Slashdot Mirror

It's another election year and it's bound to be one that we will remember, if only due to the changing face of the Internet that has already started with laws like the DMCA and the WIPO. Many of you are rightly worried about which candidate will be the best to vote for in terms of the jobs, the technology, and the freedom we all value so much. So here are a couple of questions from readers who are curious about the arrival of politics on the net, and the political tools both currently available and in development to help online voters make informed choices.

molo asks: "This is the year I will be entering the work force, and I've realized that I need to vote to protect my rights as an American, an individual and a programmer. For that reason, I ponder this question:

Which candidate is better for geeks (and the associated geek jobs and issues)?

There is plenty of political FUD being spread from all sides, and to help you weed through it, here are some links for each of the candidates: Bush on Technology and the New Economy, Gore's High-Tech Economic Agenda, Gore on Technology & Science, Nader on Corporatism, Buchanan's Issues and Browne's Issues (anything relevant on these last two?). While I realize that there are a lot of differences between the candidates, can we try to limit this discussion to geek issues? Its hard to make heads or tails of these guys, and I'm curious what the rest of the community thinks."

RomulusNR asks: "The other day I visited Vote Smart, mainly to do a comparison of Nader vs. Gore (sorry libertarians, I'm a lib'ral) on their opinions on major issues. To my discouragement, I discovered two things while visiting the site. One, is that no major presidential candidate has filled out Vote-Smart's presidential issues test, even after repeated urgings from Vote Smart, high-profile political colleagues, and major SIGs. No, not even Mr. Internet Inventor himself. The other thing I noticed made me think Vote Smart had become thoroughly useless... in that practically every schmo with designs on political attention and the bother to get their names on their state's presidential ballots, is listed on Vote Smart. If VS's list is to be believed, there are about 60 candidates for the presidency as we speak -- about 55 more than I could think of."

I don't agree with the two-party system, but not even the most politically divergent democracies in the world have that many independent parties (at least not with their own candidates). It would be impossible to carry out an election with 60 competing candidates.

Which makes me wonder two things. One, if the Internet allows every schmoe to declare themselves a presidential candidate, will it help the political process? Will it even have an effect, with all those also-rans diluting the third-party pool? Two, if all major (or even remotely viable, like Nader) political candidates are going to simply ignore grassroots Internet 'informed politics' attempts like Vote Smart, what good will they be able to do?"