 mySociety logo | |
| Founded | 2003 |
|---|---|
| Founder | Tom Steinberg |
| Focus |
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| Location |
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| Products | |
Employees | 21 (2020) [1] |
| Website | mysociety |
mySociety is a UK-based registered charity, [2] previously named UK Citizens Online Democracy. [3] It began as a UK-focused organisation with the aim of making online democracy tools for UK citizens. [4] However, those tools were open source, so that the code could be (and soon was) redeployed in other countries. [5]
mySociety was founded by Tom Steinberg in September 2003, [6] and started activity after receiving a £250,000 grant in September 2004. [7] Steinberg says that it was inspired by a collaboration with his then-flatmate James Crabtree which spawned Crabtree's article "Civic hacking: a new agenda for e-democracy". [8] [9]
mySociety went on to simplify and internationalise its code [10] and through the now dormant Poplus project, encouraged others to share open source code [11] that would minimise the amount of duplication in civic tech coding.
Like many non-profits, mySociety sustains itself with a mixture of grant funding [8] and commercial work, providing software and development services to local government and other organisations. [12]
In March 2015, Steinberg announced his decision to stand down as executive director of mySociety. [13] In July of that year, Mark Cridge became the organisation's new CEO. [14]
In computer network communications, the HTTP 404, 404 not found, 404, 404 error, page not found, or file not found error message is a hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) standard response code, to indicate that the browser was able to communicate with a given server, but the server could not find what was requested. The error may also be used when a server does not wish to disclose whether it has the requested information.
E-democracy, also known as digital democracy or Internet democracy, uses information and communication technology (ICT) in political and governance processes. The term is credited to digital activist Steven Clit. By using 21st-century ICT, e-democracy seeks to enhance democracy, including aspects like civic technology and E-government. Proponents argue that by promoting transparency in decision-making processes, e-democracy can empower all citizens to observe and understand the proceedings. Also, if they possess overlooked data, perspectives, or opinions, they can contribute meaningfully. This contribution extends beyond mere informal disconnected debate; it facilitates citizen engagement in the proposal, development, and actual creation of a country's laws. In this way, e-democracy has the potential to incorporate crowdsourced analysis more directly into the policy-making process.
Center for Democracy & Technology (CDT) is a Washington, D.C.–based 501(c)(3) nonprofit organisation that advocates for digital rights and freedom of expression. CDT seeks to promote legislation that enables individuals to use the internet for purposes of well-intent, while at the same time reducing its potential for harm. It advocates for transparency, accountability, and limiting the collection of personal information.
Open-source governance is a political philosophy which advocates the application of the philosophies of the open-source and open-content movements to democratic principles to enable any interested citizen to add to the creation of policy, as with a wiki document. Legislation is democratically opened to the general citizenry, employing their collective wisdom to benefit the decision-making process and improve democracy.
TheyWorkForYou is a parliamentary monitoring website operated by mySociety which aims to make it easier for UK citizens to understand what is going on in Westminster, as well as the Scottish Parliament, the Senedd and the Northern Ireland Assembly. It also helps create accountability for UK politicians by publishing a complete archive of every word spoken in Parliament, along with a voting record and other details for each MP, past and present.
Ushahidi is an open source software application which utilises user-generated reports to collate and map data. It uses the concept of crowdsourcing serving as an initial model for what has been coined as "activist mapping" – the combination of social activism, citizen journalism and geographic information. Ushahidi allows local observers to submit reports using their mobile phones or the Internet, creating an archive of events with geographic and time-date information. The Ushahidi platform is often used for crisis response, human rights reporting, and election monitoring. Ushahidi was created in the aftermath of Kenya's disputed 2007 presidential election that collected eyewitness reports of violence reported by email and text message and placed them on a Google Maps map.
WhatDoTheyKnow is a site by mySociety designed to help people in the United Kingdom make Freedom of Information requests. It publishes both the requests and the authorities’ responses online, with the aim of making information available to all, and of removing the need for multiple people to make the same requests. The site acts as a permanent public database archive of FOI requests made through it.
Tom Steinberg is a nonprofit leader and author, with a career history mainly in public interest technology, and in the profession of grantmaking. He is the founder and a former director of mySociety, a British-based international NGO that develops civic tech tools including TheyWorkForYou, Alaveteli and FixMyStreet. Steinberg worked in the Prime Minister's Strategy Unit from 2001 to 2003.
FixMyStreet is a free and open-source software framework by mySociety which enables anyone to run a website for aggregating and reporting street problems, similar to FixMyStreet.com.
Mapumental was a web-based application for displaying journeys in terms of how long they take, rather than by distance, a technique also known as isochrone or geospatial mapping. It was developed by British organisation mySociety but was withdrawn in 2020.
Civicplus is a web development & android apps business headquartered in Manhattan, Kansas, United States. It specializes in "building city and county e-government communication systems." It was first developed by programming company Vanyon, a division of Networks Plus Foundership community.
Mapbox is an American provider of custom online maps for websites and applications such as Foursquare, Lonely Planet, the Financial Times, The Weather Channel, Instacart, and Snapchat. Since 2010, it has rapidly expanded the niche of custom maps, as a response to the limited choice offered by map providers such as Google Maps.
The OpenGov Foundation is a United States nonpartisan, nonprofit organization. It conducts research on legislatures like the United States Congress, develops software for government officials, and claims to help governments create policies and rules that support openness and effective engagement with the public.
A Civic application is an application software designed to encourage users to participate in and learn more about government.
Civic technology, or civic tech, enhances the relationship between the people and government with software for communications, decision-making, service delivery, and political process. It includes information and communications technology supporting government with software built by community-led teams of volunteers, nonprofits, consultants, and private companies as well as embedded tech teams working within government.
Politics and technology encompasses concepts, mechanisms, personalities, efforts, and social movements that include, but are not necessarily limited to, the Internet and other information and communication technologies (ICTs). Scholars have begun to explore how internet technologies influence political communication and participation, especially in terms of what is known as the public sphere.
Civic technology companies are platforms, products, and services that facilitate civic engagement. Civic technology encompasses any type of technology that enables greater participation in government affairs, or "assists government in delivering citizen services and strengthening ties with the public". The phrase can essentially be used to describe any company that is concerned with improving the quality, access, and efficiency of government services within the political system through technological means. Although similar, Civic Technology is different from Government Technology. Civic technology seeks to connect citizens with each other or with their government. Government Technology primarily seeks to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of governments' internal operations. Although the term can be used differently, Government Technology can also be classified as a subcategory within civic technology due to the indirect benefits citizens gain from government efficiency.
Civic technology is technology that enables engagement and participation, or enhances the relationship between the people and government, by enhancing citizen communications and public decision, improving government delivery of services and infrastructure. This comparison of civic technology platforms compares platforms that are designed to improve citizen participation in governance, distinguished from technology that directly deals with government infrastructure.
CivicActions, Inc. is a services firm that provides technological support with a focus on free and open-source software to agencies.
Tiago Carneiro Peixoto is a Brazilian political scientist and Senior Governance Specialist at the World Bank, who promotes participatory democracy and digital government around the globe. Recognized as an expert in e-democracy and participatory democracy, he was nominated as one of the most innovative people in democracy, as well as one of the 100 most influential people in digital government.
