I just read this great article on deseretnews.com which talks about House Bill 477 which was rushed through at the very end in the hopes that the general public wouldn’t notice or care that they would have less access to government records when all was said and done. Oops.
“The Tea Party Movement, The Scott Brown Senate election, rebellions in Tunisia and Egypt… the 2011 Utah State Legislature. These are recent examples of when 21st-century technologies, combined with traditional media, have irreversibly changed a political trajectory,” says Frank Pignanelli in the article.
Yes! And that’s what so exciting about it. Read on, people! Read on!
Here are some quotes from the article (I encourage you to read the whole thing).
To the surprise and dismay of the news media and government watchdog groups, lawmakers rammed through HB477. The deed was done quickly — planned and executed almost flawlessly to minimize pressure on lawmakers and strike before opponents had time to mobilize.
…
Sure, angry stories and editorials would be written…. But the average citizen really doesn’t care whether a public employee’s text messages are public documents…. So, lawmakers appeared to have won.
Well, not quite. The social media freight train hit them before they could even hold a victory party.
…
Shell-shocked legislators, looking like the proverbial deer in the headlights, wondered what hit them. With surprising speed, the bill was recalled and amended to allow broad discussion and a special session before it takes effect.
The uprising occurred spontaneously, organically. No one really organized it. Even the media lobbyists were in awe, watching in amazement as their cause was embraced in a grassroots uprising that was beyond anything they could orchestrate.
This is what I love about the Internet/social media/modern communication technology: it gives people a voice. Anybody who wants to say something, can say it. The masses aren’t beholden to newspaper editorials to be heard. People can learn, create, organize and act faster and more effectively than ever before in human history – all because of the democratizing power of the Internet.
The political mentality of “Sure, angry stories will be written and there might be a few newscasts, but it’ll blow over because nobody can do anything about it” is gone. Forever. Our representatives must listen to those they represent (crazy, I know), come down from their ivory towers and realize they are no longer isolated in an office, immune from their constituents until the next election.
This is also why net neutrality is such a huge deal (read earlier posts here, here and a longer post in Wired here). If we don’t protect the Internet from telcos, other huge companies and even the government itself, all the democratizing power and freedom that it’s enabled will be threatened.
Image courtesy of karmadude.
