The challenge of crowdsourcing policy and feedback

Personal Democracy Forum’s Techpresident posted an interesting video in which White House Science and Technology Officer Beth Novak makes the point that new media has been great for getting the message out there, but poses the question, “How do we crowdsource feedback and input in a way that’s manageable?”

DA launches new interactive website

On Monday, the DA launched a new online initiative – The Silent Majority. It makes use of video (many thanks to MyVideo for providing us with a customised player), photographs and sound recordings to tell stories about the real life impact of policy decisions and implementation (or lack thereof). As you can read on the site’s ‘About’ page, it is “designed to bring to the fore stories and issues concerning those South Africans who do not usually have a voice in the mainstream media.”

Tip O’Neill, Speaker of the US Congress between 1977 and 1987, once famously said “All politics is local.” The Silent Majority seeks to illustrate that by telling local stories about the lives and experiences of people on the ground, rather than just looking at national politics, the ANC or the government.

“It is this gap, between the national and the local, between the general and the specific, and between the promises and the practical reality, that The Silent Majority will explore.”