After a few days here in Austin, I've met a few people worth talking to more than once about issues that Washington needs to tackle properly in order to keep the tech economic engine humming. On the other hand, I've been worried about the lack of overt political awareness of many of the geek types here. Smart people should be more involved and aware, but sadly, we're often not very well engaged in politics if we work in tech, because of a) distance and b) the harsh reality that politics is about people, and tech is about good code. The people who write good code often don't get on well with people who are about people.
That doesn't mean it can't change.
At 11am, I'll have coverage of a panel that's pretty much a mashup of the group from Politics Online, Adam Conner, Patrick Ruffini, Julie Germany, Colin Delaney. Didn't I see them all last week? I guess we get to have a happy fun reunion.
The 2008 presidential have been friending users all over MySpace. And Facebook. And Digg. And about a dozen other mainstream social networking sites. But then the outreach stops. Or does it? Are the campaigns using social networking communities to encourage political participation, or have they become just another form of political advertising? Does having a profile on these sites actually meet the goals of a campaign - winning votes, donors, and volunteers? What about the voters? What do we want? A discussion about the ways in which online social networks are changing politics and whether or not 'authentic community' and 'political campaigning' are mutually exclusive.
Let's hope my WiFi works better today. Next year, I'm packing an AirCard.
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