Ask HN: How do we change things? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: How do we change things?

4 pointsanthonycerra6 comments

Members of this community are pretty good at changing the way we interact with the world on a daily basis. Some really cool things have come out of asking "How can this be better?". You already have changed the world for the better.

As I read the recent post about net neutrality I got to thinking about our roles and interactions with government. I realized that not much has changed despite the surge of Internet users over the last decade. Our candidates are still spoon fed to us. Decisions are not made with the best interest of constituents in mind. And despite services like Facebook and Twitter many of us feel like we don't have a voice. This observation applies both to national and local politics. There has to be a better way.

So my question to the smartest people in the room is, how can this be better? Do we make a Groupon for causes (Groupon's original business) and showcase one injustice a day? Do we create a Facebook for aspiring politicians and level the playing field for those who want to get into public service? We did that for business, why not extend that to politics?

How can we change things?

Please keep the comments free of party biases. Only the Sith deal in absolutes =)

1) There is no We.

If you want to change something, then it's up to you to do it. It's hard work, but it can be done. Plus, we will never agree with you (because there is too big a range of views to ever be put under a name like we).

2) You are very wrong about the change that has happened.

In the 2004 election Howard Dean was the early favorite for the Democratic primaries because of his huge internet following. In the 2008 election Barak Obama won the democratic nomination and the presidency on a campaign mostly financed by individual donations over the internet. In the 2010 mid-term elections Tea-Party backed Republicans won a huge number of seats based on the Tea Party organizing support on the internet.

3) Change happens in the small. If you want to change everything, find one, small, specific thing and work at it every day until you change it. You'd be surprised at how much else you'd change along the way.

"our roles and interactions with government. I realized that not much has changed despite the surge of Internet users over the last decade." --> a variety of inefficiencies that will be corrected one of these days...maybe by a number of us?

" Decisions are not made with the best interest of constituents in mind. " think about the polling systems that are still in place. they call up landlines -- LANDLINES! the only people that are being sampled are our grandparents...

"And despite services like Facebook and Twitter many of us feel like we don't have a voice. " government hasn't exactly integrated social software/services. one of these days...

"So my question to the smartest people in the room is, how can this be better? " i think one of the biggest issues is the epidemic of groupthink/influence that is plastered all over politics. if opinions were submitted behind an anonymous software, i think a lot of the problems would be mitigated.

we've actually got the chief of staff for the majority WHIP in GA approaching his government friends about leveraging our ranking software to address many of the issues you mentioned. happy to speak more about it with you outside of HN as we're just beginning to explore the space & the potential impact.

-adam

How can we change things?

You cannot change anything until you understand the cause of your problems.

The structure of political systems determines the range of possible outcomes. We have a political system that structurally has an unusually large number of veto points (compared to similar western nations). The result is that change is slow and the system is resistant to external forces. In addition, we have a system that systematically overrepresents the interests of rural counties.

There is a relatively "easy" way to fix the second problem: states with large populations should start splitting into multiple states. But due to status quo bias such "simple" changes are unlikely to ever happen. Fixing the veto points problem is harder still: it is wired into the fabric of American governance.

Technocracy. I'm not convinced that politicians, bankers, and lawyers can solve the problems our society will face in the coming years. The problem is, things haven't gotten bad enough for true change to be possible. They just keep kicking the can down the road.

Things won't change until everything collapses. The system has accumulated far too much cruft, and needs rebooting.

I may be a bit overly cynical. http://i.imgur.com/zP5fa.jpg

Open source and decentralize two of civilization's greatest responsibilities: governance and economy.

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