[Open-Legislation] [Mempol2] PoliticalMemory 2.0 - Hackathon #1 - Feb. 24th (6PM) to Feb. 26th - IRL & IRC]

Thu Feb 17 11:00:13 UTC 2011

Here are some political memories of mine :-)

The first version of MEP tracking I know of was created by Hartmut Pilch (FFII) and was called Knecht. It also had activist annotation and relations functions ("in order to optimize, promote and keep track of their actions"). As far as I know it was written in lisp. It did not work very well, but most pretty straight forward stuff you needed was there.

Further, the creation of voting lists and the scripts for ranking of amendments and results was (to my knowledge) first created by Gibus and Jonas (also FFII at the time). There should be stuff around from swpat 1st reading 2003. Here's data retention from 2005:

http://people.ffii.org/~jmaebe/dataret/plen1/votinglist%20EDRI-FFII-PI%20final.pdf

Indeed tools are needed to monitor what's going on in the Black Box of Brussels. But as one behind creating "the score" in some of the dossiers internet activists have been working on, I'd say there also needs to be a lot of transparency in who, how and why certain amendments get certain weights when building the over all score.

Simply put, activist groups using MEP ranking should also spend time on explaining how the ranking was construed. So for the workshop I'd include that as a necessary feature - some kind of platform to facilitate discussion, knowledge exchange and understanding to be able to justify "the score" in a straight forward manner.

//Erik

On 02/16/2011 11:37 PM, stef wrote: 

	hey, if you know of any pythonistas being available on irc or in paris at that
	time, pls urge them to join us. this will be very useful in defending our
	internet.

	On Wed, Feb 16, 2011 at 09:29:02PM +0100, Jérémie ZIMMERMANN - La Quadrature du Net wrote:

		Thanks for forwarding this message as widely as possible among your cool
		hacker networks!

		English page:
		http://www.laquadrature.net/wiki/Hack-a-thon1_Political_Memory_2.0

		French page:
		http://www.laquadrature.net/wiki/Hack-a-thon1_Memoire_Politique_2.0

		*** INTRO ***

		Political Memory, (aka "MemoPol") is a project created by La Quadrature
		du Net to achieve the following goals:

		* Provide a framework for political activists in order to optimize,
		promote and keep track of their actions (initially defending free speech
		and other fundamental freedoms online).

		* Provide citizens an accurate view of their political representatives'
		(PRs) actions in parliaments and assemblies.

		* Raise the political cost of taking bad decisions for representatives
		by attributing good and bad points.

		In a nutshell: We collect official data about political representatives.
		Public votes and decisions are used to compute a score, and this score
		allows us to do a a lot of interesting things:

		* Rank PRs according to your political goals and issues,

		* Point out discrepancies between who talks the talk, and who actually
		walks the walk ,

		* See trends among groups of PRs and individual members of parliament,

		*** WHAT, WHO? ***

		Political Memory 2.0 is a complete rewrite of the previous Political
		Memory tool (originally based on perl scripts outputing mediawiki
		pages). It is now composed of: Django, CouchDB, Various set of scripts
		(in bash, python, perl), HTML, CSS and JS for the frontend

		We are looking for smart cool people skilled in those fields!

		You can get the current version at https://github.com/stefanp/memopol2

		*** HACK-A-THON? ***

		We are organizing a two-day IRL and on-line gathering to achieve the
		following goals: - Present the exisiting project to new potential
		contributers. - Decide on the roadmap and task lists. - Settle on best
		practices and developments guidelines - Push the ongoing developments as
		far as we can. - Design interface and other aspects. - Drink beer
		together (or remotely)

		*** WHEN? WHERE? ***

		From Thursday 24th of February 6PM (Paris time) to Saturday 26th of
		February, until energy lasts. We'll provide internet connectivity (bring
		your laptop!) and follow the event on IRC.

		So far, the detailed program is the following:

		* Thursday 24th, 6PM - ... / Octopuce (29, rue Merlin, 75011 Paris) /
		*core-contributers gathering* (limited space, *send an email before
		coming* contact @ laquadrature.net; come if you know the project already
		and intend to commit) : decisions on key design issues and roadmap

		* Friday 25th, 10:00AM - Saturday 26th / Le Loop (very cool Hacker Space
		on the 4th floor of squatted building 40 rue René Boulanger (M°
		République) 75010 Paris / Continuous hacking: programming, webdesign,
		testing and moar!

		* Friday 25th, 6:30PM - 8:00PM / Le Loop 40 rue René Boulanger, 4th
		floor / Short introduction to Political Memory for new contributers +
		use cases from an activist perspective (@jerezim from @laquadrature) +
		discussion with initiators and core-contributers

		You can participate to the whole event via IRC on channel #lqdn-travail
		on irc.freenode.net (or via our web interface: http://lqdn.fr/chat)

		In case of you need anything, you can reach Mat on +33 6 634 634 91 or
		write to contact at laquadrature.net

		*** FAQ ***

		* Shall I bring beer?

		No, we will provide beer, wine, croissants and coffee \o/

		* What shall I bring?

		A laptop if you have one (spares will probably be available), and
		anything you need to feel comfortable (blanket, club mate, trip glasses,
		etc. ;)

		* I know so little, how can I be sure my contribution will be helpful?

		Any help from motivated people can be helpful! Just come over! In doubt,
		you can talk to us over IRC before doing so, we'll convince you! ;)

		* I would love to come in order to usefully contribute, but I cannot
		afford the travel. Ain't life a bitch?

		Yes it is indeed, and then you die. But we may help by refunding your
		travel expenses! Just contact us

		* I have other questions about Political Memory 2.0 or the organizing of
		the event?

		You can ask them on our IRC channel: #lqdn-travail on irc.freenode.net
		(or http://lqdn.fr/chat) or on our mailing-list:
		https://laquadrature.net/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/mempol2 or by writing
		to contact at laquadrature.net

		-- 
		---  La Quadrature du Net ------- http://www.laquadrature.net
		---  Co-founder, spokesperson --- Twitter/Identi.ca: @jerezim

	---end quoted text---

-- 
Erik Josefsson
Adviser on internet policies
Greens/EFA Group
GSM: +32484082063
BXL: PHS 04C075 TEL: +3222832667
SBG: WIC M03005 TEL: +33388173776

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