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Kansas Nerd Uses Net To Shake Up Political Fundraising

Posted by kdawson on from the will-it-still-work-once-everybody-is-doing-it dept.

ghostlibrary sends a note about Sean Tevis, an information architect in Kansas, who is running for state representative with the help of an xkcd lookalike cartoon and grassroots Net-based fundraising. Tevis had garnered more than 6,000 contributions, most of them small, from around the country, far out-fundraising his opponent. Major news outlets have picked up the story as a harbinger of 21st-century Net-based political campaigning. Reader ghostlibrary adds, "As a bonus, Tevis cites xkcd intentionally (rather than just ripping it off without crediting it) and, well, it's actually funny."

13 of 179 comments (clear)

  1. Results of the election by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    "Strangely, he won the election with a +5, Insightful."

  2. How about some links? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    How about some links to the guy?

    Tevis' website and the comic in question should get most people started.

  3. Saw this last week... by fitten · · Score: 4, Insightful

    and donated even though I don't live in his state and I typically don't vote Democrat (don't vote Republican, either). We need new blood in political office... people who are a little more 'in' with technology, etc.

    1. Re:Saw this last week... by dattaway · · Score: 4, Funny

      I live next to State Line Road on the Missouri side. Kansas needs all the help they can get! I donated to keep the grass greener over there!

    2. Re:Saw this last week... by mhall119 · · Score: 5, Funny

      We need new blood in political office... people who are a little more 'in' with technology, etc.

      Great, then we'll just have them wasting time filibustering measure to declare Vi better than Emacs, or KDE better than Gnome.

      --
      http://www.mhall119.com
    3. Re:Saw this last week... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      Oh get real. What kind of an idiot would put someone in office who uses Vi or KDE? I mean give me a break.

  4. Re:breaking news! by Captain+Splendid · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Once again, /. is right there, breaking news, reprinting from Digg 3 weeks late.

    Seriously, this is a month old. I gave him $10 back in July.

    Anybody who comes to /. for the "scoop" is an idiot. What you come here for is the discussion with fellow geeks.

    You must be new h- *checks UID of parent* -you really ought to know better by now.

    --
    Linux, you magnificent bastard, I read the fucking manual!
  5. Why? by xZgf6xHx2uhoAj9D · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I still have no idea why anyone would give this guy money or vote for him. Is it just because he's a nerd?

    Let's look at his education policy. Apparently his entire platform on education is "we should have the best schools". How would he go about making that happen, you ask? Why it's simple! By making sure they're the best, of course!

    1. Re:Why? by Meshugga · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Exactly.

      Also, an eye-opener was, that that same guy originally had some weird attitude about immigrants, a la "american jobs only for american people", which he switched, when a huge cryout from the /. rolled over him...

      And I really think he already was mentioned on /. some time (weeks-months) ago, at least I recall a particular cartoon, that with the 20$ thing.

      Please chaps, please think twice before giving a guy money just because he is "from the internets".

      And please stop political advertising on /., it really sucks, no matter who it is.

    2. Re:Why? by ShadeOfBlue · · Score: 5, Insightful

      While I haven't donated, I say give the guy a chance. Has he thought everything through? Probably not, but our political system is filled with the merely ignorant to the truly cretinous caricatures or corruption. If he wins I'll be interested in following his story, see how an outsider does.

      Or to put it another way, do we have good reason to put much faith in this guy? No, but we have a whole lot of reasons to not put any faith in the other guys.

  6. View Source by zerocool^ · · Score: 4, Interesting

    View page source (on his xkcd-style ad) for a hidden message to geeks.

    --
    sig?
  7. Wait, you're telling me... by Legion_SB · · Score: 5, Insightful

    ... someone running for a state representative spot isn't posturing as having the answer to every single problem?

    This is a problem with politics. What we need in government are people who know a lot about certain fields, who are willing to listen to others who know a lot about other fields.

    Instead, as the parent post so painfully illustrates, what we as voters do is vote for the people who claim to have ALL the answers. And guess what? The ones who claim to know the answers to everything are the ones who don't know crap about anything.

    --
    'a';DROP TABLE users; SELECT * FROM DATA WHERE name LIKE '%'... if you're reading this, it didn't work.
  8. Thanks for all your comments by seantevis · · Score: 5, Informative

    We've been on a few sites, but making it onto /. is something special.

    Running for state rep means earning the trust of many voters in a few short months. Word of mouth goes a long way, but voters can't be reached effectively by email. The net's contributions make it possible for me to keep up a full time campaign at five nines while still keeping my day job.

    I decided to run because my current state rep needed to retire. The 15th district needed someone better. I want to show the politicians in Topeka just how much difference a geek can make.

    With your help I got their attention. Keep it up; we plan to show those people the power of technology. Keep checking the blog for updates and new comics.

    -Sean
    sean@seantevis.com