at the grocery store) we wanted, bagged it all up and included a movie or CD that we wanted. Best gift every birthday! Callen took to Aunt Betty right away and we try to make it a point to see her when we come down so that he can sit on her lap. However, last time we were home he wasnt so into sitting down leave it to Aunt Betty to find a smiley face ball that he loved and he sat and played with it for the entire time we were there.

Last thing I have to say – if you ever need a Tic-Tac check with Aunt Betty. You can be sure she will have some orange ones and if she doesn’t she will get you some for the next time! I hope she realizes how much she has impacted everyone’s life that she knows, especially her family and friends. One of the strongest and most caring women I will ever know and have as a role model. If I can only be half the woman she is, I will be successful in life and family!

Barb

I have a lot of specific memories of Aunt Betty and some that are more like feelings.  Aunt Betty has had an influence on my life in ways that I can’t pinpoint but know are present at different times. When I think of all the lessons learned from this wise woman I think of things like loyalty to friends, hard work will always pay off and giving back to the community you live in is important.  It isn’t about hearing her voice reminding me to do things, although there are times when that’s true, it’s more about her helping to shape the person that I have become today.  She is a very giving person and a very proud person.

She always wanted us to learn something new and remember our past-it’s the teacher in her.  Betty showed us the back roads and the towns around where she and her sisters grew up and who lived where and for how long and when their birthdays fall and how they are related to us.  I love that she has a steel trap for a brain- she remembers everything.  She made us feel connected to the world and made it seem small to a couple of little city girls.

I remember summers at the farm and sleeping with Aunt Betty in the North room.

I remember watching her sing at Sweet Adeline’s and going to dinner at Country Kitchen afterwards.

I remember driving to Nashville with Betty, Carol and Mom and laughing and telling stories and just watching the scenery.

I remember learning to shell a walnut, a pecan and a pea pod from Aunt Betty.

I think of her listening to the radio and keeping up on all the High School sports and I remember Betty coming to visit to watch me play softball.

I love her caramel corn, cookies and chex mix and the fact that she never forgets to bring a package or 2 of Twizzlers with her.

I remember spending the night at her home in Ft.Madison and watching TV (Charlie’s Angels specifically) in the hide-a-bed in the living room when I was supposed to be asleep.

I remember many times going to Stuart and Lyda’s farm and on one occasion Robin got to pick out a kitty to take home.

Mostly, I will always remember a quiet woman who taught children and taught me to respect others and world around me.  She is one of the strongest women I have ever known.

These memories will always be dear to my heart.  Aunt Betty will always be dear to my heart.

Is there any urge more basic than for your life to be of consequence? No matter how we define consequence, most of our instincts and actions seem aimed towards it.

Forging a Confederation

I used to live in Philadelphia and I’d walk around Old Town and I got it that the Founding Brothers were technologists in many ways. They too were dealing with an interesting bandwidth accident exhibiting unintended outcomes. England’s purpose for the Colonies, of course, was to get more stuff as cheaply as possible and to tax the colonists as much as possible. But bandwidth got in the way.

This was such a wild land that, for the better part of a century, the colonies were more isolated from each other than from Mother England. Gradually though, wagon trails were built and it became more convenient for the Carolinas to deal with Pennsylvania than with England. The other virtue was that the colonists, though profoundly different north-to-south, related to each other far better than to the Court of St. James and the East India Company. By the 1770’s, the differences could no longer be ignored. Like any network, the colonies paid closest attention to the highest fidelity signal.

What’s interesting is how few people set the direction for the American Experiment. Only the 56 white guys in Carpenter’s Hall understood what a leap they were taking with the Declaration of Independence. It’s not like they were being closely controlled by their state legislatures which were several days’ ride away. It was never a certainty that Tom Jefferson’s stirring Enlightenment-era declarations of individual freedom would set the stage for their conclusions. He did it because he could and he wanted to be of consequence.

Eleven years later, the 39 signers of the Constitution acted just as independently in setting down the rules of engagement for the people and their rulers. No one paid much attention to their secret work until they were surprised by the many changes the Constitution proposed. The fight over the document was fierce and the debate thoughtful, but they didn’t revise what the standards body had hammered out. So the twig was bent and that was the direction our nation inclined. In October 1788, the old Congress disbanded quietly to make way for an entirely new form of governance.

That was some serious standard-setting. Today, we’re the delegates setting the standards for the world that will follow us. Relatively speaking, we’re even fewer than the four score or so men who did the real work of putting symbols on parchment. Some of the symbols we’re using are pretty arcane, but they set standards anyway, which will mold society as surely as did the Federalist papers.

Writing the Human Code

“Humanity [is on] a personal quest to enlarge the soul, liberate the spirit, and light up the brain. On that quest, politics is simply a roadblock of stentorian baboons” —Tom Robbins

So a few will debate nuances no one else comprehends. Even fewer will lay down the words that free our progeny. What works will grow and the rest will wither, as it always has. Someday we’ll see that the Toms, Jefferson and Robbins, were right in seeing that as long as there are willing followers there will be exploitive leaders.

We’re learning how to follow our collective gut, add what we can, use what works and leave something better behind. Maybe this isn’t an apocalypse but a parenthesis and the age of hierarchy is an interruption in organic evolution as it’s always gone on.

Doing sensible things is what makes us consequential.

The title and description raised a number of questions for me. Is power always a sum of something? Does disruption always subtract power from whatever it disrupts? What is “digital power” and how is it applied? What makes private and public “sectors”? Are they really that separate? Why does the possessive pronoun “their” apply to citizens?

The word balance calls to mind something like the image on the left. You have a sum of X in one place, and it’s balanced by a sum of Y in another. For many subjects involving power the metaphor applies. There is a given sum of gold in the world, for example. But does power always pile up in ways that a scale suggests? Does it pile at all?…

…For that conference, and for the rest of us in the meantime, I invite considering this: The entity with the most power to gain is the individual…Giving individuals more power is the job ProjectVRM and its development communities have taken up. But it will happen anyway.

It’s tempting to focus on what Big Bad Government and Big Bad Companies are doing. They hog spotlights they deserve in any case. But digital technology makes many other places no less deserving of spotlights. Our ability to learn, to inform and to act, will only grow. If we’re busy being discontented with others who have more power at the moment, we’ll get less done. And we’ll miss out on a lot of the fun.

Doc and I agree that what’s most fun is ‘building shit’. That means web applications that have a reasonable shot at routing around our most vexing economic and societal constraints. And we agree that if you’re discontented, you’re less likely to build something with that magic route-around power. Lots of work has been done, on projects with a good purpose, but they all seem to be focused on politics rather than government.

Doc’s ProjectVRM seeks to invert the power balance between customers and vendors, while my personal project is to invert the power balance between lawmakers and voters. I had no interest in attending the Georgetown event because I’m a guilty instigator of the Tragedy of the Netroots I described last month. Following the Howard Dean half-time celebration-cum-meltdown in 2003-4, we Internet utopians just knew that We-the-People were about to wrest control of the political power levers from the political hacks. The fact that nothing even close to this happened should cause We-the-Netroots to reconsider our assumptions. But that hasn’t happened. Instead, people convene meetings like the one at Georgetown to opine where all this is going.

The mechanisms behind We-the-Netroots’ collective failure were a mystery to me until I came across Kevin Kelly citing The Shirky Principle, “Institutions will try to preserve the problem to which they are the solution.” Kelly asserts that “complex solutions (like a company, or an industry) can become so dedicated to the problem they are the solution to, that often they inadvertently perpetuate the problem”. Kelly notes the tension between institutions’ business as usual and edge phenomena:

In his brilliant, classic book The Innovator’s Dilemma, Clay Christensen demonstrates how disruptive technologies almost always arise from the margins of an industry, where they start out as insignificant, or toy, solutions. Honda’s hobbyist electric bicycles were no threat to the big four automobile companies, until electric bikes become motorcycles and motorcycles became small efficient cars. Cheap crumby dot matrix printers were no threat to big offset printing companies until dot matrix became inkjet printers and inkjects became the HP Indigo 5000 on-demand printers. In each case, the solutions were marginal, barely working, at first, and therefore ignored.

And therefore huge.

Among those obsolescent patterns is politicians’ willful disregard of their constituents’ preferences. Every day we are urged to “tell your representative to …………….” But our pleas, if we even make them, never match a cause with a voter who matters to an Olivia Snowe or Max Baucus. These messages are as futile as yelling at the support tech that their web site sucks.

If you don’t feel impotent about effecting change, you don’t understand the real game in politics as well as Matt Taibbi does.

The iVote4U system is fundamentally different. It’s about governance, not politics. Using iVote4U, you don’t care much who your politician is. Instead, you “push” your interests to him/her and make it clear that how the politician votes in Congress will affect how you will vote in the next primary election.

The most valuable resource in politics is a voter who shows up at a primary election. Like diamonds, they’re valuable because they’re scarce. Primary voters matter so much because most elections are safely Democrat or Republican. All the nuttiness we see in Congress is about primary elections, not the general. iVote4U gives certified constituents a way to use their primary vote pledges to give political cover to politicians who act on principle, so they don’t have to pander to the zealots who show up for the primary.

Like those zealots, iVote4U primary voters are loyal to a cause but not a party, but their loyalty stems from rational curating of a politician’s actions for years, with real consequences for the incumbent or challenger in the next primary election.

Called “Super Voters,” they are 3rd-party certified constituents, pledged to vote in the next primary, who are watching the politician’s actions, and will vote accordingly.

There is no greater threat or benefit to a politician’s career.

(FWIW, calling it the “Comcast transaction” without explanation, Susan reveals how far we insiders have distanced ourselves from the real people – voters – who might have an interest in an issue and might exert real political power on an acquisition that affects our ability to use broadband and to be free to deploy the Internet on our own behalf without interference from our Internet provider’s vested interest in the content they want us to “consume”. Out here in the nocluesphere, we have no idea what the “Comcast transaction” might be.)

Susan is rightly exercised:

1. The transaction would give Comcast, the nation’s largest cable operator, control of one of the five large US content providers and about 30% control of Hulu.com.  If the transaction is approved, Comcast will be behind about one out of every five viewing hours in the U.S.  We are a nation of living-room watchers, and Comcast will be there.
2. Comcast is smart to be using control over content to guarantee dominance in broadband.  There are fewer competitors in broadband – usually two in any locality, a cable company and a telco – than there are in video.  Cable is already doing better than VZ/AT&T, and prices for high-speed Internet access are staying high and bundled.  NCTA says that cable modem service is “available” to 92% of homes.  We won’t be seeing VZ or AT&T fiber reaching more than 40% of households over the next few years.  Cable has a bright future.
3. Comcast says that this is a vertical transaction that should not trigger competition concerns.  They point out that both the Comcast and NBCU cable networks together will add up to just 12% of national cable advertising and affiliate revenue.  (Comcast wants the NBCU cable networks (CNBC, Bravo, Oxygen), which generate 60% of NBCU’s earnings.)  They also say that online video content is so wildly competitive that this deal will have no impact.

And Susan suggests the questions that might come up on Thursday:

• What power will Comcast have to shape the future of online video (or “Internet TV”)?  This transaction may make it less likely that people will cut the cord and disintermediate their cable provider, moving their online video-watching from their PCs to their large living room screens.  Comcast will have no incentive to make its content available online to non-subscribers.
• Online video/Internet TV is a new market.  Right now, it’s relatively small and confined to PC-viewing.  Comcast says we shouldn’t consider potential harms to a future market.  Is that right?
• What effect will this transaction have on the prices consumers pay for cable subscriptions and high speed Internet access?

But there is NO structural mechanism to ensure that those questions actually come up. Sure, on Thursday, under the currently trusted guidance of FCC Chair Julius Genachowski, the right questions might be heard. But would they have been heard under Dubya’s appointed tool, Genachowski’s predecessor, Kevin Martin? As citizens, can we afford to place our trust in the hope that the regulators will always have our interests in mind? How might we ensure that knowledgeable questions are asked in these crucial committee meetings? Since lobbyists can’t guarantee what questions are raised in a hearing, how might we?

“We” being, you know, actual voters. Maybe even *certified voters*, proven to be constituents of the representatives asking the questions and guiding the trajectory of the hearing. i.e., voters getting their democracy on.

Those are the kind of voters who drive politicians’ actions: the questions, comments and votes they express in committee hearings and on the floor of the Congress.

If there were a zoning hearing affecting your home, you’d damn well find out who’s on the Zoning Board and what their biases are. Likewise, if you want to affect a Congressional Committee Hearing, you need to know who’s on the committee. In this case, the committee is the House Subcommittee on Communications, Technology and the Internet, reporting to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce. So here’s the playing field of this particular subcommittee:

Rick Boucher, Virginia, Chairman

There they are, 34 Congresspeople, concerned mostly about being re-elected in nine months, jonesing for $3,000 per day so they can buy as many ads as needed to convince voters (whoever they are!) that they are listening to their voters. I can’t find the quote, but $3,000 per day is what I remember from Larry Lessig and that’s good enough for me. On any given day next fall, these representatives will drive 45 minutes out of their way to meet a dozen or so of their (presumed) constituents in a gym or diner to demonstrate how well they listen.

Given those imperatives, how hard can it be for a few third-party-certified* constituents to get a question asked in a hearing, the asking of which costs the representative nothing and which may line him up for grassroots campaign contributions that the lobbyists can’t promise and, amazingly, might explicitly pledged votes? Those being votes that no lobbyist would even suggest they could corral for you. They’re not in the Get-Out-The-Vote business. “GOTV” is the essence of “retail politics”, and that’s what political campaigns spend lobbyist money on. But what if we voters got into the GOTV business? Hmmm.

Welcome to the new math of citizen engagement. In the bargain, voters’ questions might actually make the representative look well informed. But wouldn’t that reduce the contributions they might get from the interested corporations? How much would it matter? According to a 2006 report from Freepress.net:

Between 1991 and 2006 major cable industry interests and their trade groups spent more than $105 million on campaign contributions to federal candidates and on lobbying in Washington. The five members of Congress who currently hold key positions on the crucial House and Senate Commerce Committees alone have received more than half a million dollars in contributions from major cable interests since 1991. Contributions went both to members’ candidate committees and their leadership political action committees (PACs).

It’s a lot of money, but how much might those fifteen years of contributions sway each representative? According to the FreePress report, Comcast has contributed $2,516,528 to Federal candidate committees and leadership PACs from 1991 to 2006. That amounts to $167,769 to ALL politicians through the period. Freepress notes that, in 2006, when Fred Upton, R-MI, was chair of the House subcommittee, he had received $118,997 from Comcast since 1991. Of course, it stinks, but it amounts to $7,933 per year.

Perspective: We hate the fact that our congresscritters, on average, must raise $3,000 per day to conduct a serious campaign. But shouldn’t we acknowledge that, for their apparent champion on the subcommittee, Comcast was only willing to provide 2.6 days of fundraising? Do we really believe that Fred Upton is willing to pervert his entire agenda for that mild level of support?

And Fred’s just the most highly compensated supporter of the Comcast devil. In fact, the other 33 committee members must be far less impressed, financially, with Comcast’s agenda. And you can bet that they also have broadband that sucks, and they know it.

So what’s the point here? American households, not corporations, have most of the money and all of the votes. Given the tools becoming available, we might be equipped to use them.

Responding to 9/11

… we need to be warriors: take our losses, bury our dead, isolate our exposures, repair specific flaws in our systems and stick to our mission plan: … In America’s third century, [it] has not changed for 228 years: Our God-given purpose is to demonstrate that a varied populace from disparate origins can live peacefully under an open government that governs minimally but humanely.

Britt Blaser, 2004

Chris didn’t like his link telling people that my blog would harm our computers. That’s not my aim. I just wanna hurt our brains. Some friends know that my project, the Independence Year Foundation , has evolved away from the iYear branding to a two-part platform called iVote4U. That’s because it’s a better way to state what’s in the tin.

Here’s the current description, with enough links to screw up your weekend:

The iVote4UPolitician Management & Support System

Nutshell:

iVote4U: two parts that work together.

Part 1: a set of spaces, one per US representative. The spaces are for constituents to meet, talk, and influence their reps.	Part 2: a Facebook app for voters to pledge action.
David Weinberger, Ph.D.: “The trick is that the app is set up so the rep can be certain that the citizen is in fact one of her/his constituents.”

iVote4U’s Facebook Application Services

1. Voter home page, with politician action panels
2. Candidates for each office you vote for.
3. Dashboard: Politicians you’ve “touched” in any way.
4. Vote and Money Pledge manager.
5. Vote bombs: Vote challenges you’ve issued or supported.
6. Causes: the Facebook Causes you’ve sent to politicians.
7. Invite Friends to join iVote4U.

1. Politician Action Panel elements:

1. Become a certified constituent to make politicians listen.
2. Say Yes-No as a snap indicator of support.
3. Pledge your vote with a firm calendar commitment.
4. OWN your politicians: pledge to vote in the Primary.
5. Pledge money to your favorite politicians.
6. Form a powerful voting bloc supporting a Facebook Cause.
7. Send a smiley, a frown or other emotion to your politicians.

Documents and links

Who’s behind the iVote4U system?

The design and vision is provided by the Independence Year Foundation, a Not-for-Profit corporation. The Facebook iVote4U apps leverage the community and connectivity of the world’s largest social network.

The 585+ virtual political jurisdictions are being designed, built, hosted, maintained and supported by the companies who built and support whitehouse.gov: Acquia Inc. and Phase2 Technology. (They can’t and won’t tell you that, but it’s public knowledge)

I have a default action when I run into the absurdity of grand potential limited by unimaginative capital. I haul out my tattered copy of Tom Robbins’ Skinny Legs and All and re-read the best single paragraph ever written on economics:

During periods of so-called economic depression, societies suffer for want of all manner of essential goods, yet investigation almost invariably discloses that there are plenty of goods available. Plenty of coal in the ground, corn in the fields, wool on the sheep. What is missing is not materials but an abstract unit of measurement called ‘money.’ It is akin to a starving woman with a sweet tooth lamenting that she can’t bake a cake because she doesn’t have any ounces. She has butter, flour, eggs, milk, and sugar, she just doesn’t have any ounces, any pinches, any pints.(Skinny Legs and All, 1990)

1. a sequence of words that sound like communication when spoken but are equally meaningless when read backwords or forwards, e.g., in the great history of America rulings there have been rulings.
2. a person who speaks in palindrones, often a person who does no useful work and lives off others.

ORIGIN early 21st cent.: from Greek palin‘again‘ + Old English drān, drÇ£n [male bee,] from a West Germanic verb meaning ‘resound, boom‘ ; related to Dutch dreunen ‘to drone.‘

I’ve been absent from this blog for 2-1/2 months, a gap that once seemed inconceivable to this narcissistic raconteur. In that time though, our team has created 5 potential blogs for me, at the following sites:

1. iYear.US
2. NewGov.US
3. NewPrez.US
4. .govAdvisers.US
5. PeoplePressure.US

They created 5 potential blogs there for you too, since every member at those sites gets their own blogs, which include some nifty blog features that we’ve not seen elsewhere. (“nifty”= old fart for very cool)
It started when we rolled out the Independence Year Project (iYear.US) on June 23, as a major sponsor at the Personal Democracy Forum. Independence Year is the year between the last and next Independence Days, which we kicked off at a fireworks celebration at the East 43rd St. HQ on July 4th. As usual, the display was spectacular, being so close to the Macy’s fireworks barges.

[It's always troubled me that a nation formed to support its citizens' pursuit of happiness celebrates its birth by mimicking combat explosions. Having experienced both sides of combat firepower, I know there's little happiness in the pursuits of a shooter or a shootee.]

The featured guests on July 4th were our partners at Zaah Technologies, Maurice Freedman and Sandy Fliderman and their friends and family. The Independence Year platform and its stunning possibilities are a celebration of the mechanisms provided by Zaah through our partnership to build a new way to transform American governance.

I hope to add to this each day from South Yarmouth, Cape Cod. If so, I’ll try to describe the many ways that the iYear platform routes around politics to implement citizen-managed governance, at every place that such a disturbance might be beneficial.