8 ms·

It'd be interesting to see a system where a government had a GitHub and people could submit laws as pull-requests

by pmalynin 12y ago

fineIllregister 12y ago
They do. Type up a bill and mail it to your Congresspeople. I don't see how the medium changes proposing laws.
- jonalmeida 12y ago
  I think the difference is that with a PR it's public knowledge if the government responds/acknowledges/denies the request. It's also easier to type a bill and email it rather than use snail mail (I'm assuming that's what you meant).
  - fineIllregister 12y ago
    You could e-mail a bill you wrote to your Congressman right now. Congress may be out of touch, but they do have e-mail. The transparency angle is interesting, but I still don't think anything would change. Pull requests would be ignored like petitions, or receive canned responses like letters. The primary problem here is not technological.
johnnyg 12y ago
This is a serious and important idea.
- j2kun 12y ago
  Could you explain why? It seems like just as strange a technological barrier (for the average citizen) as the current process of proposing a law.
  - toomuchtodo 12y ago
    The average citizen can use Twitter, which has been pivotal in recent revolutions. The Github/git process and format brings something that is crucial to the political process we've been missing: transparency.
    - alfiedotwtf 12y ago
      And to add, it would be cool to put them in a repo when introduced, see history of where they are amended and by who, and then after they are passed see links beside each passage every time they are referenced in court.
      - toomuchtodo 12y ago
        Also, have the entire thing versioned/archived into the Internet Archive.
  - bdcravens 12y ago
    Probably easier than the current way of directly influencing legislation (for the average citizen)
  - Abundnce10 12y ago
    Imagine if we could analyze a current law (ex. Computer Fraud & Abuse Act) and tweak the parts that are being abused or used in a way that they weren't intended. Or each time a law is added (merged with Master branch) we could see who voted in favor of that law (i.e. greater transparency). Other countries could take our constitution/laws up to a certain point (commit) and then branch off and implement their own approach. There are many ways we could utilize git to improve how laws are created/modified/deleted. Laws are just rules and processes humans have come up with in a best effort to guide society in the right direction, no different than code is just logic programmers come up with to direct servers and clients to interact in a desired way. We've realized the importance of version control in the software realm, it's time to take it's powerful properties and apply it to the political sphere.
vezzy-fnord 12y ago
Has a body of theory, but is still in very early stages: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Government https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Government That said, there would have to be some guarantee of an active political process behind it. Most likely scenario is that it becomes a largely ignored dumping ground, similar to your average petition site.
- gelatocar 12y ago
  I think Open-source governance is pretty relevant here as well: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_governance http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_governance
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
shogun21 12y ago
I would love to use git blame and git cherry-pick!
xux 12y ago
If you look here, he's already doing that: https://github.com/PresidentObama?tab=activity https://github.com/PresidentObama?tab=activity
- Everlag 12y ago
  I'm almost certain that's a bot. See https://github.com/sunlightlabs/us-laws/issues/135 https://github.com/sunlightlabs/us-laws/issues/135
  - jey 12y ago
    And it reveals a complete misunderstanding/misuse of GitHub Issues: the issue is filed after the law has been passed and signed into effect, so the issue is "opened" only after we would have closed the issue, and it appears that it will never get closed.
    - apendleton 12y ago
      Sunlighter here (though this isn't my project). This was mostly done to test our IFTTT channel (https://ifttt.com/sunlightfoundation https://ifttt.com/sunlightfoundation), so I think we were limited in terms of what actions we could trigger. We've talked about doing a non-IFTTT version that would extend the metaphor way further, but haven't (yet) actually made it happen.
    - iancarroll 12y ago
      It's not intended to provide a medium of discussion (at least pre-vote) - it's intended to be a directory of laws. I would assume Issues is only used for IFTTT compatibility.
    - pan69 12y ago
      Sorry, I don't understand what you're saying, are you implying that once a feature (law) has been pushed into production (signed off) there can be no issues filed against such feature?
      - 12y ago
oscargrouch 12y ago
And if you think that we (coders) use it to control a source code, that will be turned into a program, or platform.. Now, if the "source code" is projects, laws, discussions, and once this process reach some goal, this could be "compiled" and the resulting platform would be a full State managed in digital form.. Now imagine all this together with automation, the compiled platform (which is "The State") can launch given its program (legislation) not only a way humans control themselves but how automated systems can help us with that.. I mean besides something like robots, a police car would receive the new "program", so the cops would abide to the current legislation.. the car could have cameras and detect if crimes or other things happens, according to the program it has, the federal constitution, etc.. this is just a glimpse In a IOT world, a government that had automated all of its platforms, machines, etc.. given a current state of a Government platform, a binary, that could flow and update everywhere, with the current laws
- jsprogrammer 12y ago
  Yeah, let's please not automate the cops, or anything with a weapon.
sebastianavina 12y ago
Only if laws were redacted in org-mode.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
RoboTeddy 12y ago
I bet we'll see this in virtual worlds.
timothya 12y ago
Unfortunately, such a system would be very difficult for U.S. law. See this previous discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3968653 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3968653
fiatjaf 12y ago
The laws would never pass the Travis CI tests.
joeyspn 12y ago
Doable with Ethereum and Smart Contracts..

It'd be interesting to see a system where a government had a GitHub and people could submit laws as pull-requests

fineIllregister 12y ago

They do. Type up a bill and mail it to your Congresspeople. I don't see how the medium changes proposing laws.

jonalmeida 12y ago
I think the difference is that with a PR it's public knowledge if the government responds/acknowledges/denies the request. It's also easier to type a bill and email it rather than use snail mail (I'm assuming that's what you meant).
- fineIllregister 12y ago
  You could e-mail a bill you wrote to your Congressman right now. Congress may be out of touch, but they do have e-mail. The transparency angle is interesting, but I still don't think anything would change. Pull requests would be ignored like petitions, or receive canned responses like letters. The primary problem here is not technological.

johnnyg 12y ago

This is a serious and important idea.

j2kun 12y ago
Could you explain why? It seems like just as strange a technological barrier (for the average citizen) as the current process of proposing a law.
- toomuchtodo 12y ago
  The average citizen can use Twitter, which has been pivotal in recent revolutions. The Github/git process and format brings something that is crucial to the political process we've been missing: transparency.
  - alfiedotwtf 12y ago
    And to add, it would be cool to put them in a repo when introduced, see history of where they are amended and by who, and then after they are passed see links beside each passage every time they are referenced in court.
    - toomuchtodo 12y ago
      Also, have the entire thing versioned/archived into the Internet Archive.
- bdcravens 12y ago
  Probably easier than the current way of directly influencing legislation (for the average citizen)
- Abundnce10 12y ago
  Imagine if we could analyze a current law (ex. Computer Fraud & Abuse Act) and tweak the parts that are being abused or used in a way that they weren't intended. Or each time a law is added (merged with Master branch) we could see who voted in favor of that law (i.e. greater transparency). Other countries could take our constitution/laws up to a certain point (commit) and then branch off and implement their own approach. There are many ways we could utilize git to improve how laws are created/modified/deleted. Laws are just rules and processes humans have come up with in a best effort to guide society in the right direction, no different than code is just logic programmers come up with to direct servers and clients to interact in a desired way. We've realized the importance of version control in the software realm, it's time to take it's powerful properties and apply it to the political sphere.

vezzy-fnord 12y ago

Has a body of theory, but is still in very early stages: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Government https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Government That said, there would have to be some guarantee of an active political process behind it. Most likely scenario is that it becomes a largely ignored dumping ground, similar to your average petition site.

gelatocar 12y ago
I think Open-source governance is pretty relevant here as well: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_governance http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_governance

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

shogun21 12y ago

I would love to use git blame and git cherry-pick!

xux 12y ago

If you look here, he's already doing that: https://github.com/PresidentObama?tab=activity https://github.com/PresidentObama?tab=activity

Everlag 12y ago
I'm almost certain that's a bot. See https://github.com/sunlightlabs/us-laws/issues/135 https://github.com/sunlightlabs/us-laws/issues/135
- jey 12y ago
  And it reveals a complete misunderstanding/misuse of GitHub Issues: the issue is filed after the law has been passed and signed into effect, so the issue is "opened" only after we would have closed the issue, and it appears that it will never get closed.
  - apendleton 12y ago
    Sunlighter here (though this isn't my project). This was mostly done to test our IFTTT channel (https://ifttt.com/sunlightfoundation https://ifttt.com/sunlightfoundation), so I think we were limited in terms of what actions we could trigger. We've talked about doing a non-IFTTT version that would extend the metaphor way further, but haven't (yet) actually made it happen.
  - iancarroll 12y ago
    It's not intended to provide a medium of discussion (at least pre-vote) - it's intended to be a directory of laws. I would assume Issues is only used for IFTTT compatibility.
  - pan69 12y ago
    Sorry, I don't understand what you're saying, are you implying that once a feature (law) has been pushed into production (signed off) there can be no issues filed against such feature?
    - 12y ago

oscargrouch 12y ago

And if you think that we (coders) use it to control a source code, that will be turned into a program, or platform.. Now, if the "source code" is projects, laws, discussions, and once this process reach some goal, this could be "compiled" and the resulting platform would be a full State managed in digital form.. Now imagine all this together with automation, the compiled platform (which is "The State") can launch given its program (legislation) not only a way humans control themselves but how automated systems can help us with that.. I mean besides something like robots, a police car would receive the new "program", so the cops would abide to the current legislation.. the car could have cameras and detect if crimes or other things happens, according to the program it has, the federal constitution, etc.. this is just a glimpse In a IOT world, a government that had automated all of its platforms, machines, etc.. given a current state of a Government platform, a binary, that could flow and update everywhere, with the current laws

jsprogrammer 12y ago
Yeah, let's please not automate the cops, or anything with a weapon.

sebastianavina 12y ago

Only if laws were redacted in org-mode.

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]

RoboTeddy 12y ago

I bet we'll see this in virtual worlds.

timothya 12y ago

Unfortunately, such a system would be very difficult for U.S. law. See this previous discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3968653 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3968653

fiatjaf 12y ago

The laws would never pass the Travis CI tests.

joeyspn 12y ago

Doable with Ethereum and Smart Contracts..