[Reporting on Nature 2.0] Team Momentum wants to save democracy by replacing elections with expressive signage
If you think of it, democracy is weird. Maybe Winston Churchill was right when he stated democracy is the worst form of government except for the other forms that have been tried from time to time. And yes, every four years representative democracy forces you to choose between the red, blue, green or grey. One vote in an ocean of millions results in voting apathy. People get cynical and believe their vote does not make any difference. Not in terms of quantity nor in terms of quality: will my representative make happen what he stands for anyway?
Political campaigns come in like crushing rollers. These days, they put more effort in dividing people than trying to sell a project that is so intelligent, visionary and attractive that it unites people. Especially today, peoples opinions are influenced by a cocktail of fake news, social media algorithms, neuromarketing, spin, framing strategy, etc…
It is sad that political content is no more about truth. It limits to what works
Team momentum is part of the ‘Giveth’ network that spread its teams over several tracks in the Odyssey hackathon. What they have in common is their quest for new systems in the future of supporting purposes (think charity, good causes) and decision making.
A mix of technology and direct democracy results in ‘values as signage’
A part of our democracy’s fix might be another way of capturing values. Imagine voting means that you opt inn with a signal. This signage is always-on, not static, but dynamic as it is continuously interpolated over time. This way we reduce emotion and impulsive hick-ups caused by political campaign guerilla techniques, scandals, framing, etc… The system keeps track of where you stand for in the long run. It will keep track of the people who share the same values until a certain threshold is achieved. If achieved, an agenda point is ready for execution. If not, the system waits for the right amount of backers without the existing volume gets lost.
