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> Issues

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• Digital Access policy -- How should the access to Digital media be encouraged while protecting the rights of the Copyright holders and the infrastructure profits.
  
  
  • Copyright -- How can the the Content providers be protected while preserving the Right to Free Use
    
  • Freedom to Link -- Should Electronic references, "http://" links be considered "Fair Use"
    
  • Internet Policy -- How should we control the access and content on the Internet
    
  • Internet Radio -- How should the streaming Internet radio sited be charged and controlled
    
  • Law -- How the laws of the United states are effected by international treaties
  • Spam -- How should unsolicited commercial electronic mail be controlled
    
    
• Federal Budget --How much money should the Government distribute and how it should be distributed.
  
• Palo Alto City Council -- What information is available to help in deciding how to elect local officials. I live in Palo Alto and am investigating how to set up an issue area to deal with the information that one might be interested in collecting for electing our City Council members.
  
  
• Social Security {to be done?} – The social security system will run out of money some time in the future because we are living longer, we have fewer Employees paying for each Retired person, etc.
  
  
• Stem Cell Research {to be done?} – Embryonic Stem Cells may be able to cure diseases in the future, but they are derived from fertilized eggs. Should such research be permitted and funded?
  
• Sudan -- There have been hundred's of thousand's of people killed in the Sudan and so far neither the UN or the US or other organizations have been able to stop this "genicide", An issue page has been opened to consider requesting that George Bush and John Kerry get together to agree on a bi-partison policy and get the US and UN behind such a proposal. -- June 23, 2004
  

Sections of an Issue "Thread"

There will be some procedure for identifying issues of importance. Initially there will be a certain number that can be "formatted" by the staff, and these will be chosen by the staff based on their knowledge and interest. As soon as there is sufficient staff, then the important issues will be chosen by the popular vote of the Users and once an issue is determined to be important, it will be formatted as discussed below. The staff will be responsible for setting up the initial pages, Summary, Discussion Group, etc. and for contacting mediating individuals and special interest sites who will be responsible for running the issue pages.

• Summarize the issue, and update the status and news about the issue.

  Once an issue is chosen as Important to the users of WeMater.com, the issue will be summarized so that the reader can get a first impression as to whether they are interested in it. This should be as much as possible be unbiased.

• Have various special interest sites present their positions on the issue.

  The issue will probably have a number of specail interest sites that have specific positions on it. The most popular ones of these, Pro and Con will be listed, with a short discription of each position, and links off to the sites for further information. {Note: I wonder if the positions should be on the Summary page, with pointers to the sites. In addition, more links will, of course be on each issue's links page}

• Host discussion groups on the issue
  • Develop a set of consensus positions, both pro and con

    There has to be a way that the users can interact to incrase their knowledge of the issue. It is assumed that this can best be done by partially monitored discussion groups, pehaps with one for each of the identified special interest groups? The objective of these is to deepen the knowledge of the users, assist the special interest groups in developing their arguments Pro and Con, and come up with a set of proposals that can then be voted upon and will inform the legislators who have to make law on the issue.

• Take polls on these consensus positions,
  • Inform the representatives about the results of the polls and discussions.

    Once there are a few consensus positions, then the Users {and visitors} of the site can vote to indicate what their position on the issue is. Associated with the vote will be an identity, for statistical purposes, of each user, so that we can adjsut the site, as much as reasonable, to reflect the population of the US, and various sub groups. It is hoped that this adjustment will lead to making the results more useful as the Users will be permitted to vote only once, and the vistors will be required to validate themselves, E-mail address?, to prevent mass single person voting. In addition, the Users will have registered their groups so that, for example, if twice as many republicans vote, then the resulting poll will note that, and have adjusted figures that are as reasonable as possible reflections of the US voters.

• Maintain records of the representatives actions and candidates positions.

  Once the Representatives, or Candidates, know the position of the Users, and thus a groups of US citizens, they can express their positions on the issue as well as having their position, when it is reflected in action, maintained on the site. The users will be able, via a profile, to recover these positions and actions, and thus compare the Representatives and Candidates based on the importance they place on various issues.

• Provide a more extensive set of links to sites interested in the issue.

June 24, 2004 2:38