Just released a new political advocacy tool: MailCongress.org | Hacker News Reader

Just released a new political advocacy tool: MailCongress.org

mailcongress.org

6 pointsbcardarella13 comments

MailCongress.org has been a passion project of mine, finally over the past month I've had the free time to build it. Basically, it gives you the power to send physical mail to your congress people over a web app. I handle the printing, stamping and sending of all the mail.

So there is a cost. $1 per letter and the messages are limited to a single printed page. I am also limited today's trial to the first 100 participants. (I currently don't have the printing hardware in place to scale this yet… but if the response is good I'll invest immediately)

If you guys like, hate, whatever the idea please give me some feedback. Thanks!

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We have a similar (but much better) website in the UK - http://www.writetothem.com/

Enter your postcode and it will give you a list of your local councilors, your MP, your MEPs, along with their party information, and a link to a list of lords. You then click who you want to contact and it gives you a form to fill in.

The contact is free, and via email rather than post, but in the UK that's just as good a way to contact them. They usually respond by post.

I'm not certain how it is in the UK but the US is very different. In fact, most of the email is ignored and used for data collection purposes. (i.e. donation drives)

Hand written letters are very influential. Clearly that is not possible via a web interface. But still an actual physical letter is quite powerful for a US politician.

I've personally only done it a couple of times, and I have received letters in response both times. The general impression I get here is that email is just as good as letters for contacting politicians.

I worked in a Congressional office and email which contains a name and address within the representative's district is treated just like a paper letter.

So, I am a candidate to use this if I care enough but an issue to mail my representatives but either

1. I do not know who they are.

2. I do not have a way to commit my words to paper and mail them to the representatives.

I don't say that there aren't people who will find this convenient, but it seems a narrow market.

The web site takes care of problem #1. And maybe I'm completely misunderstanding you, but it seems like it's entirely about solving problem #2.

@sblom got it right, the site solves both problems. The congress person will know you are a constituent based upon the home address you provide. (it will be on the outside of the letter as the return address but also on the inside under your name identifying you as a constituent)

However, the same problem exists with regular mail. If somebody wanted to provide a bogus home address they could. There is no real way for us to validate you are who you say you are. And there will be some people that have a different billing address and name information on their credit cards than their home address so I didn't want to validate based upon that.

I _love_ this idea--I often want to send a letter to my Congressmen, but am too lazy to actually address an envelope.

Only problem: how do we know that mailcongress.org will actually mail the letters that we pay to have them mail? It's not like we can call our Congresscritters later to confirm that they received them...

The site will send you an email when the letter has arrived. We encourage that you make a follow up phone call.

But I understand the concern. This is the hump I'm trying to get over, trust. All I can say is that this is very important to me and the only way it will work is if the users trust:

1.) Their letters are being sent. 2.) Their correspondence is private.

This is a nice and idealistic idea. But If you actually try mailing your member of Congress, you will find that for the majority of time by far, there will be no response whatsoever. If you do get a response, it will be a canned boilerplate letter that most likely will not address the issue you raised.

Which is why when the letter arrives in their office you'll get an email saying so. You'll also get their phone number so you can make a follow up phone call. Keeping this type of loop is important if you want to get heard.

I suggest you iterate this process a few times, because you'll discover that's not how DC works. Politicians understand money; and view constituents with contempt. Interns answer the phone and assure you they'll "tell the Member your views." If you believe that, I have a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHjPcgb0pZI&t=1m37s

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