Open Source and Democracy

Picture by Scott Pakulski under Creative Commons License

I was researching a topic that fascinates me: the changes produced by what is called the Open Source Paradigm and I came across this Ted Talk (find link below) that impressed me deeply because, among other things I'm an Argentinian and I'm specially worried about the political model of my country. I was deeply surprised when, in the middle of the talk, shows up an Argentinian lady named Pia who proposes to extrapolate the Open Source concept into politics in order to achieve some sort of Greek democracy, where citizens can vote straight forward the laws that are discussed at the representatives chamber by means of an App. Last year Pia has founded her own political party called: "The party in the Net." (I imagine that they don't rely on big sums of many to found their party so I encourage my fellow compatriots to investigate this new party's platform, what they are doing, etc and spread through social networks or other means if available, should they think that this proposal is viable and can be an alternative for positive change in our country). Personally, after listening to this Ted Talk I don't think that Pia is dreaming of Utopia (though I can easily sense that some adjustments must be needed) You might say that poor Argentinian people don't have usually access to computers. However, if the country continues the path it's following now, soon people will have to spend days buying basic supplies as it occurs now in Venezuela. Instead they can sit a couple of hours a day in the computer parlor whenever it's subjected to consideration the continuation of their own assistance plan. May even participate in the debate and, if not, the representative of "Party in the Net" will be required to compute their vote as if every one of the resolutions that there they passed were a referendum. Here the talk: Listen Now: Open Source World