[p2p-research] 10 days to go... SUPPORTING Smari McCarthy's P2P Electoral Candidacy for the Icelandic Constitutional Assembly

Thu Nov 18 18:51:38 CET 2010

Smari is it true that this is the Shadow Parliment software you refer
to in the quote in this email?:

https://github.com/rbjarnason/open-direct-democracy

On Thu, Nov 18, 2010 at 11:34 AM, Samuel Rose <samuel.rose at gmail.com> wrote:
> I did it. And if everyone likes what they see, I will post the same
> thing to smartmobs.com
>
> Plus, we'll let the following people know about it:
>
> boingboing.net
>
> Bruce Sterling (for his wired blog)
>
> John Robb on global guerillas
>
> The Espians
>
> perhaps some of those folks would be willing to talk about it or link
> to this on their blog
>
> Smari, do you have a website for your campaign?
>
> Please link to this in twitter, on facebook
>
> On Thu, Nov 18, 2010 at 10:15 AM, Michel Bauwens
> <michelsub2004 at gmail.com> wrote:
>> THANKS simona,
>>
>> smari: we're doing what we can with the material available, but I suggest an
>> english text on your motivation and policy proposals,
>>
>> Sam: would you consider writing something for our regular blog, based on
>> your remark in facebook, which was well formulated I think,
>>
>> sorry, for the moment, still on the road and conferencing!
>>
>> On Thu, Nov 18, 2010 at 1:58 AM, Simona Levi <info at conservas.tk> wrote:
>>>
>>> I'll do my best but i don't have much influence in Icelandic electors.
>>> We will move it in the social network.
>>> I'll also publish it the 25 in Catlan main news agency...
>>>
>>> El 17/11/10 14:48, Michel Bauwens escribió:
>>>
>>> Dear Smari,
>>>
>>> of course, I want to fully support you on this, but I have a serious issue
>>> of timing, I just arrived in buenos aires, somewhat in a crisis mode as
>>> something went wrong with the coordination, no pick up and no reservation at
>>> the stated hotel, I need to solve this today, somewhat stressed you'll
>>> understand, then, tomorrow, there is the keynote and 2 days of conferencing,
>>> it's hard to say how much time I have.
>>>
>>> Most quickly, what I can do is just re-use what you write now, first at
>>> Ning, wait for someone to re-write it with some info about YOU, I can then
>>> always add a paragraph about why this is a truly historical occasion (a true
>>> p2p candidate, broader than single-issue oriented Pirate Party) then we
>>> publish it on the blog, and once it is there, we can repeat a few rounds of
>>> facebooking/twittering around the link,
>>>
>>> If you want us to do more, feel free to ask, we'll try our best
>>>
>>> As I said, for me, it's just bad timing when I'm on the road like this,
>>>
>>> I copied the list, in the hope and confidence that others on the list
>>> agree to support you even more, but I guess best is if you can provide
>>> material we can work around by adding a supportive paragraph,
>>>
>>> Don't hesitate to ask for anything, the worse that can happen is that
>>> people say no thanks <g>
>>>
>>> Michel
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> 2010/11/17 Smári McCarthy <smari at immi.is>
>>>>
>>>> Hi Michel, Simona,
>>>>
>>>>  In reference to our conversation in Barcelona about my candidacy for
>>>> the Icelandic Constitutional Assembly, I'm thinking that it's about time
>>>> to invoke the P2P culture and try and rally some external awareness and
>>>> support.
>>>>
>>>>  What I'd suggest is if we can draft some kind of letter of endorsement
>>>> from the P2P community and get a bunch of signatures, then I could wave
>>>> that around here.
>>>>
>>>>  A slightly more involved but potentially useful thing would be some
>>>> kind of video clip, just a talking heads thing, with somebody speaking
>>>> about the importance of understanding of networked societies and that
>>>> this understanding be incorporated into modern state structure.
>>>>
>>>>  And then of course there's the easiest thing to do, which is to click
>>>> the "like" button on my Facebook page. 97% of Icelandic adults use
>>>> Facebook and various sites are using Facebook ranking as a measure of
>>>> popularity, despite it being an incredibly skewed estimate.
>>>>
>>>> https://www.facebook.com/pages/Smari-McCarthy-a-stjornlagabing/161452417212255?ref=ts
>>>>
>>>>  Michel, could I request that you take initiative on this on the list?
>>>> I can provide you with background information but I do feel very awkward
>>>> about asking people to support me. :P
>>>>
>>>>  Here's some initial background [sharable]:
>>>>
>>>> ----------------------
>>>>
>>>>  In 1874 Iceland received its first constitution from the Danish king
>>>> as a result of popular demand for increased home-rule. In 1918 the
>>>> country became sovereign under the Danish crown, and in 1920 a new
>>>> constitution to this effect was enacted.
>>>>
>>>>  In 1944, after being disconnected with Denmark for over a year,
>>>> Iceland proclaimed independence. A temporary constitution, mostly based
>>>> on the constitution of 1920, was accepted, with an article stating that
>>>> it should be renewed within the year.
>>>>
>>>>  Now 66 years have passed without the constitution being reevaluated.
>>>>
>>>>  After the financial crash of 2008 the Icelandic people, understanding
>>>> the need for democratic reform as well as economic reform, started to
>>>> make demands for a constitutional assembly. After the government
>>>> collapsed in early 2009 the new government coalition of the Social
>>>> Democrat Party and the Left-Green Party agreed to organize a
>>>> constitutional assembly, although for many months this idea looked like
>>>> it would be buried.
>>>>
>>>>  In late October 2009 a national assembly was held in Iceland, where
>>>> 1500 people were randomly selected from the census to work over the
>>>> course of a day to create a new set of guiding principles for Iceland.
>>>> In the aftermath it was decided in parliament that the popular demand
>>>> for a constitutional assembly was so great that the issue could no
>>>> longer be ignored.
>>>>
>>>>  On June 25th 2010 law 90/2010 was enacted creating a mandate for
>>>> general elections for a constitutional assembly consisting of 25-31
>>>> nonpartisan individuals, based on single transferable vote in addition
>>>> to a gender quota rule. The elections for this assembly are to be held
>>>> on November 27th 2010, 10 days from now.
>>>>
>>>>  The electorate is the roughly 228000 voters in Iceland, and there are
>>>> 523 individual candidates running in the election, all as individuals
>>>> although some have known connections with special interest groups,
>>>> political parties, and such. These relationships have been mapped by
>>>> various websites. Various other websites provide filtering mechanisms of
>>>> various sorts in order to help people weed out the best 25 candidates to
>>>> vote for.
>>>>
>>>>  After the elections the assembly will convene in February 2011 and
>>>> operate for 2-4 months during that year to draft a new constitution and
>>>> propose it to parliament, along with suggested adoption mechanisms and
>>>> protocols. If parliament accepts the new constitution it will be put to
>>>> a referendum.
>>>>
>>>>  There has been an alarming amount of P2P activity in relation to this
>>>> election. Campaigns are primarily being operated through social
>>>> networking sites, with a lot of pressure on candidates not to advertise
>>>> in traditional media. A lot of individuals and organizations have been
>>>> in direct contact with the various candidates in order to provide their
>>>> own arbitrary filters, and in general there is a lot of buzz, but also a
>>>> lot of uncertainty, as the number of candidates and the equidistribution
>>>> of the attention is the source of great confusion.
>>>>
>>>>  To reduce this confusion somewhat and to promote the elections as an
>>>> important step towards more direct democracy, a broad coalition of
>>>> candidates from various political leanings has joined forces to raise
>>>> awareness about the forthcoming elections, operating on amicable
>>>> grounds, and further, there are discussions about creating a "shadow
>>>> assembly" using the Shadow Parliament Project's software and
>>>> organizational mechanisms, in order to facilitate broad discussions
>>>> amongst the general public during the operation time of the assembly.
>>>>
>>>>  In short, it looks like the opportunity for Iceland is great, but
>>>> there are still a number of hurdles. It will be interesting to see the
>>>> results, and hopefully this will lead to a great democratic upheaval,
>>>> promoting and protecting networked societies in the future.
>>>>
>>>> ------------------------------
>>>>
>>>>  Hope you can use some of that in some meaningful way.
>>>>
>>>>     - Smári
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net  - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net
>>>
>>> Connect: http://p2pfoundation.ning.com; Discuss:
>>> http://listcultures.org/mailman/listinfo/p2presearch_listcultures.org
>>>
>>> Updates: http://del.icio.us/mbauwens; http://friendfeed.com/mbauwens;
>>> http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens
>>>
>>> Think tank: http://www.asianforesightinstitute.org/index.php/eng/The-AFI
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net  - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net
>>
>> Connect: http://p2pfoundation.ning.com; Discuss:
>> http://listcultures.org/mailman/listinfo/p2presearch_listcultures.org
>>
>> Updates: http://del.icio.us/mbauwens; http://friendfeed.com/mbauwens;
>> http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens
>>
>> Think tank: http://www.asianforesightinstitute.org/index.php/eng/The-AFI
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
>
>
> --
> --
> Sam Rose
> Future Forward Institute and Forward Foundation
> Tel:+1(517) 639-1552
> Cel: +1-(517)-974-6451
> skype: samuelrose
> email: samuel.rose at gmail.com
> http://forwardfound.org
> http://futureforwardinstitute.org
> http://socialmediaclassroom.com
> http://localfoodsystems.org
> http://p2pfoundation.net
>
> "The universe is not required to be in perfect harmony with human
> ambition." - Carl Sagan
>

-- 
--
Sam Rose
Future Forward Institute and Forward Foundation
Tel:+1(517) 639-1552
Cel: +1-(517)-974-6451
skype: samuelrose
email: samuel.rose at gmail.com
http://forwardfound.org
http://futureforwardinstitute.org
http://socialmediaclassroom.com
http://localfoodsystems.org
http://p2pfoundation.net

"The universe is not required to be in perfect harmony with human
ambition." - Carl Sagan