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Having started someone along these lines, you would need a human element in between the raw data and the emails, translating each bill's name and purpose into h
by cheald 15y ago
Having started someone along these lines, you would need a human element in between the raw data and the emails, translating each bill's name and purpose into human-speak. They are so shrouded in legalese that it's extraordinarily difficult to parse out the intent of many of them, and "bad" parts seem to be very difficult to locate at a casual glance. Even reading over the text of SOPA, it isn't immediately obvious to the layperson why it's a bad bill. The way it reads obscures the truly odious parts of the bill. Were it not for analysis and coverage done by third parties, you and I would probably read SOPA and say "Yup, that's a good idea, upvote".
You'd need a full-time staff of lawyers translating this stuff for the rest of us to make something like that worthwhile/
- sunchild 15y agoActually, many law firms publish this kind of content on their own sites all the time. You could probably arrange to aggregate their content if you properly attribute it.
- cheald 15y agoIf you have any sample links, I would be extremely grateful. I got two days into the project and realized that even if I could get this data to people, they wouldn't be able to understand it. Any remedy to that would be massively appreciated.
- sunchild 15y agoYou'll still have some legwork to do, since every firm publishes them on their own sites, and you'd need their permission to republish them. Here's an example: http://www.pillsburylaw.com/index.cfm?pageid=32&itemid=40233 http://www.pillsburylaw.com/index.cfm?pageid=32&itemid=4... Here's a site that aggregates this kind of content: http://www.jdsupra.com/ http://www.jdsupra.com/
- rgarcia 15y agoGamification! Add a "wtf?" or "what does it mean?" option. Clicks on this would create/increase a community bounty on an objective, concise summary of the bill's impact.
- geekfactor 15y agoIn this respect it would/could be like a Wikipedia for bills.
- DevX101 15y agoThis is a pretty important point. I doubt more than 10,000 people in the U.S. read PIPA and SOPA in their entirety (only a handful of congressmen/women are included in the 10,000) Our reactions to proposed legislation are almost entirely based on the interpretation of a few and signals we take from peer groups. I'd like to see a great summary of every legislation with the following info in VERY CLEAR and concise language: - factual account of what the proposed legislation does/enables - who will love the bill - who will hate the bill - how much will this bill cost taxpayers per year when implemented If we had those 4 points easily accessible for every piece of legislation, it would be a positive thing for our democracy.
- ericd 15y agoI've been idly thinking about making a website that does precisely this. It would take a wide variety of expertise and a LOT of manpower to pull off, though. It would be great to tie this to politicians' voting records as well.
- finnw 15y agoWhether this will work depends on who writes each of these sections. For example if you ask the sponsors of the bill "who will hate the bill" they will always say "terrorists", so the field will not actually tell you anything and will quickly become useless.
- pbhjpbhj 15y agoSounds like the should then be sacked automatically for fraud against the electorate and their position come up for re-election (with them excluded for a term). No, it'll never happen.
- Tobu 15y agoPopVox has an “organisations endorsing” / “organisations opposing” section. It's not as gameable as finnw suggests, except for some misrepresentation: the “US Chamber of Commerce” is a large, extremely right wing lobby, some industry groups don't exactly represent their constituents; call it a start. SOPA: https://www.popvox.com/bills/us/112/hr3261 https://www.popvox.com/bills/us/112/hr3261 PIPA: https://www.popvox.com/bills/us/112/s968 https://www.popvox.com/bills/us/112/s968